Oct. 8 - Oct. 22 Statendam - MDR Questions

[Guardsy]

We will be embarking for this 14-day adventure.

 

I assume there are 4 formal nights, 2 each "week".  If that is correct, does a recent traveler know WHICH nights those are?

 

Also, we have two nights, one each week, for specialty dining.  We don't want to miss anything fabulous in the MDR.  If you have suggestions WHICH nights not to miss in the MDR that is appreciated.

 

Finally, bonus points if someone has a link to the menus for such a 2-week cruise.  Not having been on HAL in many years, is the menu from the first week merely repeated for the 2nd week of the cruise?

 

Thank you all!

[CruiserBruce]

If it is a true 14 day cruise...not two 7 days, B2B, it should have 3 Gala nights. If it is two 7 day B2B, it will have 4 Gala nights. Without having the itinerary in front of me, can't tell you what days Gala nights will be.

 

Again, if two 7 day cruises, the menus will repeat. If its a true 14 day (which you are hinting its not), you will 14 different menus. 

[Cruising-along]

We are on this cruise with you.  Since this cruise goes only once/year (Quebec to FL) there hasn't been a recent cruise with this itinerary.  I believe there will be 3 Dressy nights at the most. I don't know why they're taking so long to let us know, later than I've ever seen.

[Guardsy]

24 minutes ago, CruiserBruce said:

If it is a true 14 day cruise...not two 7 days, B2B, it should have 3 Gala nights. If it is two 7 day B2B, it will have 4 Gala nights. Without having the itinerary in front of me, can't tell you what days Gala nights will be.

 

Again, if two 7 day cruises, the menus will repeat. If its a true 14 day (which you are hinting its not), you will 14 different menus. 

Correct, it is a 14-day cruise, not a B2B.

 

[CruiserBruce]

13 minutes ago, Guardsy said:

Correct, it is a 14-day cruise, not a B2B.

 

If you go find the "Live from" thread from the N. Statendam 24 day cruise in August,  you will see a lot of menus, including the Gala nights. As that cruise was 10 days longer, no way to absolutely tell which ones will be used on your cruise. Just takes a little looking around here...tons of info for you.

[Roz]

1 hour ago, Guardsy said:

We don't want to miss anything fabulous in the MDR. 

 

The food in the MDR is good to very good, but I wouldn't call it fabulous.

[Florida_gal_50]

14 minutes ago, Roz said:

 

The food in the MDR is good to very good, but I wouldn't call it fabulous.

That’s exactly what I thought 😛.

 

For the op, Roger Jett’s sight has lots of information.  A 24 day cruise is not going to give a good indication of menus.  That was a pricy cruise.  This one not as much.  Since this cruise only happens twice a year, back and forth it will be near impossible to find menus.  
 

Here is a link to Rogers site which might be limited help.

 

https://rogerjett-photography.com

[Florida_gal_50]

1 hour ago, Cruising-along said:

We are on this cruise with you.  Since this cruise goes only once/year (Quebec to FL) there hasn't been a recent cruise with this itinerary.  I believe there will be 3 Dressy nights at the most. I don't know why they're taking so long to let us know, later than I've ever seen.

Have you looked at your boarding pass? It should be listed on there the amount of gala nights.

[dfish]

8 minutes ago, Florida_gal_50 said:

Have you looked at your boarding pass? It should be listed on there the amount of gala nights.

It isn't on there  yet.  We still have preliminary boarding passes.   I would expect to see that information next week when we're within 14 days of sailing.  As it is one cruise and not two 7 day cruises, I also expect there will be 3 Gala/Dressy nights.   Normally they are on sea days, so I would avoid booking specialty dining then.  

[Florida_gal_50]

4 minutes ago, dfish said:

It isn't on there  yet.  We still have preliminary boarding passes.   I would expect to see that information next week when we're within 14 days of sailing.  As it is one cruise and not two 7 day cruises, I also expect there will be 3 Gala/Dressy nights.   Normally they are on sea days, so I would avoid booking specialty dining then.  

That information used to be on there as soon as the boarding pass was available.  I wonder if they are no longer including that information.  Maybe people were getting upset if it was wrong.  Thanks for the information.  I agree that there will be 3.

Edited September 19, 2022 by Florida_gal_50

[Cruising-along]

6 minutes ago, Florida_gal_50 said:

That information used to be on there as soon as the boarding pass was available.  I wonder if they are no longer including that information.  Maybe people were getting upset if it was wrong.  Thanks for the information.  I agree that there will be 3.

Yes, it was on there as soon as the boarding pass was available in the past.  Oh well, I'm going to pack assuming there will be 3, and if there are 4 (I doubt it) I'll just duplicate 🙂  

[Florida_gal_50]

2 minutes ago, Cruising-along said:

Yes, it was on there as soon as the boarding pass was available in the past.  Oh well, I'm going to pack assuming there will be 3, and if there are 4 (I doubt it) I'll just duplicate 🙂  

I think you’ll be good.  I like that cruise itinerary even though it’s a bit chilly. I thought about booking it but it was quite pricy at that time.  It’s my favourite ship so have a wonderful time.

[Cruising-along]

3 minutes ago, Florida_gal_50 said:

 It’s my favourite ship

Mine too. 🙂  

[dfish]

26 minutes ago, Florida_gal_50 said:

That information used to be on there as soon as the boarding pass was available.  I wonder if they are no longer including that information.  Maybe people were getting upset if it was wrong.  Thanks for the information.  I agree that there will be 3.

This preliminary thing is new.  The first time we had a preliminary boarding pass was in July when we went to Norway.  I don't think we had them last year for Alaska.  They don't list our boarding time on the preliminary one either.  They used to, but this time it just says To Be Assigned.

[Florida_gal_50]

15 minutes ago, dfish said:

This preliminary thing is new.  The first time we had a preliminary boarding pass was in July when we went to Norway.  I don't think we had them last year for Alaska.  They don't list our boarding time on the preliminary one either.  They used to, but this time it just says To Be Assigned.

I know I had it in March.  The silly thing with the bar code only came up about 2 days before.  Prior to that it was the preliminary.  I was beginning to think they weren’t going to let me on 😛.

[albingirl]

I, too, love this ship.  We get involved in some excursions so we don't get that involved in planning for dinner reservations.  Go with the flow, that sort of thing.  But, you'll love the ship and the MDR is great just so long as you stay away from the loud area out back by the serving station.  Go in the middle of the MDR and you'll be fine.

[crystalspin]

3 hours ago, Guardsy said:

does a recent traveler know WHICH nights those are?

 

Also, we have two nights, one each week, for specialty dining.  We don't want to miss anything fabulous in the MDR.  If you have suggestions WHICH nights not to miss in the MDR that is appreciated.

Looking at the itinerary, I would guess the 11th (sea day), either the 14th or 15th (earlyish all-aboard), and either the 19th or 20th (seadays). 

 

You might book your specialty dinners for whichever of the "either" pairs speculated above!

[Guardsy]

Not so much concerned with how MANY formal nights (i am assuming now there are three), but more what nights they are so we don't miss the formalness of the big dining room (and the special menus, if there are any).  I may be asking too much.

 

[Florida_gal_50]

8 hours ago, Guardsy said:

Not so much concerned with how MANY formal nights (i am assuming now there are three), but more what nights they are so we don't miss the formalness of the big dining room (and the special menus, if there are any).  I may be asking too much.

 

I would go with the post above yours for the dates.  No one is going to be able to give you absolute dates just a good guess.  I think you could be setting yourself up for disappointment.  There is really nothing formal about the dining room and the food is really nothing to special.  The menus used to be very nice maybe 10 or 15 years ago.  Not so much now.

[Sharon in AZ]

13 hours ago, Guardsy said:

Not so much concerned with how MANY formal nights (i am assuming now there are three), but more what nights they are so we don't miss the formalness of the big dining room (and the special menus, if there are any).  I may be asking too much.

 

I am on this same cruise also. I agree with @crystalspin and my guess is October 11th will be the first dressy evening and October 19th or 20th to be the last dressy evening. Those are all sea days. The other dressy evening will probably be a port day with an early afternoon all aboard time. 
 

The menus those evenings will have some special offerings, like a surf & turf, shrimp cocktail, etc.  I saw one the other day with a petite filet with a crab bearnaise type sauce. 
 

Do you have the Navigator app?  You can view the MDR menu from there. After looking at a few of them you can kind of tell which ones are for dressy evenings.  However, it’s hard to know what menus will be on our cruise since it’s a 14 day cruise. 
 

 

[Crew News]

14 hours ago, Guardsy said:

Not so much concerned with how MANY formal nights (i am assuming now there are three), but more what nights they are so we don't miss the formalness of the big dining room (and the special menus, if there are any).  I may be asking too much.

 

HAL has three Gala Night menus that are standard across the fleet and tend to continue for several years.  The first and second Gala Nights use the silver and gold menus, respectively.  There may be supply issues that cause an item or two to be changed.

 

Silver Menu               Gold Menu

Edited September 20, 2022 by Crew News

[RuthC]

16 hours ago, Guardsy said:

Not so much concerned with how MANY formal nights (i am assuming now there are three), but more what nights they are so we don't miss the formalness of the big dining room (and the special menus, if there are any).  I may be asking too much.

 

No 'may be' about it; there is absolutely no 'formalness' in the main dining room. It hasn't been called 'formal' night in a long time; it was dropped to 'Gala' night. Now it has been dropped again to 'dressy' night. There will be (very) few people dressed formally, and a few more dressed up. 
On my recent cruise, which was a long one on which people usually do dress up, many people didn't even bother to change out of what they had been wearing all day. 
As to the menu on 'dressy' night, I find them good ones to avoid. Those are usually good nights to go to a specialty restaurant.