Zuiderdam-24 Day Magic of the Mediterranean--Set. 5-29

[Cruzin Terri]

We left home on Sept. 3 and travelled to Jacksonville, FL for our flights to Barcelona. We stayed overnight at the Courtyard by Marriott and were able to leave our car at the hotel during our entire trip.

The next day we started our long journey at 8:23am on American Airlines. We took a turbo prop to Miami and then were on a 767 to JFK and after a 3 hour layover boarded another 767 to JFK. We used our frequent flier miles and were very lucky to have enough miles to travel in business class. The flights all went off without a hitch. However, we were very worried that there would be problems and would not reach Barcelona on time. We actually arrived early with all our luggage. In retrospect, I will always plan to arrive at the port city at least one day early and avoid the anxiety associated with missed or cancelled flights, lost luggage, etc.

We used the HAL transfer to the port, which cost more than a taxi. However, we handed over our luggage at the airport and did not see it again until it arrived in our stateroom.

I must say that I was very apprehensive about the Zuiderdam. After reading a number of negative reviews about her during the summer, I was a bit concerned about the condition of the ship and whether we would encounter numerous problems for our 24-day journey. My fears were unfounded. I found her to be as lovely as she was when we were on her in Alaska last summer.

Check-in went smoothly and we were escorted to the Lido for lunch. It appeared to be a long wait for our staterooms to be ready and we were suffering from jet lag and just overall tiredness and wanted to relax. Finally at 1:30pm the announcement was made that we could proceed to our staterooms and everyone was very glad to do so.

We were in a Superior Verandah Suite 8046. The room was in excellent condition and our steward, Ferry kept it that way during the entire 24 days. He was great. We never encountered any odors or other similar problems during the entire trip.

We were assigned Open Seating in the dining room. While I originally had requested fixed main seating and was waitlisted for this, Holland America arbitrarily changed me to Open Seating about 11 months out and there was nothing I could do to get it back, not even on the ship. We therefore made a reservation as soon as possible for the first evening and requested a table for two. We were assigned table 126 near the aft windows and had a wonderful dining room steward and assistant. Toto and Andik worked well as a team. Our dinners always arrived timely and were the right temperature. We requested a table with him again for the second night and invited friends to join us. It was confirmed. However, when we arrived at 8 pm, we were told the table was still occupied and they offered us another table. The overhead light was not working, the dining and wine stewards ignored us and we were generally unhappy campers. When we made our reservation the following morning I made sure to let them know of the mishaps of the previous night and requested a table with Toto again. My reservation was honored this time. In the course of dinner, I told Toto of our unhappiness the night before and the reservation attendant overheard us. He offered to help. For the rest of the cruise, we had a standing reservation for dinner at 6:15 pm at a table for two. On another evening when we declined the reservation because we wanted extra time in port and walked in without a reservation, we had the same experience as the previous time. Open seating worked for us only because someone offered to help and we had a marvelous dining room attendant and assistant. However, on future cruises I will be sure to request and be adamant that we get fixed dining. As we would leave the dining room at approximately 7:30pm we always saw people waiting for tables. I do not know how long they had to wait.

We are quiet people who are not into many activities. We usually had a drink in our stateroom before dinner and occasionally went to the shows or the casino. Therefore I cannot comment on the lounges or other venues. We did use the Crows Nest and the Explorations Café occasionally, but only for quiet times. I did notice that both these venues were very crowded when the ship was at sea.

I had my laptop with me, and used the internet from my stateroom. Service was very slow and therefore made using the internet just to get email a very expensive proposition. For those of you who will say that I should not have been worrying about email, I will just tell you that we are caregivers for a disabled person and this was the most efficient way of communication with those who were caring for him in our absence. It was not just for browsing and fun.

The ports were amazing. We felt each port was better than the previous one. We did not do many ship shore excursions. We prefer doing things on our own. We did, however, take the ship transfer from Livorno to Florence and we did the Profitis Ilias and Oia excursion in Santorini only so that we could get an early tender off the ship. My husband did the shore excursion to Delos from Mykonos.

We did arrange private tours in Navplion, Katakolon, Athens and Ephesus. They were all good. In Navplion and Athens we used Spiros (athenstaxi.com) and in Katakolon we used George. In Ephesus we used Sammy’s Travel. While Sammy’s gave us a good tour of Ephesus, they insisted that we spend time in both a Pottery Factory and a Rug Factory where we were subjected to very high-pressured sales pitches. I do not like this and was not happy that we were brought to these places despite telling our guide that we did not want to do so.

In Monaco, we had signed up for a tour to St. Paul de Vence, which was cancelled due to lack of interest; therefore we walked around Monaco and even gambled in the Casino.

In Civitavechhia and Messina we took the train. Both worked out well with no difficulty. We were able to enjoy Rome and Taormina respectively with plenty of time. In Rome, we had made reservations for the Scavi Tour and that was one of the highlights of the trip.

In Corfu we rented a car from Sunshine Rentals. No problems with that. However, it started to storm so we returned the car early and got back to the ship.

I opted not to go out in Dubrovnik for the same reasons. The skies were dark and lightning was quite frequent. My husband took the HAL bus to the City and then walked the walls. The sun came out a ½ hour prior to sailing.

In Venice we bought a 3-day Vaporetto pass and used it to get around. I think the price was 31 Euros and gave us unlimited rides. The walk from the port to the Piazzale Roma to get the vaporetto is about 20 minutes. For those who were mobility challenged, there was a private water bus company “Alilaguna” that got you to St. Marks Square and back for 11 Euros round trip. No passes on this line. We were able to do the Secret Itineraries of the Doges Palace and visit St. Marks, have lunch in St. Mark’s Square listening to the music by Florian’s Caffe and toured a number of other landmarks. Venice is magical!

In Split we toured Diocletian’s Palace, but there was not much else to see. The waterfront promenade is pretty with its restaurants and nice shops.

In Mykonos I went shopping. It was glorious. Jim went to Delos and afterwards, we met up and had dinner at Little Venice. A seafood pasta that was delicious.

In Santorini we took a ship excursion and then walked around Oia and Fira before heading back on the cable car.

Both my husband and I came down with colds on the last few days of the trip. This put a damper on the end of the trip. We are still trying to get over them.

On the last day in Venice for disembarkation, we opted to take the transfer to the Piazzale Roma for $15 per person. We were told that there would be few if any taxis at the port. However, when we disembarked, there were quite a number of taxis. However, we got on the bus and were dropped off at the far end of the Piazzale Roma, as far away from the taxi stand as you could get. We had quite a bit of luggage and had to lug it across the whole parking lot only to find out that there were no taxis in sight. We waited 45 minutes for a taxi. So those who are considering this arrangement, think again. In retrospect, I would have pre arranged a taxi to meet us at the port.

We stayed at the Courtyard by Marriott near the Airport that night because we had an early flight the next morning. I can’t say enough good things about this property. It was sparkling clean, the staff was friendly and helpful and there was a restaurant attached to the hotel that served fresh tasty food. Our plans to go back to Venice did not materialize because we were both feeling quite sick from our colds. So we went to sleep for the afternoon.

In the morning we took the complimentary shuttle to the airport.

Our flights home were on Iberia. They were even better than the out bound flights on American. We were again in Business Class. We flew from Venice to Madrid, then to Miami and then American to Jacksonville.

Finally on Wednesday morning we drove home after a good night’s sleep in Jacksonville.

I was glad we opted for the unlimited laundry and pressing. Our clothes were clean all the time and it made me realize that I brought too many clothes with me.

I was also glad we toured on our own. We enjoyed exploring places the tours didn’t go and not being part of the crowds.

In summary, the Zuiderdam is in good shape and we enjoyed this trip immensely. IT WAS THE TRIP OF A LIFETIME AND I HAD THE TIME OF MY LIFE.

Terri

[johnlcruise]

Enjoyed reading your review.Thanks for taking the time.

[Jen&Joe]

Thanks for posting your experiences. It sounds like you had a fantastic time. We will be on the Zuiderdam in 2.5 weeks so it was nice to read your review. I fear we will end up with the AYW dining as well. Did you find that you had to call early in the morning to guarentee your table with your requested server?

[Cruzin Terri]

Thanks for posting your experiences. It sounds like you had a fantastic time. We will be on the Zuiderdam in 2.5 weeks so it was nice to read your review. I fear we will end up with the AYW dining as well. Did you find that you had to call early in the morning to guarentee your table with your requested server?

I would suggest you call early. I would also suggest that you talk to Afton, the dining room manager and ask him if you can have a standing reservation for a certain table at the same time every evening. He did it for us. However, if there is a night you do not expect to eat in the dining room, make sure you let him know. If something comes up and you find you will not be there, call the dining reservation number (88) and let them know. The fellow that takes the reservations in the afternoon (Matt) is very accommodating. I suggest you become friends with him. He sets up the tables as they become vacant. Ask your server who he is. He is a BIG help.

Terri

[jjb415]

Thanks so much for taking the time to write the report of your experiences on the Zuiderdam. It was helpful to me and I'm sure will be helpful to many others !! :)

[formercruisestaff]

Thanks so much for taking the time to document your experiences....

 

 

I FLY OUT TO BARCELONA ON FRIDAY AND I AM SO EXCITED :D

[Sunshinecrew]

Great report Terri! We were on the Barcelona to Venice portion of the cruise with you. We had no problem with seating at any hour. Never had to wait though on three occasions we chose to sit with others to avoid even a small wait and just to add someone new to talk to. But we did have problems with service, especially as you noted, with the wine stewards and getting drinks in a timely manner.

 

We may have been near you on occasion as we too had the same server a couple of times that you mentioned.

 

My review is here:

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=847665

[DMorris]

I have read a lot of complaints about the sewer smell aboard the Zuiderdam... did you notice this at all during your trip? I enjoyed reading your review. Thank you for sharing.

[Sunshinecrew]

I have read a lot of complaints about the sewer smell aboard the Zuiderdam... did you notice this at all during your trip? I enjoyed reading your review. Thank you for sharing.

 

Not at all onboard and we were on deck five where the previous poster stated they had a problem.

 

The only place I smelled sewer was when we got off the ship at the dock in Katakolon. A sewer odor was in the air. Perhaps they were emptying.

[Cruzin Terri]

I have read a lot of complaints about the sewer smell aboard the Zuiderdam... did you notice this at all during your trip? I enjoyed reading your review. Thank you for sharing.

I did not notice smell of sewerage at all on the ship. However, on both stops in Katakolon, it was noticeable at the dock.

The ship was clean, the glassware and flatware were clean and the ship is in overall good shape.

I must say, I did not look for the negatives and if they were there, they certainly did not manifest itself to me.

My big complaint is more that AYW Dining still needs some tweaking. I will tell you that for the next two cruises I have already confirmed fixed dining. This time, HAL WILL NOT take it away from me.

Terri

[NAJNLA]

My big complaint is more that AYW Dining still needs some tweaking. I will tell you that for the next two cruises I have already confirmed fixed dining. This time, HAL WILL NOT take it away from me.

Terri

 

Hi, Terri-

 

Hmmmm......guess we had a different experience with HAL's version of anytime dining.:confused: We specifically signed up for AYW on this cruise because of our good experience with anytime dining on prior cruises with Princess......mainly because of the flexibility it gave us in planning our day and evening and secondly because we got to meet a lot more people on the cruise. We could go to eat whenever we were good and ready, depending on what we had done that day and which shows we wanted to see that evening.

 

During this particular cruise on HAL, we ate in the dining room 22 nights of the 24 day cruise, and showed up without prior reservations at the dining room at times varying from as early as 5:30 to as late as 8:00, and NEVER had to wait over a minute to be seated. We also always asked to be seated at a table of 6 or 8 and as a result met new friends each night. During the course of the cruise we sat at many different tables and had many different wait staff.....and were well satisfied with the service provided by most of them.....including the famous Hunky Dory!:)

 

Our only minor complaint about the dining room was that we had some difficulty early in the cruise getting a glass of cold skim milk (their first attempt was a room temperature mixture of powdered milk served in a warm glass?) with our meals, but after talking to the Food and Beverage Manager, this issue was pretty well resolved to our satisfaction for the rest of the cruise.:) Every time we saw him in the Lido, Hunky called out our names and often asked if we were still getting our cold skim milk okay.:)

 

Anyway, we thought HAL handled AYW dining very well.....and especially on a port intensive cruise, would definitely request it again.:)

[dforeigner]

Thank you for taking time to write a review.

[Cruzin Terri]

Hi, Terri-

 

Hmmmm......guess we had a different experience with HAL's version of anytime dining.:confused: We specifically signed up for AYW on this cruise because of our good experience with anytime dining on prior cruises with Princess......mainly because of the flexibility it gave us in planning our day and evening and secondly because we got to meet a lot more people on the cruise. We could go to eat whenever we were good and ready, depending on what we had done that day and which shows we wanted to see that evening.

 

During this particular cruise on HAL, we ate in the dining room 22 nights of the 24 day cruise, and showed up without prior reservations at the dining room at times varying from as early as 5:30 to as late as 8:00, and NEVER had to wait over a minute to be seated. We also always asked to be seated at a table of 6 or 8 and as a result met new friends each night. During the course of the cruise we sat at many different tables and had many different wait staff.....and were well satisfied with the service provided by most of them.....including the famous Hunky Dory!:)

 

Our only minor complaint about the dining room was that we had some difficulty early in the cruise getting a glass of cold skim milk (their first attempt was a room temperature mixture of powdered milk served in a warm glass?) with our meals, but after talking to the Food and Beverage Manager, this issue was pretty well resolved to our satisfaction for the rest of the cruise.:) Every time we saw him in the Lido, Hunky called out our names and often asked if we were still getting our cold skim milk okay.:)

 

Anyway, we thought HAL handled AYW dining very well.....and especially on a port intensive cruise, would definitely request it again.:)

Well, the three nights I did not have a reservation and just walked in, the service left much to be desired. The nights I had a standing reservation with Toto, we were served timely and the food was the appropriate temperature.

The nights that we walked in without a reservation we were open to seating with others. We were given a table for 2 on each of these occasions.

I did see people waiting whenever we walked out of the dining room. I did not stop to ask them how long they were waiting. It could have been only a few minutes or they could have just arrived. I don't know.

I am not a hard person to please and usually roll with the punches. I would have been thrilled if I had the same experience as you. Our original intention was to walk in every night but scrapped that after the first few times.

Anyway, we had a great cruise, the ship was in great shape and I had the time of my life.

Sorry we didn't get the opportunity to meet.

Terri

[Sunshinecrew]

Well, the three nights I did not have a reservation and just walked in, the service left much to be desired. The nights I had a standing reservation with Toto, we were served timely and the food was the appropriate temperature.

The nights that we walked in without a reservation we were open to seating with others. We were given a table for 2 on each of these occasions.

I did see people waiting whenever we walked out of the dining room. I did not stop to ask them how long they were waiting. It could have been only a few minutes or they could have just arrived. I don't know.

I am not a hard person to please and usually roll with the punches. I would have been thrilled if I had the same experience as you. Our original intention was to walk in every night but scrapped that after the first few times.

Anyway, we had a great cruise, the ship was in great shape and I had the time of my life.

Sorry we didn't get the opportunity to meet.

Terri

 

When we walked in each night at various hours from 6 to 9, there would be at least one couple ahead of us in each of the two lines and occasionally several parties standing about behind us or sitting along the wall. But I doubt that even had we insisted on a table just for us that we'd have had to wait more than ten minutes. Those nights that they asked if we would like to sit with someone else or wait we just chose to sit with someone else. On the last night when they asked this we said, "No, we've done that three times and tonight would like it to just be the four of us." and they seated us immediately.

 

The service went by the wayside when the tips went to an automatic charge and pooling though I'm sure that there are exceptions and you find a waiter as you did who still tries harder to please.