Live! The Grouch on Zaandam, 14 days, Round Trip Boston - Montreal 8/27/22

[whogo]

On Zaandam or not? Passport, Covid vaccination record, Covid PCR or Covid antigen test, ArriveCan, Verifly, HAL Navigator app, air travel chaos, TSA, thunderstorms, and Mrs. Whogo's plane ticket is made out to her her first and middle name instead of her first and last name. How could that happen? How could she not have her last name on the ticket and how could the mistake not have been found until her boarding pass was printed the night before travel? I am admitting to nothing. Will Mrs. Whogo be aboard? Would Mr. Whogo sail without her? Why is he posting this in the middle of the night? This may be a short blog. Stay tuned.

 

[kazu]

Well, I sure hope both of the Whogo’s get successfully on the plane and on the ship. 🤞 

 

Looking forward to your reports and hoping the first one is all worked out well 🤞 

[whogo]

Spent 45 minutes online 'chatting' with Sonya with my thumbs at American Airlines. She said she corrected Mrs. Whogo's name. I showed her that she hadn't. Sonya admitted that she could not change the name and I should call reservations, but did not provide a number. Declined the opportunity to rate her service, you are welcome, Sonya. I will never know if I was dealing with a human or with artificial stupidity.

 

Ten minutes on the phone with Mary was a delight, she was capable and her voice was like a song. She could not correct the problem, said it could be corrected by the desk agent at airport check in. And it was!

 

This was two day ago on Thursday morning. At the desk at 5:20 AM, way earlier than she likes to arise, but Mrs. Whogo was pleasant, the desk agent was a delight and the TSA agents were friendly. The TSA's Nude-O-Scope did not like me, the computer outline of me had a big red dot where a prude would hang a fig leaf on a statue. Actually, it was an embarrassingly small dot. “I'm going to pat you down, sir, any sensitive areas on your body?” I looked at the where the dot was and thought, 'duh'. I explained that yes, I'm a guy. We made it through security, boarded on time, flew around thunderstorms, connected in O'Hare, were served pretzels and cookies and arrived in Boston on time.

 

[oakridger]

Whew!!!    

[SilvertoGold]

Hilarious!  Please continue and have a great cruise!

[whogo]

Received lots of emails from no_reply@hollandamerica.com reminding us of our 11:00(!) boarding time. That is mighty early, with two HAL ships in port. The email subject lines read, "Attn: Leedsb, IMPORTANT NOTIFICATION for..."

 

Leedsb means absolutely nothing to me, not related to my name or Mrs. Whogo's middle name or anything, fear everyone received the same email and we all will be there at 11:00.  Then again, Leedsb may be a HAL secret code warning staff of my grouchiness, our tipping practices, and the unlikehood of our using the spa, casino, or shops.

[JacksGal]

We are on this cruise in two week!  Looking forward to your insights and comedy.  lol  Any daily activity sheets or menu pics are super appreciated.  🙂

[rkacruiser]

16 hours ago, whogo said:

Mrs. Whogo's plane ticket is made out to her her first and middle name instead of her first and last name. How could that happen?

 

American Airlines:  this is the second time in recent weeks that such a thing has happened.  Friends had a flight from CVG to JFK to HEL and discovered that the woman's name was spelled incorrectly.  It took 20 minutes for it to be rectified.  AA blamed their tour company.  Now, with your experience, I wonder.  

[whogo]

Boston

 

Saturday, August 27 Boston, MA 5:00pm

Sunday, August 28 Bar Harbor, ME 7:00am 4:00pm

Monday, August 29 Halifax, NS, Canada 9:00am 6:00pm

Tuesday, August 30 Sydney, NS, Canada 9:30am 5:30pm

Wednesday, August 31 Charlottetown, PE, Canada 7:00am 4:00pm

Thursday, September 1 St. Lawrence Seaway (Cruising)

Friday, September 2 Quebec City, QC, Canada 9:00am 6:00pm

Saturday, September 3 Montreal, QC, Canada 7:00am 5:pm

Sunday, September 4 Quebec City, QC, Canada 7:00am 4:00pm

Monday, September 5 St. Lawrence Seaway (Cruising)

Tuesday, September 6 Charlottetown, PE, Canada 9:00am 6:00pm

Wednesday, September 7 Sydney, NS, Canada 8:00am 5:00pm

Thursday, September 8 Halifax, NS, Canada 8:00am 4:00pm

Friday, September 9 Bar Harbor, ME 7:00am 5:00pm

Saturday, September 10 Boston, MA 7:00am

 

I know what you're wondering. Why would I take such an odd back to back cruise? It's the exact same ports on the second leg. There will be children aboard, school has not restarted. It's too late for puffins, too early for fall foliage. The big selling point was that the cruise leaves from Boston and we'd be able to visit our daughter and son-in-law. We should have scheduled two weeks in Boston and a two day cruise instead of vice versa.

 

Had a delightful time with them. Superior dinner Thursday at Myers + Chang. I was the only who thought Mrs. Whogo's mussels were the winning dish, my fish tacos were the best such ever, the son-in-law's pork dumpling was better than my braised pork belly buns, his noodle dish was terrific and they managed to make my vegetarian daughter's tofu dish delicious.

 

I can't say enough good things about my daughter's choice of a husband. In addition to all elee, he drove us to Salem for the tourist sites. The witch museum was hokey and bizarrely run, checked in with one guy only to be checked in by another who fiddled with stickers to show which group we were in. We were held hostage in the gift shop during an intermission. I told you I was a grouch. Learned that witches were hanged, mostly, not burned at the stake. All done hundreds of years ago so Salem would prosper when their shipping and manufacturing industries died away. Plenty of other witch/psychic shopping opportunities in town.

 

The House of Seven Gables was terrific. Excellent docent, interesting history, and a secret staircase. Don't tell anyone. The son-in-law fetched the car from a half mile away when rain threatened. It was a joy to have someone else do the driving through heavy traffic in a thunderstorm.

 

He drove us again to the port Saturday. I was concerned about all the traffic into Black Falcon cruise terminal, most was headed for the Niewu Statendam. With relatively few passengers checking in, the irritations hardly bothered me. All that fiddling with Verifly Navigator and they wanted a printed copy of our boarding passes, etc, etc. Save the trees? Baloney. I had already uploaded photos of ourselves to the Navigator app, still had to stoop for another, line my head up with the outline and watch the countdown, 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... 0... So what already? For Pete's sake. Click! They got the grouchy shot. Onboard before noon.

 

We booked a balcony cabin and received a massive upgrade. Exact same cabin, but we were a full two, yes, two cabins midship of what we booked. Big win. I'm still smiling.

 

We explored the ship, weighed myself in the gym, touched a barbell without picking it up and can say I went to the gym. Calm Lido lunch for us, not many passengers around, assume they board later and hope to find out how many of us there are.

 

Watched the safety video, things have changed, the seven shorts blasts and one long blast now means to go to your lifeboat instead of waiting in your cabin for more news. The lifejackets now have a chin strap (official name is something else, I did not take notes, will die in an actual emergency) and more straps. I suppose someone showed that this design could have saved two lives between 2010 and 2015 and the change was mandated. Big win for lifejacket industry.

 

Attended the sail away, beautiful weather, met cruise and travel director Glenn Michael. Sounds like he is from Australia or Oklahoma, I get the accents confused. A bit late sailing out we backed past the Nieuw Statendam and Adventure of the Seas with an MSC container ship off the other side and sailed out under the approach to Logan Airport and past the old fort on Castle Island. All pretty cool.

 

Glenn ran a good Team Trivia at 7:00. Mystery solved, he's Australian. We did dreadfully, only ten out of eighteen correct. The winning team had eleven corrected. Elvis's first national TV appearance was on the Dorsey Brothers show, who'd have thought it? I wonder if the big band leaders gave him the time of day.

 

No one at the scheduled piano bar, cancelled due to illness. Music trivia was not as well run, technology challenges, too slow, but no excuse for my score of 21, the winning score of 31 was about 6 more than the second place team. They have to quit asking about all these new songs from the 80's and 90's and all. In bed just before 11:00 and slept well. Good first day.

 

[Andi Land]

Looking forward to your review. We were to be onboard but COVID took us out. Have fun!

[quilty964]

Good to hear you made it aboard!  Have a great trip!!

[REOVA]

AH the COVID ship (Reading "Cabin Fever" right now. A interesting perspective from our experience on a different ship at the beginning of the pandemic, even with their creative liberties included). We had over 200 cases a few weeks aqo on the VoV so mask up. It will hide your grouchy snarl as well when they ask you to sanitize  🤣 Probably more cases were onboard but many people rather spread the "love" than get tested and quarantine for 6 days. (We elected the later). Glenn Michael used to be the HAL piano payer and has moved up over the many years. He did treat everyone to a sing along one night when the piano player was out. Fernanda was our Music Trivia host and it was funny to hear her pronounce the songs and artists from the 60's and 70's, as if they were from a fairy tale (long ago and far far away). We only had to show our card at deck 3 and watch safety video on TV, are they back to full muster? Speaking of TVs, supposedly the new TVs were on the dock waiting for installation (Supply chain delay) so you may get a choice of more than 4 channels now. Enjoy and safe travels.

[whogo]

Sunday, August 28, 2022

 

Fantastic day in Bar Harbor, ideal weather, beautiful scenery, nice people. Thanks to longtime Hal cruiser and blogger Jeff's mention of it, we rented a two seat electric vehicle from Acadia Gem. What fun it was to drive the doorless car through Acadia National Park. Very sporty. Nifty vehicle, 25 mph maximum speed, it seemed faster. The vehicle is not allowed on roads with a speed limit over 35, we did not annoy people by driving too slowly and actually passed a gas powered car. Lots of pull outs for vistas, absolutely gorgeous, much like the north woods of Minnesota or Wisconsin, but with the ocean thrown in and nothing at all like back in the corn belt. We drove to the top of Cadillac Mountain and cheered on the cyclist that was nearing the top. The park was packed on this end of summer weekend. We saw a number of novice cyclists who were struggling just to get out of Bar Harbor, don't rent a bike unless you are an athlete.

 

Thanks also to CC member Btimmer's recommendation of the Pocket Earth map app for tracking our route. Mrs. Whogo shopped in the tourist hotspot that is Bar Harbor and I paid $0.75 for three postcards to write and mail from the last US port for while. I got a kick out of the Chinese Joy restaurant's big “No Lobster” sign, they must have gotten tired of people asking for it.

 

Normal tender ride back for me. Mrs. Whogo lucked into the big open air Miss Samantha boat with ocean wildlife displays and easy access. She also lucked into a good two man team and won at afternoon trivia by three points.

 

Covid? Cruise director Glenn Michael and the food and beverage managers wore masks outside, even. The fire door is closed on the aft section of the port of deck six. Of the faces I could see on my tender, five were masked including me, twenty were not. I have not heard any coughing.

 

Dressy night tonight. Rack of lamb or filet mignon? Decisions, decisions.

 

 

[Florida_gal_50]

Acadia national park is beautiful.  I’m glad you enjoyed it.

[canadianbear]

I loved Bar Habor-one if my favourite little ports.

Enjoying your reports.  That’s a tough decision between rack of lamb or filet mignon….hubby says lamb, I say filet!  Good luck.  

[madera1]

Enjoying your descriptions and taking notes as we have a Sept 2023 Atlantic coast cruise booked and will be stopping at some of these ports.

[DAllenTCY]

Your posts are the best entertainment any CC followers could ask for.

 

(I did learn in high school not to end a sentence with a preposition)....more than 60 years ago.  Nobody cares anymore.

 

I'm to lazy to retype the sentence anyway.

 

David

[whogo]

Dressy night dinner last night, no one would have guessed from appearances, zero dinner jackets, zero ball gowns, four suits with ties, more suits without, a handful of sport coats, a couple dozen collared shirts, two t-shirts, one baseball cap. Mrs. Whogo commented, did not know she cared. Women were better turned out than their male companions.

 

Mrs. Whogo was happy with her sea bass. Grouchiness? Jumbo shrimp has always been a curious oxymoron, the four shrimp in my jumbo shrimp cocktail were below the jumbo standard and one had suffered badly in its peeling. Asked for cocktail sauce instead of aioli and what I received was short on horseradish. Ketchup anyone? Excellent rare filet mignon for me, but why put it on top of the mashed potato and under the shredded crab with sauce? The crab is touching the meat. Ick. Strawberries Pavlova was indistinguishable from a very small fresh strawberry sundae.

 

Even more grouchiness? The English as a second language cruise staff do not run good music trivia contests. Michael handed out answer sheets individually. “How many in your group? Just one answer sheet here?” Started ten minutes late, took forever to describe the rules and then could not get the tech staff to adjust the volume. Suffered four overly long over modulated clips that people in the back could not hear.

 

In bed at 11:00, lost an hour at 2:00 AM as I set my watch ahead. Arose at 6:00 AM, today, Monday to overcast skies and wet decks, no land visible, planned arrival in Halifax at 9:00. Breakfasted on a bog standard American diner meal of eggs over easy, whole wheat toast and bacon. Diners do it better, arrange everything on the plate properly. Yet another Holland America cutback to report, lox is now displayed flat on a platter instead of rolled into neat little cylinders with capers.

 

I prefer the dining room, but who can wait until 7:30 opening time? The day is half over.

 

A rumble outside our cabin at 7:45 announced the arrival of the Halifax pilot, big engine on the pilot boat. The captain docked with little help from me, just a little body English, the gangway opened a bit later than the scheduled 9:00. Great cruise, we are off on foot.

[canadianbear]

It’s a shame the staff are allowing t-shirts and bb caps in the dining room.  They used to be discreetly told by the maître de to change.  We haven’t cruised since December 2019 but noticed in the Pinnacle at dinner one night a fellow with a ripped t-shirt on and (just my opinion) that  is disrespectful-that is what the Lido is for.  
 

HAL has certainly changed from when we first started cruising.  
 

 

[REOVA]

2 hours ago, whogo said:

Asked for cocktail sauce instead of aioli and what I received was short on horseradish.

We had same problem with prime rib and horseradish sauce, eh mayonnaise. I asked 4 different servers for horseradish sauce and got 4 ramekins of mayo. I asked for straight horseradish and they told me it was bought premixed. Supervisor came over with another ramekin and tasted it with tears in his eyes. Said they probably added wasabi. 😅 Agree with you on the Pavlova - almost raw inside. Over the years I've tried to ignore the "old" days and find appreciation of the good things about being on a ship (familiar crew, ole friends, etc). The scales definitely are tipping towards the best thing at least still being able to get on a ship. Will take years to tip the other way.  The Halifax HOHO was actually a better tour than any of HALs. Driver stopped at locations to let us off to wander and take photos for a few minutes and gave a great commentary. He was a history teacher so that helped. Just don't get off permanently if you want to get back on another bus, they over sell them and pass you by. It rained while we were there but hope you had an enjoyable day. 

[rkacruiser]

21 hours ago, DAllenTCY said:

(I did learn in high school not to end a sentence with a preposition)....more than 60 years ago.  Nobody cares anymore.

 

I care, but, I am sometimes guilty of that sin.  My English teachers in Junior High, High School, and my two English professors in college would have not given me the grades that they did if I had not learned otherwise.  (Thank God for what they taught me.  I know the difference.)

 

6 hours ago, whogo said:

Excellent rare filet mignon for me, but why put it on top of the mashed potato and under the shredded crab with sauce?

 

I guess what is a "modern presentation of an entree" remains from recent years.  This "stacking" of stuff was once "in".  Why is it still?  (If it really is?  Or, did HAL's Food and Beverage Vice-President not get the memo that this seems so "yesteryear"?)  Never liked it, personally.  But, like you, I deal with it.  

[gilboman]

7 hours ago, canadianbear said:

It’s a shame the staff are allowing t-shirts and bb caps in the dining room.  They used to be discreetly told by the maître de to change.  We haven’t cruised since December 2019 but noticed in the Pinnacle at dinner one night a fellow with a ripped t-shirt on and (just my opinion) that  is disrespectful-that is what the Lido is for.  
 

HAL has certainly changed from when we first started cruising.  
 

 

yup lots has changed..but that's just how it's always been with passage of time i suppose,

 

but after last couple of years, it's even more casual now and can't say i'm not happy about it... even lawyers don't suit up anymore unless they have to goto court, and even khakis is basically semi formal now... athleisure is in and you have "fitted" joggers as default for many places now whereas before it was at min khakis and button up ..everyone from ibankers and lawyers who used to suit up have gotten way more casual and obviously other professions as well.

 

heck even NBA headcoaches don't need to suit up anymore after the league bubble games in 2020 and now are just sweatpants and polo shirt 

 

as cruiseline and and their customers get younger and older ones are dropping off, cruiselines have to adapt . We've packed a lot lighter than we used to thats for sure!

[SilvertoGold]

Re: stacking of food on plates.  It is OK, just remember that as an adult you are allowed to play with your food and dump off whatever is offending you onto the plate from its high perch :)  I do this all the time and it never bites back!

[canadianbear]

12 minutes ago, gilboman said:

yup lots has changed..but that's just how it's always been with passage of time i suppose,

 

but after last couple of years, it's even more casual now and can't say i'm not happy about it... even lawyers don't suit up anymore unless they have to goto court, and even khakis is basically semi formal now... athleisure is in and you have "fitted" joggers as default for many places now whereas before it was at min khakis and button up ..everyone from ibankers and lawyers who used to suit up have gotten way more casual and obviously other professions as well.

 

heck even NBA headcoaches don't need to suit up anymore after the league bubble games in 2020 and now are just sweatpants and polo shirt 

 

as cruiseline and and their customers get younger and older ones are dropping off, cruiselines have to adapt . We've packed a lot lighter than we used to thats for sure!

We are more casual too which started as air lines cost for luggage went up etc.  I don’t mind casual but don’t agree with baseball caps

or t-shirts in dining rooms. 

[whogo]

Mrs. Whogo led the pedestrian tour of Halifax on Monday, August 29. Walked up past old houses, architecturally interesting to me, similar age and style, one beautiful preserved, most showed serious need of paint on their cedar shingle siding.

 

The Halifax Public Gardens were wonderful, nice and green, quiet, beautifully designed and maintained, the only surviving Victorian garden in North America, allegedly. Admired the place on our own, incredible assortment of colorful flowers, footpaths, a stream, ducks and all. Reached the visitor center and joined a tour which had just departed. Volunteer guide David was a gem, great story teller, delightful sense of humor. He gently corrected a couple of us who called the place a park instead of a garden. Saw a mature American Chestnut tree, I thought the species had been wiped out by a blight, apparently not in Canada. Also an Ohio Buckeye tree like I have not seen in ages. Congratulations Halifax on keeping the gardens up.

 

Mrs. Whogo marched me on to the Citadel, neat old star shaped fort. Must have been well designed, no one seriously attacked it. “Costumed” is not the right word for the staff dressed as soldiers of old in kilts and what not. As we were guided around the fortress the uniformed staff described their uniform, weapon, bagpipe or whatever and tell the whys and the hows. Great way to show off the place.

 

It pained me to walk past the brew pub instead of into the brew at the port. I know you can't hit them all, I haven't hit any this cruise.

 

Unfortunately, the sun came out for the entire day. And we'd had such glorious overcast skies sailing in. I spent months cultivating a healthy pallor and it was ruined by a day in the sun. I was shocked to look in the mirror at my precancerous tan.

 

Delightful table mates at dinner and an uninspiring menu. Mrs. Whogo ordered the always available chicken, a sign that she had given up. My slice of pork with some fancy pants French name was fine, one table mate was disappointed to find that her chile rellenos was fried and I was too polite to ask about the bizarre looking pot roast.

 

Cruise director Glenn Michael ran a superior music trivia contest. A former Holland America piano performer, he played the quiz songs including a couple of classical pieces. Fellow contestants could not resist singing out the answers. I did better than I thought, considering I had never heard of Cold Play and some other group, finished well out of the money, will survive without another Holland America pin. Don't let my grousing mislead you, I had a great day.