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MS Eurodam - A Cruise to Paradise on a Paradise Ship

cruisetrail

By cruisetrail,
in Holland America Line

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cruisetrail

cruisetrail

Posted
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fk8n52.jpg

 

A brief review of a recent cruise on MS Eurodam.

(Possibly more pictures to follow later...)

Embarkation

Fort Lauderdale.

Terminal 21. Around noon.

 

The easiest ever. It took us a few minutes to complete all formalities and get on the ship.

 

Ship condition

Immaculate for the age (5 years).

 

Ship design

This is a famous ship designed as a classic cruise ship.

The Eurodam offers a full range of amenities one would expect for a classy sea travel.

 

Cabin

Clean. Ready, no wait.

Both stewards were friendly people and hard workers.

 

Food & Service

Excellent.

Excellent everywhere we tried it: MDR, Lido, Pinnacle, Le Cirque.

Even poolside junk food was tempting. But we never touch it on the cruise - too much real food.

 

Pools/Sun decks/Promenade decks/Observation deck/Hydropool & Thermal Suite/Gym/Sports Court

All this well-being complex was excellent as expected.

No crowds.

Tons of space.

Quiet.

Private.

Enjoyable.

A minor complaint - a music band was present in the aft pool area a couple of times. I would prefer to never see and hear them there.

That was a nice group but let them play in the midship pool area.

 

Entertainment

In comparison with the cruise one year ago - what a difference!

The live orchestra is gone.

"Adagio strings" (4 musicians) is now "Adagio" (piano+violin).

Yes, piano is a huge power, but.... the four strings were a part of a live orchestra.

As no promenade deck means no cruise ship, no strings means no orchestra.

Last year we had:

Four full shows (including the introductoty show).

Singers - beautiful voices. Absolutely lovely personalities.

Dancers - sparkling energy, very professional choreography.

And the final note - an explosive live orchestra performance.

 

This time....

Pre-recorded music.

Voices still excellent.

Choreography - cheesy.

And only three full shows (including the introduction).

 

There were guest performers on the Main stage: The BB King Blues Band.

IMO this is not a substitude for a real show.

 

As usual, there was always music or something else on the small stage (Queen's Lounge) and chamber performances in all bars.

 

I would rate last year main show program as 5 out of 5 (unexpectedly phenomenal). This time - 3 out of 5.

Subjectively (to our personal taste) it's 1* out of 5*, so we had almost no entertainment program on this cruise.

 

However, the ship is simply beautiful. So our own entertainment program was not focused on the shows this time.

The art collection on the Eurodam is endless. Every time you find something new. The lack of quality shows gave us more time for sports, sea views, hydropool & thermal suite and.... great food - all that we thoroughly enjoyed on the Eurodam.

 

Itinerary

Grand Turk and HMC - p-a-r-a-d-i-s-e.

There were not much sun on HMC this time, but overall we enjoyed this stop.

San Juan - nothing. Enjoyed the ship and beautiful weather.

St. Thomas - been there many times. Enjoyed the ship and beautiful weather.

 

Overall - absolutely lovely cruise on a first class resort ship.

The only spot was the lack of proper main stage performances.

So technically it's overall 4.5* out of 5*.

 

After the cruise we have nice tan, feel healthier and look younger.

:)

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castle12

castle12

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HAL will probably regard the BB King Blues Band as a rousing success.

 

They created a lot of buzz around the ship. We decided to stop by the Queen's Lounge to hear them for ourselves ... well, hear them is all we could do! The place was packed, standees overflowing into the hallway. We did finally catch them on the Main Stage and very much enjoyed the performance. So did the rest of the audience, who gave them a standing ovation which resulted in an encore song.

 

We spoke to one of the band members the following day. He said they have a four-month contract with HAL.

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kazu "Live from...." Rare

kazu

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Thanks for taking the time to share your experiences with us.

 

Sounds like you were very happy with the ship which is good to hear.

 

Your comparisons of the entertainment were very interesting.

 

Glad you enjoyed yourselves and welcome home!

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brazilgirl "Live from...." Rare

brazilgirl

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Nice review! Thanks! It is so interesting , here on the HAL boards , the Eurodam gets great reviews.

 

If you read many of the recent member reviews , it sounds like an entirely different ship! I am going in July and prefer to believe tge reviews here :)

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DFD1

DFD1

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Thanks for your review. We always enjoy Eurodam. I don't agree with your assessment of the entertainment. IMO, it is much improved with the smaller acts, guest acts, and shorter shows.

 

As far as I can tell, HAL is getting much approval from guests with the new format.

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lvz2cruz

lvz2cruz

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Thank you for your review. We love Eurodam too.

I have a question though. When we cruised in December the CD was JC. Every morning we were awakened to an annoying announcement by him. There were several throughout the day and it was totally not what we usually love about HAL. Of course constant reminders of Bingo. I think he likes hearing his voice. He totally botched the Newlywed Game and was just really bad. When he introduced the show each night if he did not get enough applause, he walked off and came back on "so we could try again".

Is he still onboard?

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cruisetrail

cruisetrail

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Thanks for your review. We always enjoy Eurodam. I don't agree with your assessment of the entertainment. IMO, it is much improved with the smaller acts, guest acts, and shorter shows.

 

As far as I can tell, HAL is getting much approval from guests with the new format.

 

I have to agree with your disagreement because it's a very subjective matter.

 

However, I cannot stress that enough: a live orchestra on a cruise ship is totally different experience.

 

Nieuw Amsterdam Orchestra

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cruisetrail

cruisetrail

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Thank you for your review. We love Eurodam too.

I have a question though. When we cruised in December the CD was JC. Every morning we were awakened to an annoying announcement by him. There were several throughout the day and it was totally not what we usually love about HAL. Of course constant reminders of Bingo. I think he likes hearing his voice. He totally botched the Newlywed Game and was just really bad. When he introduced the show each night if he did not get enough applause, he walked off and came back on "so we could try again".

Is he still onboard?

 

The CD: JV.

He is a handsome man with good manners and a good sense of humor.

Not annoying at all.

We are on the promenade deck in the morning (jogging). We did not hear anything like that there.

Announcements were minimal.

"Bingo" - I don't remember this word at all.

There were no "so-so" jokes when introducing the shows (4 nights).

I need to add that normally we do not participate in so-called "activities".

We mostly enjoy the activities provided by the ship itself: open decks, pools, sports court, gym, spa, various food options, exploring ship's interiors and the art collection.

So we are somewhat less exposed to the situations where we see and hear ships' entertainers.

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Boytjie

Boytjie

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Thank you for your review. We love Eurodam too.

I have a question though. When we cruised in December the CD was JC. Every morning we were awakened to an annoying announcement by him. There were several throughout the day and it was totally not what we usually love about HAL. Of course constant reminders of Bingo. I think he likes hearing his voice. He totally botched the Newlywed Game and was just really bad. When he introduced the show each night if he did not get enough applause, he walked off and came back on "so we could try again".

Is he still onboard?

 

JC had an accident and left the ship prior to our 2/9 cruise, Jason Venner replaced him

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Frankie Sue

Frankie Sue

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We were on the Eurodam sailing Feb. 23. We also really, really enjoyed B.B King..... they were a refreshing, modern change. But contrary to some, we found the food to be the worst we have had on any Holland ships. I could not believe that the main dining room menu repeated after only 3 days. We ended up dining in Tamarind 3 nights to escape the boring main dining room food........ I guess it goes to show that food is a very subjective thing. Otherwise we also really enjoyed our cruise..........

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cruisetrail

cruisetrail

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We were on the Eurodam sailing Feb. 23. We also really, really enjoyed B.B King..... they were a refreshing, modern change. But contrary to some, we found the food to be the worst we have had on any Holland ships. I could not believe that the main dining room menu repeated after only 3 days. We ended up dining in Tamarind 3 nights to escape the boring main dining room food........ I guess it goes to show that food is a very subjective thing. Otherwise we also really enjoyed our cruise..........

 

Hi Sue,

There is a very good method of making the food topic less subjective: attaching actual menus.

Unfortunately I did not excel in that - the ship kept us too busy.

I will try to reconstruct something from the pictures I took.

Any help will be appreciated.

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