Rotterdam Transatlantic

[fabric_fabric]

We are currently on the Rotterdam traveling from Fort Lauderdale to Amsterdam and then on to Norway. My husband and I are both quite disappointed in the cruise. Embarkation was a total disaster taking over three hours. We learned through word of mouth (nothing at all from HAL) that requirements for Europe had changed and everyone needed to be Covid tested at the dock prior to sailing. HAL did nothing to inform guests that embarkation would be delayed due to the testing so there were two enormous lines of guests waiting for testing. In many cases the guests were waiting in the sun with no water for several hours. Eventually the local Sheriff’s department delivered us water. The ship itself is quite contemporary for our taste, but BEAUTIFUL and very clean. The music is phenomenal. Bar staff and all the wait staff does a great job. The food is subpar compared to our prior cruises on various lines. We have not eaten in a specialty restaurant so my comments relate to the MDDR and buffet - the choices are pedestrian which is OK, but nothing is ever hot unless you have it specifically cooked for you. The Dive burgers and New York Deli food is good and arrives hot. Most disturbing for our ongoing trip is that our bed has horrendous vibration at night preventing us sleeping. We are on deck 6 midship in a veranda. Has anyone else had a problem with this? (The room is small but adequate. We also do not like the door opening on the verandah which has no way to remain open in warm weather and is heavy and slams shut.) We have no nightlights in the room! I try to remind myself that any cruise is a good cruise! This is not a ship we will choose in the future especially for Caribbean travel.

Edited April 26, 2022 by fabric_fabric
Add;l info

[albingirl]

Unusual for a midship cabin to have so much vibration.  Go to guest services and request a change.  Yes, the doors do slam but they really don't want you leaving them open since it affects the air conditioning in other cabins.  Sorry you are so disappointed.  I'd give my eye teeth to be on a transatlantic right now.  It's my favorite form of cruising.

[SeaWatch12]

2 hours ago, fabric_fabric said:

We have no nightlights in the room! 

We were on the ship in March in an aft Vista Suite and were very surprised there wasn't a night light in the bathroom. It kind of made it a challenge finding the bathroom during the night. Had to be very careful. Otherwise, we enjoyed the room.

 

[LindaJ+]

Is there an outlet in the bathroom for plugging in a night light if I pack one?

[*Miss G*]

1 hour ago, LindaJ+ said:

Is there an outlet in the bathroom for plugging in a night light if I pack one?

 

I use this LED sensor light I picked up at the dollar store.  It fits in the shaving receptacle perfectly.  (It uses less wattage than an electric shaver.  About 0.5 w)

 

Edited April 26, 2022 by *Miss G*

[fabric_fabric]

A standard nightlight cannot be used in the bathroom outlet.

 

[*Miss G*]

3 hours ago, fabric_fabric said:

 

We also do not like the door opening on the verandah which has no way to remain open in warm weather and is heavy and slams shut.) 

 

 

As @albingirl said, the verandah doors are not to remain open.  It’s been discussed a lot so an explanation will probably be posted soon.  You will have very unhappy neighbors.  I agree you should mention the vibration to your cabin steward or Guest Services.  Sorry to hear you are disappointed in your cruise.

[fabric_fabric]

16 minutes ago, *Miss G* said:

 

As @albingirl said, the verandah doors are not to remain open.  It’s been discussed a lot so an explanation will probably be posted soon.  You will have very unhappy neighbors.  I agree you should mention the vibration to your cabin steward or Guest Services.  Sorry to hear you are disappointed in your cruise.

We always leave the sliding ones open when the weather is nice and have never been criticized or been told otherwise. We do close them if we are not in the room. 

[Wakepatrol]

Please try to get past the embarkation fiasco it was almost a week ago

[RedneckBob]

Oh no. Vibration in your cabin! Sorry to hear this but we had a similar experience on our Rotterdam cruise in late Feb, early March 2022, 14 days

 

We were in Cabin 6052 and there was creaking behind the bed 24/7 or what I call 31. HAL tried to fix three times but no good results. After three days of contract noise we were relocated to Deck 5 with a huge balcony and no further issues.

Edited April 26, 2022 by RedneckBob

[Tampa Girl]

33 minutes ago, fabric_fabric said:

We always leave the sliding ones open when the weather is nice and have never been criticized or been told otherwise. We do close them if we are not in the room. 

 

But now you have been told that the doors are to remain closed and the reason for it.  The fact that no one has criticized or told you otherwise is not an excuse to leave them open - on any ship.

[albingirl]

30 minutes ago, Tampa Girl said:

 

But now you have been told that the doors are to remain closed and the reason for it.  The fact that no one has criticized or told you otherwise is not an excuse to leave them open - on any ship.

As usual, rules for thee....

[RuthC]

2 hours ago, fabric_fabric said:

We always leave the sliding ones open when the weather is nice and have never been criticized or been told otherwise. We do close them if we are not in the room. 

As Albingirl, and others, have said, leaving the balcony door open is not allowed, and now you know. 
When you leave the door open, it cuts off the air supply to all the cabins in your zone, which runs from higher decks to lower. That means the outside and inside cabins below you have no A/C or air flow. This is totally unfair to them. If you want to enjoy the outside air, go out on your balcony and enjoy to your heart's content. 

[rkacruiser]

It's disappointing to keep reading some negative comments from those who have/are sailing on Rotterdam VII.  Cuisine issues?  Tie this to whomever is the Executive Chef on the ship, in my opinion.

 

As far as the issue of keeping one's balcony door open, why aren't people using common sense?  If you had a balcony door that could be opened where you live and your air conditioning is working, would you keep that darn door open?  If so, you must enjoy receiving a significantly higher utility bill than I do!  

[510picker]

For those of you wanting a night light, I bring these battery powered motion lights with us. I stick one on the nightstand drawer face next to the bed. When I swing my feet off the bed, the motion turns the light on. I pull it off before we leave and it works well. 
 

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07PB9Z1ZZ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[flowery]

Fabric- thanks for posting about the subpar, cold food on the Rotterdam. I see you normally sail Celebrity. We think Luminae (dining room for suites) has amazing, delicious food. In the past though, we haven't been that happy with Celebrity's MDR food and several of the specialty restaurants we've tried on Celebrity ships have been mediocre.

We are going on the Rotterdam in order to be with friends who have FCC.

I fervently hope HAL's cuisine is better than Princess's which is truly awful.

 

I would not sail Celebrity during Covid, however, since they are apparently moving guests into Ocean View isolation cabins on low decks. Balconies are reserved for quarantining crew!

 

How are the Covid numbers on your sailing? Where are the isolation cabins? is the captain announcing daily infection numbers?

[*Miss G*]

16 minutes ago, flowery said:

 

I fervently hope HAL's cuisine is better than Princess's which is truly awful.

 

 

Having just got off Sky Princess I can definitely say that HAL’s cuisine is better than Princess.  I did prefer Alfredo’s pizza over HAL’s, though, but HAL’s burger restaurant (Dive-In) has Princess’ Salty Dog beat hands down, along with the Lido buffet and MDR.

[Dunmore2]

Battery powered tea light candles make good nightlights too. I don’t want anything too bright, so I get the yellow tinted ones. They’re cheap enough too.

[Linguist208]

6 hours ago, RuthC said:

leaving the balcony door open is not allowed,

Just curious... where is this stated? I see people say this here a lot, but no one from HAL ever mentioned it. If I hadn't seen it here, we could have easily propped our balcony door open every night.

[thepoint]

We are on this cruise also and definitely agree with you about the quality of the food.  Also, when dining, you are in and out within about 40 minutes.  It is very rushed even when you say that you want to take your time.  The Orange dining room cannot compare with Lumina on Celebrity, nor can the Neptune Lounge be compared with Michael’s Club.   The menu in Orange is the same as the main dining room with one item extra.   The Lido Market has had better quality and selection.  The wait staff, bartenders,  cabin attendants and Neptune lounge attendants are absolutely wonderful.

Our room is comfortable and very nice.  The balcony is large and inviting.  Laundry is returned within 24 hours.    The ship is beautiful and we have heard there is only about 1600 guests.  It would be nice to have a little more variety in the entertainment area.   

[kazu]

3 hours ago, Linguist208 said:

Just curious... where is this stated? I see people say this here a lot, but no one from HAL ever mentioned it. If I hadn't seen it here, we could have easily propped our balcony door open every night.

 

There is a sign right on /beside your balcony door stating NOT to leave it open.

[Caribbean Chris]

47 minutes ago, thepoint said:

 The Orange dining room cannot compare with Lumina on Celebrity, nor can the Neptune Lounge be compared with Michael’s Club.   The menu in Orange is the same as the main dining room with one item extra.  

I agree with you about Michael’s Club which has been a big motivator to book Celebrity suites for us. But as a fan of both companies’ suite dining rooms, I’ve had a better experience post-Covid with food quality in Rotterdam’s Club Orange. 
 

I am not a picky eater but a couple of weeks ago on Constellation in Luminae, lunches & dinners were not close to pre-Covid quality. For example, the steak frites and Luminae burger I’ve enjoyed at lunch for years were tough and gristly. A pasta dish arrived cold (as did others) and dry with minimal sauce. I’m rethinking a future X cruise we booked.

[waiting2retire]

I am also on this cruise and loving my first transatlantic!  I hope I don’t jinx it with just one more sea day to go, but the seas have been very calm, and other than a few showers, the weather has been amazing. 
 

with regard to the food onboard, we purchased Club Orange for the sole purpose of decreasing the price of the veranda cabin we wanted. The bonus has been that the CO dining room has wonderful service and piping hot food. The Dive-In fries are still the best at sea and our Canaletto dinner was delicious. Our Pinnacle dinner was very good but I have to say the quality of the beef was not as good as in the past. Tamarind on tap for tomorrow. 
 

I am a mask wearer. At the beginning of the cruise I would say approximately 40-50% of cruisers were wearing masks indoors. Today it’s more like 15-20%. I think people are becoming more confident as the cruise continues. While there is no way of knowing how many cases of Covid are onboard, I have heard very little coughing, sneezing, or other signs of illness. We are on Deck 4 aft, and it seems both sides of the midship cabins are blocked off. We have noticed very little coming and going from the blocked areas. 
 

any other questions feel free to ask and I will answer if I can. 
 

[Alfisti]

2 hours ago, waiting2retire said:

with regard to the food onboard, we purchased Club Orange for the sole purpose of decreasing the price of the veranda cabin we wanted. The bonus has been that the CO dining room has wonderful service and piping hot food.

 

The CO on Rotterdam is definitely worth it!  Also Sony, Lee, Anne, and Franco are the BEST on board!

[ScoutDiver]

4 hours ago, thepoint said:

 The Orange dining room cannot compare with Lumina on Celebrity, nor can the Neptune Lounge be compared with Michael’s Club.   The menu in Orange is the same as the main dining room with one item extra.  

If Lumina is the suite dining on Celebrity, at least on Edge, Celebrity charges a fortune compared to Holland America.   Celebrity should be over the top with no excuses in these areas.   

 

HAL you are paying for a little nicer/larger suite and a few perks.    Celebrity Suites are competing with Seabourne etc.