Delighted by R Class (Zandaam)

[BigMattT]

We’re disembarking Zaandam in Montreal tomorrow, and having followed these boards for a while, I’m so grateful to have finally experienced an R Class HAL ship.
 

For a couple in our early 40’s, we were a little concerned reading some feedback about lack of entertainment and dining options… but those were totally unfounded. In fact, we both agreed this is our favorite class ship now, and we’re a little saddened there are only two left in the fleet.

 

The vibe is totally relaxing taking walks on the wide promenade, finding cozy nooks to read, few crowds anywhere… and the short walks to get everywhere were much appreciated.

 

The Main Dining Room and Pinnacle were leaps and bounds better than our experience on the Eurodam last summer… and the vastly quieter dining venues were welcome after the loudness of Koningsdam and Rotterdam. MDR inclusions are obviously victims to some economic realities… but the value here is still significant vs the competition. And the service is simply stellar. (Canaletto seems to be the most consistent dining option across all ships, and it didn’t disappoint here either. Solid Italian. A classic Italian chophouse presentation of lamb chops is always one of my favs.)

 

Truly our only grumble was a consistently long line at Guest Services due to an overwhelming number of passengers with a poor understanding of how their own devices worked trying to access the Navigator app. If we had a dollar for every person who bragged about being a 5-Star Mariner to others in line before being belligerent or telling their life story to the Guest Services crew…..
 

Understandably, people have differing ideas of what makes a great vacation…But with a ship small enough to call on interesting New England and Canada ports daily, we didn’t have any need for late night entertainment.  Considering the upcoming trends for the next generation of vacationers without kids is a larger focus on comfortable spaces to gather in small groups, access to internet-connected personal entertainment devices, and a lessened emphasis on alcohol/partying… I can’t imagine a circumstance where a lack of stage show or comic we’ve never heard of would influence our peer group’s vacation decision. HAL may have (inadvertently?) created the ideal vacation brand for introverts.

 

Comfy beds. Roomy Oceanview cabin. A remarkably good looking ship for nearly 25 years old.

 

Embarkation in Boston was a breeze… we arrived shortly after our assigned 2:30pm boarding time and the terminal was virtually empty. Only saw 4 others boarding while we did. (We later heard lots of people discussing how they ignored their assigned time and arrived early… so perhaps our experience wasn’t typical.)

 

We maybe would have liked to see a NY Deli-like venue or an always-open option for light bites when the MDR and Lido were between meals. (From ~9:30am-11:00am and 8:30pm-10:30pm, the *only* option is room service… and we rarely want to eat in our cabin.) Even a “grab and go” section of sandwiches and bagged chips added to the Explorations Cafe or the Dive-In would be nice.

Thanks again to everyone who has amassed such a trove of knowledge on these classic ships on here. Here’s hoping we can sail on R Classes a few more times before they’re a thing of the past!

 

Bravo HAL!

 

 

[REOVA]

Agree, will be sad when HAL's smaller ships are all gone.

 

Can you expand on what was wrong with your Eurodam cruise and which cruise it was? 

[canadianbear]

We’ve sailed on the Zaandam a few times (quite awhile ago now) and loved the ship. The size of the ship is perfect and I’ll also be sad when gone.  I honestly thought HAL would build another new one that size for getting into “smaller” and unique ports.  
 

Happy to hear you enjoyed the cruise.  Thanks for sharing.  

[BigMattT]

1 hour ago, REOVA said:

Agree, will be sad when HAL's smaller ships are all gone.

 

Can you expand on what was wrong with your Eurodam cruise and which cruise it was? 

Was Eurodam August to Alaska 2022. Without belaboring the point, they were really struggling with food quality and servers seemed tired of hearing about it. Pinnacle especially.

[rodndonna]

7 hours ago, BigMattT said:

 

Understandably, people have differing ideas of what makes a great vacation…But with a ship small enough to call on interesting New England and Canada ports daily, we didn’t have any need for late night entertainment.  Considering the upcoming trends for the next generation of vacationers without kids is a larger focus on comfortable spaces to gather in small groups, access to internet-connected personal entertainment devices, and a lessened emphasis on alcohol/partying… I can’t imagine a circumstance where a lack of stage show or comic we’ve never heard of would influence our peer group’s vacation decision. HAL may have (inadvertently?) created the ideal vacation brand for introverts.

 

 

 

Thanks for your review and post. Like you this will be our first cruise on the Zaandam (reverse itinerary) in 3 weeks today.

 

Like you we are introverts and generally prefer smaller ships. Oddly as introverts, I  actually find we tend to meet and interact with more people on smaller ships even though there are less of them on board.

[Mary229]

I do like the Zaandam too, very much.  I am glad you enjoyed the cruise. 

[POA1]

Glad you enjoyed your cruise. There's a lot to be said for the smaller ships. You'd have loved the S class as well. Thank you for your very nice report.

[kazu]

Lovely report.  thanks for sharing.

 

I am a fan of the smaller ships - especially one particular that is no longer in the fleet.  They might not have all the bells and whistles of the Pinnacle and Signature Class but I have alway found the crew, service and food to be very good to excellent.  

 

So glad you enjoyed your first R class ship.

[teacherman]

To all who enjoy, or have cruised on, the Zaandam, I would suggest you read the book entitled "Cabin Fever."  This is the true story of the Zaandam, which was in South America the winter of 2019-20 when the Covid first broke out.  It is the story of the ship's very long voyage back to Florida, due to the fact that no country would allow the ship to land and disembark passengers.  We were on the cruise prior to the story told in this book, and we remembered some of the crew members mentioned in the book.  I recommend it to anyone who enjoys cruising.

[ocean sounds]

Thank you for your review!  Looking forward to my Zaandam cruise, 10 months to go!

[Spike2015]

Thank you for the review!  On our way to Montreal to board the Zaandam today!

[ocean sounds]

@Spike2015, Bon Voyage!  Have a wonderful cruise

[denton1]

I really enjoyed your review. We will be on Zaandam for a 25 day cruise at the end of July. This will be our longest cruise ever. Your description of the ship reassures us that it will be a pleasure on this ship. 

[BigMattT]

9 minutes ago, denton1 said:

I really enjoyed your review. We will be on Zaandam for a 25 day cruise at the end of July. This will be our longest cruise ever. Your description of the ship reassures us that it will be a pleasure on this ship. 

It is certainly what you make of it— but it’s utterly charming.

 

Is that Iceland trip? The crew seems legitimately excited about some of the lesser traveled itineraries coming up this year. Several specifically mentioned Iceland.

[denton1]

2 minutes ago, BigMattT said:

It is certainly what you make of it— but it’s utterly charming.

 

Is that Iceland trip? The crew seems legitimately excited about some of the lesser traveled itineraries coming up this year. Several specifically mentioned Iceland.

Yes, it is the trip to Iceland. We are really looking forward to it. We were on the Amsterdam, sister of the Zaandam, in Alaska 4 years ago. It also got into some small, otherwise inaccessible ports. Sorry that ship is no longer in the fleet, as it was a very comfortable ship. 

[happywandering]

53 minutes ago, teacherman said:

To all who enjoy, or have cruised on, the Zaandam, I would suggest you read the book entitled "Cabin Fever."  This is the true story of the Zaandam, which was in South America the winter of 2019-20 when the Covid first broke out.  It is the story of the ship's very long voyage back to Florida, due to the fact that no country would allow the ship to land and disembark passengers.  We were on the cruise prior to the story told in this book, and we remembered some of the crew members mentioned in the book.  I recommend it to anyone who enjoys cruising.

Thanks for the suggestion.  It is now on my Kindle.

[DaveOKC]

2 hours ago, rodndonna said:

 

Thanks for your review and post. Like you this will be our first cruise on the Zaandam (reverse itinerary) in 3 weeks today.

 

Like you we are introverts and generally prefer smaller ships. Oddly as introverts, I  actually find we tend to meet and interact with more people on smaller ships even though there are less of them on board.

I agree with this comment.  On the smaller ships you seem to bump into the same people more often and thus it seems easier to interact with them.  

[Spike2015]

13 minutes ago, happywandering said:

Thanks for the suggestion.  It is now on my Kindle.

It’s on my kindle too.  It’s a good read

[Spike2015]

47 minutes ago, ocean sounds said:

@Spike2015, Bon Voyage!  Have a wonderful cruise

@OceanSoundsThank you!  Very excited for our first cruise on the Zandamm!

[beach spring]

Hey, thanks for the very reassuring commentary.  We have enjoyed two times on the Veendam, once on her second voyage ever, 1997, then years later.  On our final meal in the dining room, first cruise,  our waiter gave me ALL the menus of that week!  Most charming of all was that same waiter's gifting each of "his" cruisers Dutch hats on "Dutch Night," when crew presented a talent show.  All passengers received those hats but "his" women's were hand decorated.  I will try to post a picture.  It is so wonderful, we have it in a frame for display!  Is that done anymore?  I know Dutch night disappeared, along with the Chocolate Midnight Extravaganza.

 

Our second trip on the Veendam was NYC to Bermuda, a cruise which was cut short by one day by an imminent hurricane (Irene).  For some reason, the powers that be decided we would hightail it back to NYC, whereas other ships in port chose to go further out to sea.  The resulting fiasco of that decision is another long story.  Suffice it to say, we were very displeased by HAL's treatment of  all of us 400 who could not leave the ship once back in NYC.  Oh well, it worked out for us as well as for the Manhattanites who were expecting their city to be under water (didn't happen).

 

Rambling on, I must add that the two ships offer so much more than all those loud, silly, bells and whistles of the megaships.  Not for us.  We Veendam passengers were able to dock in downtown Hamilton, Bermuda, while the big ships had to dock way outside.  Those passengers had to make their way somehow from the ship to the sites of interest on that island;  we just walked off and onto the ship, as we chose, for several nights.  

 

This will be our first cruise in several years, for various reasons, so we are really looking forward to celebrating our 50th on the Zaandam.  In class! 

[CGinMTL]

On 5/13/2023 at 9:27 AM, happywandering said:

Thanks for the suggestion.  It is now on my Kindle.

Found it available at public library.

Will pick it up this week  

Thank you 

[cruisin'teach]

Have sailed on all classes of HAL ships and the Zaandam is our favorite! Enjoy!!

Edited May 14, 2023 by cruisin'teach

[RuthC]

Other than the Prinsendam, and the earlier generations of HAL ships prior to 1992, the R-class has been my favorite four ships. I will miss them when the last of them has gone. 

[Monarda55]

OP, you mentioned enjoying “finding cozy nooks to read” onboard. Would you care to share some of your favorites?  We’ll be on Zaandam in a few weeks and I’d love to have some advance intel on where the best nooks are. 🙂

[Cruise4food]

On 5/13/2023 at 8:49 AM, Spike2015 said:

Thank you for the review!  On our way to Montreal to board the Zaandam today!

Say Hello to this family. A retired Captain with daughter and grandson.