Live from the Volendam - please join the Merry Widows on their cruise 😊

[kazu]

31 minutes ago, loretta said:

I've enjoyed your trip report very much, thank you for taking the time to share your adventures with us. I've done several HAL cruises out of Montreal or Boston to CA/NE and have thoroughly enjoyed each one and seen a lot. I am interested in your tour in Quebec, it goes to some places that I've never been to. I don't see anything on the HAL excursions for something like this. Can you share how you found it?

 I posted his info and company a bit ago.  Gilbert Garcia,  he owns the company and he is the only one that does this.  I did a lot of research.  I highly recommend him.

 

tout was $135 for 3 hours for the 2 of us and we both thought it was well worth it.

 

you ride and he pedals.

 

 

[loretta]

Thank you so much, I missed the earlier post about him amongst all your other goodies. I will definitely look him up!

[BaileyMJ]

Thank you for sharing your cruise!  I am on Nieuw Amsterdam and you are so correct about 2024 Great Cracker Shortage.  Yesterday I attended a wine tasting no crackers and one little piece of bread.

Also the 2nd white was the Laurenz Gruner Veltliner 2022 it was excellent

[kazu]

11 hours ago, BaileyMJ said:

Thank you for sharing your cruise!  I am on Nieuw Amsterdam and you are so correct about 2024 Great Cracker Shortage.  Yesterday I attended a wine tasting no crackers and one little piece of bread.

Also the 2nd white was the Laurenz Gruner Veltliner 2022 it was excellent

 

 

Nice that the wine was offered at a wine tasting.  I discovered it at a Cellar Master dinner and when I saw it was in package #3, I had to order that package. 🙂 

 

We did try a few others but this was became our wine du sour in the MDR. 🙂 

[SusieKIslandGirl]

4 hours ago, kazu said:

 

We did try a few others but this was became our wine du sour in the MDR. 🙂 

😂 I hope that was a spell check change-wine du sour???

[kazu]

30 minutes ago, SusieKIslandGirl said:

😂 I hope that was a spell check change-wine du sour???

 

It was.  I didn’t even see it.  Hopefully people knew what I meant LOL.

[kazu]

this cruise I had a last hurrah with a Neptune Suite.  they are especially nice on the smaller ships as the Neptune Lounge and concierge is service is much more personalized IMO.

Everything in the rooms has been updated with the exception of the bathroom and additional plugs.  At least, I don’t think additional plugs have been put in.  The two of us managed quite well with what we had though and we did have several items that needed to be charged - 2 cell phones, 2 IPads and a keyboard.

here are some pics of the cabin that have to go to HAL facts in case anyone is interested.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[kazu]

Final thoughts & my subjective review of the cruise:

 

Entertainment - a huge surprise.  There were some pretty dam good entertainers on this ship.  i am not a big show room person, but what i did see was very enjoyable and reports i heard from others were very good.  Some got thrown off by an entertainer unable to board due to passport issues but overall, it was surprisingly good.  7 pm show required arriving at least 45 minutes in advance.  9 pm show had more room but it too was pretty packed with few seats as the cruise progressed.

 

MDR food - good to very good.  The only real disappointments were the escargot and crème brûlée.  while we did have some Club Orange main courses, we also had regular MDR offerings and all were quite edible 😃 

 

Lido food - quite good and some very good - especially the Asian Chinese area, salad, sushi, etc.  They did have sandwiches made to order but the same meat was offered every day and finding someone to serve you at times could be a struggle or a wait.  We did not eat dinner there.

 

pinnacle Grill - definitely a good PG.  We had breakfast, dinner and 2 lunches there and all was quite good.  My tenderloin was cooked to perfection and very tender.

 

Canaletto - food was ok - good.  I can’t put my finger on it but for some reason it didn’t thrill me. nothing was wrong.  not sure if it was the service or what.

 

Cabin steward - mediocre.  Yes he cleaned the room but there were days certain things weren’t done and no towel animals worthy of speaking of.  A big contrast from my Oosterdam cruise in 2022 (my last Neptune Suite ).  My bear was posed with towel animals all the time.  And they were3 terrific.

 

Neputne Lounge Concierge - fantastic.  There are no words for how good Jennika was.  i did a LUK and mentioned her on my survey.

 

Neptune Suite itself - nice - lovely space but HAl has dumbed down the suites IMO - no bath salts, no lip balm, none of the Elemis products we used to get.  Hors d’hoeuvres are still offered but choices are limited, somewhat repetitive and I didn’t find the quality as good as they used to be.  the saving grace for this ship is the concierge and Neptune lounge.  Jennica just makes life so wonderful.  one of the best concierges I have encountered - I would rate her up there with those DD DH and i had on the Prinsendam and that’s saying something.  One of the things that bothered me was that there were no little shampoos and conditioner, etc for those taking a bath.  you would have to stand up in the bathtub to get it as it was set high for showers unless y9u got inventive (i did0.  Very dangerous iMO.

 

Entertainment in the Mix was good overall.  Different opinions on the piano man but he was entertaining IMO.  The band and singer was really good.  Wonderful voice.  Classical music and nice to listen to music was performed every night by the instrumentalists.  

 

MDR service - once we got our table changed, our waiters Oka and Adi were fabulous.  there is nothing like good service and they sure provided it.

 

Weather was a bummer with the Arctic polar wind following us but that is not under anyone’s control.  We still had fun.

 

I think that mostly covers it?  If anyone has any questions please don’t hesitate to ask.

 

 

 

 

 

[Yipper]

Thank you for your honest and detailed opinions, Jacqui. We will be on the Volendam in November (after the dry dock) and now, are looking VERY forward to it.

[kazu]

Ooops how could I have forgotten to add this?

 

The FCC on this cruise is either incompetent or lazy.  Now I know why I do not book cruises on the ship.

 

I bought some FCD’s while on the ship - usual standard form - charge my credit card used on the cruise.  easy peasy

 

I got my Future Cruise Deposit Confirmations - all good.

 

BUT she charged my FRIEND’S CREDUT CARD instead of mine.  I’ve refunded my friend but now I have to get them to change the credit card on record in case they happen to not be used (you don’t know what the future holds).  

 

We each used our own credit cards for our on board accounts.  My friend’s name is ahead of mine in the alphabet so I think she just hit the first one.

 

I amd NOT impressed with this at all.  

[Cruising-along]

Jacqui if it's the same FCC we had, I wasn't impressed with her either.  She gave different answers to different people, complained about the noise when the String Trio practiced (unprofessional IMO)

 

Maybe I missed it, but what was your cabin #?  I think you were on the 7th deck like we were.

 

Thanks again for your great live-from!

[kazu]

43 minutes ago, Cruising-along said:

Jacqui if it's the same FCC we had, I wasn't impressed with her either.  She gave different answers to different people, complained about the noise when the String Trio practiced (unprofessional IMO)

 

Maybe I missed it, but what was your cabin #?  I think you were on the 7th deck like we were.

 

Thanks again for your great live-from!

 

I don’t post my cabin number while we are cruising so you didn’t miss it.

We wee in 7032

[rafinmd]

How did 2 weeks together affect your friendship?

 

 

Roy

[kazu]

16 minutes ago, rafinmd said:

How did 2 weeks together affect your friendship?

 

 

Roy

 

We are still friends 🙂.

[Haljo1935]

4 hours ago, kazu said:

Ooops how could I have forgotten to add this?

 

The FCC on this cruise is either incompetent or lazy.  Now I know why I do not book cruises on the ship.

 

I bought some FCD’s while on the ship - usual standard form - charge my credit card used on the cruise.  easy peasy

 

I got my Future Cruise Deposit Confirmations - all good.

 

BUT she charged my FRIEND’S CREDUT CARD instead of mine.  I’ve refunded my friend but now I have to get them to change the credit card on record in case they happen to not be used (you don’t know what the future holds).  

 

We each used our own credit cards for our on board accounts.  My friend’s name is ahead of mine in the alphabet so I think she just hit the first one.

 

I amd NOT impressed with this at all.  

Disappointing and frustrating, especially since it's not complicated to get right.

[erewhon]

@kazu  Jacqui, I appreciate you taking time to report " Live' from the beautiful Volendam, thank you.    Having a great concierge certainly improves the cruising experience.

[ski ww]

Just catching up with your posts, glad to see that the entertainment is getting better.

[GonzoWCS]

Thanks for this!

 

Cheers