Lectures on transpacific cruises

[MUD]

Have booked a 39 day transpacific cruise on the Maasdam. Ships Services, on my behalf, asked the ship what lectures they'd have. The answer was that all lectures are destination related. Does any one have recent experience on lectures on a long cruise?

 

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

[kazu]

Have booked a 39 day transpacific cruise on the Maasdam. Ships Services, on my behalf, asked the ship what lectures they'd have. The answer was that all lectures are destination related. Does any one have recent experience on lectures on a long cruise?

 

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

 

 

We had excellent ones on our TA (collecotors - 31 days) and our Panama

Canal. Embarking on our first Pacific to the South Pacific and hoping for God lecturers. I will be doing a live thread in case it helps. We sail in 30 days God willing.

[rkacruiser]

My most recent long cruise experience was aboard the Statendam in September/October from Seattle to Singapore.

 

The On Location Staff Member provided decent information about the ports that we were to visit.

 

The Enrichment Lecturers were all entertaining, informative, and authoratative. Some appealed more to some guests than others. The topics included World War II history and experiences (given the Statendam's itinerary) as well as scientific oriented presentations on Earth Science topics.

 

A highlight of the entertainment program, one that I have never experienced on any ship of any Company, were presentations on most days at sea by junior Deck and Engine Room Officers and Cadets dealing with navigation and other nautical related topics. If one was interested in such, their presentations and the Q&A sessions after their presentations were highly informative and interesting. I have no idea whose idea it was for such a format to be offered. But, it was extremely well received by us guests. I hope you will experience something like that, if you are so interested.

[Mary Ellen]

We've done two trans Pacific cruises within the past few years. Both times one of the speakers focused on WWII (as previously mentioned). The first time it was a retired Australian General. He was very good with both his knowledge and presentation style. The second time the WWII lecturer was ok, not as good as the previous cruise but not bad either. The other lecturer on both cruises wasn't impressive. The earlier cruise was bad, both in knowledge and presentation. He spoke on a wider range of topics, but was far from an expert in at least one or two of those topics. Since we knew some of his information was just plain incorrect, we gave up attending further lectures as we couldn't trust anything from him. Still, at least from our experiences, the WWII lectures on the North Pacific cruises have been some of the best enrichment lectures we've had on HAL. Too many lectures on cruises these days are really sales pitches. Nothing they've come up to sell with the WWII theme - yet.

 

Several years ago on Princess we started seeing presentations from junior officers like rkacruiser mentioned. At least on Princess they were very interesting and well attended. We've not noticed that type of presentation on HAL, but if they are following Princess' lead with those we'd be interested.

[Hlitner]

When we did a long Pacific Crossing (28 day) on the Oosterdam we had a fabulous lecturer names Alan Wright who spent his life working as an Astronomer (he ran the largest Radio Telescope in the Southern Hemisphere). Alan did 9 lectures and by his 3rd it was standing room only in the main theater. After his final lecture he received a standing ovation (which lasted several minutes) which is something we have never seen on any cruise. We also enjoyed spending some time with Alan and his lovely wife (Hilary) who really enjoyed socializing with anyone who wanted to chat about science.

 

On another long HAL cruise (Prinsendam) the lecturer was another fascinating man named Danny Catt who is a Canadian biologist, naturalist, adventurer, traveler, etc. Danny did pack them in for most of his lectures and was a delight to chat with around the ship.

[MUD]

Thanks for the information.

[AncientWanderer]

We recently (last October) did Trans-Pacific on Noordam, and the speakers were a real highlight of the trip. Alan Wright, the astronomer, was onboard, and it was amazing learning about the southern skies. We also had an historian who gave excellent talks on the islands and the personalities who have explored the region. Really wonderful. Have a great cruise!

[RMLincoln]

We also had Alan Wright on Volendam from LA - Sydney, wonderful presenter. I think there was another lecturer who spoke about more cultural topics. Love that HAL usually has multiple presenters on long cruises. Enjoy, m--

[aliaschief]

Last May on our 36 day Auckland to Vancouver Oosterdam cruise we thoroughly enjoyed many Enrichment Series lectures.

 

Enjoy your cruise.

[OlsSalt]

Two of things I also like best being on HAL ships are the size of their libraries and their long-cruise enrichment lectures. Nothing tops the enrichment lectures we get on "our other cruise line" Voyages of Discovery, but HAL's for the most part are often very good. Occasionally we get a clinker and some I like better than my husband, but I come back from those long cruises having learned so many new things.

 

On a transatlantic cruise one gave a talk on all the BRIC countries who were just starting to become power-houses. He presented both their strengths and weaknesses, and now several years later he was pretty much right on in his projections. He also warned the US need to get a lot more serious about cyber-security which seemed almost alien at the time but lo and behold that was an ounce of prevention now worth a pound of cure. He was not the best of lecturers, but his over all information was top rank.

Edited March 7, 2016 by OlsSalt

[ozcruizer]

Have booked a 39 day transpacific cruise on the Maasdam. Ships Services, on my behalf, asked the ship what lectures they'd have. The answer was that all lectures are destination related. Does any one have recent experience on lectures on a long cruise?

 

Last October on the Noordam to Sydney trans Pacific crossing, there were two lecturers - one a very good astronomer from Australia and a lecturer who gave talks on the history of the Pacific area.

 

Sorry, just saw that someone has already told about the lecturers on the Noordam - Alan Wright was our favourite - I could have listened to him for hours!

 

Edited March 7, 2016 by ozcruizer
Addition