Oosterdam's 2019-2020 New Year's cruise; a photo log and a recap after the fact

[SJSULIBRARIAN]

Happy New Year John and the same to your wife. Hope 2020 is good to you both.

[Copper10-8]

59 minutes ago, SJSULIBRARIAN said:

Happy New Year John and the same to your wife. Hope 2020 is good to you both.

 

Thank you Ma'am and same to you and yours! 4 1/2 hrs to go on Oosterdam

[Copper10-8]

So this morning was the weekly safety drill for Oosterdam's crew which would last about one hour. It began with a mass casualty incident in the main dining room complete with a p/a announcement by her staff captain, Adam, (for drill purposes only) requesting any medical professionals (doctors, nurses, paramedics, EMTs, etc) to contact the Medical Dept. to offer their services. It then morphed into an abandon ship drill on the two boats decks, complete with the lowering into the water of all twelve port side lifeboats.

 

Noticed several of the lifeboat helmsmen (helmpersons) to be female - Go Girlpower!, one of which (boat 2) did an absolutely outstanding job getting her boat back in the correct position under "the falls" (the steel wires that attach the boat(s) to the davits) and hooked back up to the blocks, resulting in Boat No. 2 returning to its original position alongside boat deck in no time. Heck of a job! Very impressive drill to watch as a non-involved passenger

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Copper10-8]

Laid up inside Mazatlan's harbor off Stone Island (Isla de las Piedras) was a very interesting small cruise ship, the original Crown Monarch. Built in 1990 at Union Naval de Levante in Valencia, Spain for Monarch Cruise Lines, she has also been known as Cunard Crown, Nautican, Walrus, Havens Star, Neptune, Rembrandt II, Jules Verne, Alexander von Humboldt, MV Voyager, Vidanta Alegra and, since June 2018, as Vidanta Elegant for Vidante Cruises/Grupo Vidante out of Nuevo Vallarta, Mexico. Not sure how long she'll be in Mazatlan

 

 

 

 

 

 

[ozcruizer]

21 hours ago, oakridger said:

Hi Copper10-8.  I'm loving the review so far!

 

Here is a burning question that I meant to ask my cabin steward when I was on Oosterdam three weeks ago........why are all the towel animals now blind (no eyes)???  A couple of days mine did have eyes that appeared to be hand drawn with ballpoint pen on paper.  Anything to do with the minimization of paper like the sugar packets?  Poor towel animals made me feel bad when they couldn't see!!!

 

😪

 

~Nancy

We had blind towel animals on the Maasdam recently, too!

 

[Seasick Sailor]

Nearly 2020 Copper.. May I ask how you get into crew quarters and mess quarters to take those pictures? I would not even know where to start looking for those areas.

[Copper10-8]

7 minutes ago, Seasick Sailor said:

Nearly 2020 Copper.. May I ask how you get into crew quarters and mess quarters to take those pictures? I would not even know where to start looking for those areas.

 

You can't, unless you have a crew I.D. 😉 Gotta go celebrate/Happy New Year!

[erewhon]

5 hours ago, Copper10-8 said:

 

That Aussie wildfire smoke made it across the Tasman Sea to New Zealand?? Take care Phil!

 

The smoke is expected to clear from here by the weekend.

[Alphen]

17 hours ago, Copper10-8 said:

 

So, as you already guessed, the response onboard is that the plastic eyes of the towel animals, along with the (three different) packets of sugar substitutes, and other paper materials, are part of "environmental friendly" measures instituted by the line. As a matter of fact, I learned that, effective tomorrow/New Year's Day, the daily news letter, now named the USA Times, will be discontinued as part of that same policy (it will still be available on line).

 

It remains to be seen how this will effect the still voluminous amounts of invitations, dinner reminders, and sales pitches delivered to our mailbox

I once contacted both HAL and Algemeen Dagblad (Dutch Paper), to express my feelings how nice it would be to have a Dutch paper (Rotterdam based) available, next to the US paper, in stead of the Dutch news available on board that is usually more than 24 - 48 hours old when distributed. Having a Dutch paper, originating in the ships home town available (Rotterdam), would be a nice gesture, but never got a reply from both parties. Shame.

 

Thanks for your logs on both CC and FB, happy new your to the both of you!

Edited January 1, 2020 by Alphen

[rwams]

Bon Voyage and have a great cruise!

[Copper10-8]

8 hours ago, Alphen said:

I once contacted both HAL and Algemeen Dagblad (Dutch Paper), to express my feelings how nice it would be to have a Dutch paper (Rotterdam based) available, next to the US paper, in stead of the Dutch news available on board that is usually more than 24 - 48 hours old when distributed. Having a Dutch paper, originating in the ships home town available (Rotterdam), would be a nice gesture, but never got a reply from both parties. Shame.

 

Thanks for your logs on both CC and FB, happy new your to the both of you!

 

Happy New Year/Gelukkig Nieuw Jaar to you and the family, Jeroen!

[Copper10-8]

Finishing up with the crew drill in Mazatlan yesterday; positioning the boats under the falls so that the two sailors can grab hold of the fwd and aft blocks to hook them up to said boat is not always an easy feat. The female captain of boat No 2 was excellent at it and had her boat back home in no time!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Himself]

22 hours ago, Copper10-8 said:

 

Thanks Father and a Happy and Healthy New Year to you also; stay warm up there in the Windy City!

 

 

Lots of New Laws and Taxes in the Land of Lincoln and in Chicago. Fortunately, the Chicago taxes don't hit Naperville directly but the Illinois taxes do apply.  Over the past half dozen years  over 159,000 people have moved to other states. 

[Himself]

John Thanks for all your posts and valuable you consistently pass on to us.  Is your second career as a security officer on HAL now a thing of the past?

[Copper10-8]

8 minutes ago, Himself said:

 

 

Lots of New Laws and Taxes in the Land of Lincoln and in Chicago. Fortunately, the Chicago taxes don't hit Naperville directly but the Illinois taxes do apply.  Over the past half dozen years  over 159,000 people have moved to other states. 

 

Sounds like California! 😉

[Copper10-8]

So no matter how many times you’ve been here, Mazatlan’s harbor is by no means pretty and/or picturesque since it is principally a fishing, shrimping and commercial port. As a matter of fact, it’s Mexico’s primary port for those activities on its Pacific coast. So, once docked, all you see is large warehouses, shipping containers and a whole lot of concrete.

 

At around 12:30 pm, we went down to the gangway on A-Deck and picked up a complimentary shuttle (two open air carts with benches on top, pulled by a little tractor) that takes pax from the cruise ship(s) to the terminal building where a bunch of shops are set up both in and outside. Once off the shuttle, it’s kinda like walking a gauntlet with vendors, private tour guides and cab drivers trying to get you to go with them.

 

We decided to take a cab to the Zona Dorada (Golden Zone, the tourist area), usually about a 25 min drive for U.S. $12 one way. Cabs, at least still most of them, in Mazatlan are called Pulmonia’s. Mazatlan is known for them. They are basically an open windowed taxi, the size of a dune buggy with a roof, painted white with a Volkswagen engine under the hood. They are known as “Pulmonia’s” because when it gets cold, you can get a good case of pneumonia from riding in the back of them! There was drizzle and light rain forecasted for the PM so instead of an open air Pulmonia, we hopped into a more traditional Nissan Versa.

 

We asked the cab driver to take us to a good restaurant. it helps when your wife speaks fluent Spanish, and ended up at Restaurante y Pasteleria Panama, a family restaurant and bakery on Avenida Camarón Sábalo where 99% were locals. Pretty sure we were the only Gringos eating there today! Located on the main street in the "Gold Zone." The menu is in Spanish only so you better bring a translator or your smartphone. The food turned out to be good and the cost reasonable. Being also a bakery, the staff comes by each table with a cart loaded up with huuuge postres y dulces but we decided not partake in that feast 

 

 

 

 

[Copper10-8]

19 minutes ago, Himself said:

John Thanks for all your posts and valuable you consistently pass on to us.  Is your second career as a security officer on HAL now a thing of the past?

 

Currently on a leave of absence, Father

[lazey1]

I was on the Oosterdam for the Thanksgiving cruise and will be on her again coastal cruise at the end of April with my friend Kakalena.  I am loving your log and your photos, and I hope to someday meet you in person. I am very glad to hear that the problems aboard have apparently been corrected during the extra day (s) in San Diego.  

[Copper10-8]

Mazatlan, Sinaloa has a total of two Starbucks stores. We passed by one in the taxi and found the second after lunch via our GPS and guess what they also had in Mexico? A touch of Holland/The Netherlands 😉 You grow up with stroopwafels when you live there! Life is bueno! 

 

 

 

 

😊

 

 

[summer slope]

I remember the first time I bought Starbucks in Mexico and saw the $77 charge.  I couldn't wait to open the CC bill when we got home to make sure it was exchanged. 😁

[madera1]

Happy New Year and thank you for your posts.

[the2ofus]

Good to know about the Indonesian Lunch.  I always look forward to it.  Hope I can find it on the Nieuw Statendam over the next two weeks.

 

[the2ofus]

On 12/31/2019 at 12:33 AM, Copper10-8 said:

On the way out from breakfast at the Pinnacle Grill, we walked by some of Carnival/HAL Master Chef Rudi Sodamin "food faces" (they have them displayed just outside the manager's podium), a series of eight show plates with each culinary plate portraying a work of art - from food. Wouldn't want to consume a meal from them because those eyes would be constantly staring at you 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now that you mention those, I vaguely remember being amused and slightly unsettled by a similar presentation in the Pinnacle Grill on Prinsendam last December.

[the2ofus]

On 12/31/2019 at 2:27 PM, Copper10-8 said:

Heading back to Mum; Miss that old logo with Henry Hudson's 'Halve Maen' and the Bridge has one also, a tree that is 😉

 

 

To my way of thinking, they missed the mark when they removed the Halve Maen.  The logo was more artistically interesting and spoke to the long history of the Holland America Line.

 

[Vict0riann]

Happy New Year, Copper and your DW.  Thanks for a very interesting thread.  

 

On the subject of eyeless towel animals, we also also had them on Koningsdam for 26 days returning from the Med.  I didn’t bring up the subject, as I thought that the ship would probably restock in Fort Lauderdale.  I felt sorry for them!

 

remember these days?