Review of Lanai cabin on the Maasdam

My husband and I have been on well over 100 cruise on various cruise lines. Most recent cruises have with Holland America Line.

 

On our recent cruise on the Maasdam, we received an upsell offer for a lanai cabin.

This is my review of that cabin.

 

The first day on board while unpacking we noticed that the desk/vanity is smaller than most other outside cabins. There are no drawers for cosmetics. The couch is a very small two seater.

No explanation was provided on how to get into the cabin from the deck. A fellow passenger told us that we would be getting keys from the front desk. The key card did not arrive until the following day and then only one was provided.

 

The first night we heard a very strange knocking noise and finally discovered that it was the lanai door rattling with the wind. In addition, when the wind was high, it whistled over the top of the lanai door and out the hallway. I reported the loose door to the front desk on the second day of the cruise and they promised to have maintenance tighten the door. The door was finally fixed two days before the end of our 28 day cruise.

 

Voices of everyone passing on the deck can be heard clearly in the cabin as well as footsteps of the walkers on the deck. We have previously sailed in cabins on lower promenade without lanai doors and there was never a noise issue.

 

Our cabin happened to be under a tender. ( I know, I know, big tactical error.) On days when we were using tenders we were awakened at 6 AM by the screeching of the davits and the voices of the crewmen calling to each other and using the the walkie talkies at full volume. During the lowering to water level, (which occurred a full hour or more after waking us) and raising of the tenders we were not allowed out on deck. This is, of course, for safety, however, our boat had mechanical issues in two ports and remained in a partially lowered position all day, thus not allowing us to use our deck chairs. One of these days was in Lahaina, Maui, where the whales were all around the ship. It would have been nice to be able to sit on deck in our deck chairs and watch them.

 

Every morning the deck crew washes down the deck at 5:30 AM! One morning, they sprayed our lanai door three separate times with the hose on full spray mode. I would just be falling back to sleep when they would start spraying the door again. I notified the front desk and they said this was a one time special cleaning operation. They gave us a gift for our inconvenience.

 

The routine spraying continued at 5:30 AM throughout the cruise and we had two more episodes of window spraying. I finally was so annoyed one morning when the crewman was outside the cabin spraying a metal drain for 10 straight minutes, that I opened the lanai door and told the crewman that people were trying to sleep. He went away.

 

The beds in these cabins are located on the side walls rather than on the outside wall like other cabins on this deck and as a result, every time a toilet nearby flushes, you hear it. This can make sleeping soundly difficult.

 

I would NEVER pay for this type of cabin again. The private deck chairs are very underutilized and not worth all the inconvenience and lack of privacy.

In my opinion, these cabins are not worth the substantial premium they put on them and are no larger than any other cabin on lower promenade deck. Category EE, E and D cabins are much less expensive and offer the same views without all the noise.

 

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

Thank you for taking the time to write your review of your lanai cabin.

I know I would never book one.

Hope you enjoyed your cruise and ports.

We did enjoy this cruise to the South Pacific very much.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

Thanks for the details. Sorry you had this unfortunate experience. I can see why this "lanai" experiment did not go beyond just a few ships, now both for sale. Many report they love them so it still looks like a hit or miss experience. Could be some locations are better than others.

 

Ship's activities - lowering tenders and anchors - can't be avoided, but you offer good caution for those who have cabins located in these areas. Once on the Volendam leaving Vietnam they had to blast the ship's horns every few minutes all night long due to all the little fishing boats in the area. No sleep that night too as we were on an upper deck, but we were the ones entering their waters. That was the price for travel in this part of the world obviously.

I was upgraded to an oceanview cabin on the same deck before there were the Lanai cabins.

 

I found the OV cabin to be just as noisy as the description of the Lanai cabin.

 

Question for the OP: You said you would have liked to have been able to watch the whales from your deck chairs. I wonder if you would have been able to do so as the deck is still a public deck and other passengers are still allow to walk and stand at the railings in front of the Lanai cabins. I imagine that you still would not have been able to watch the whales from your chairs if

there were other passengers also on deck and at the rail.

On this cruise the whales were playing all around the ship while we were anchored off of Lahaina, Maui and were there all day. Not that many people onboard at any one time.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

Never did like those cabins on the Promenade Deck, for that very reason.

Allan

Having been on 3 cruises on the Maasdam in the last two years, two Caribbean and one Alaska, we had the Lanai cabin on the Caribbean and a OV on the Alaska. We liked the OV much better. Much quieter and if we were changing clothes at night we didn't have to close the curtains, I know I scared a few people when I forgot to close the curtains and came out of the shower locker into the room in my birthday suite! [emoji33]

The few positive things I can say about the Lanai cabin are, easy access to the promenade for walking around the deck(DW loves walking). No smoking allowed (that's a big one for me, balconies, heavy smokers next door, you get the idea). Reserved deck chairs, we really enjoy sitting in the chairs watching the sea go by, reading, napping. On sea days the reserved deck chairs come in handy. Other than that, I agree with trident, them some small and noisy cabins, and the sliding doors are really heavy and not easy to open.

I'm glad to hear the you enjoyed the South Pacific, our dream cruise is to do "The Tales of the South Pacific " cruise, if HAL brings that one back.

Thanks for your review.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

The problems began when the ship's designers decided that the deck with the exterior promenade would be staterooms instead of public rooms. In addition to the noise, there is also the issue of privacy (real or perceived). It seems so obvious now that this was a very poor design decision, which fortunately has been fixed on the newer ships.

 

igraf

Thank you for your detailed review of a lanai cabin on the Maasdam. My wife and I were seriously considering to book one of these cabins for a 2018 Incan Empires Cruise. When making inquiries on this forum, we received feedback on these lanai cabins. The feedback was generally positive. Your review (and subsequent replies) indicate that we need to look at other options. The Vista Suites, which we have booked in the past, are very desirable and comfortable, but the price tag for this particular cruise is quite prohibitive. We may have to look at other cruise and vacation options. Thank you, again, for your detailed review. You may have saved us a lot of money and grief.

I was upgraded to an oceanview cabin on the same deck before there were the Lanai cabins.

I found the OV cabin to be just as noisy as the description of the Lanai cabin.

We've had 5 LP OV's (not Lanais) and the only time we've been bothered by noise was in the one we had under the galley. Guess our hearing isn't as good as yours. :)

Quite a thorough run-down of the negatives of the Lanai cabins, but one was "overlooked". You can see into them at night from the promenade if there is a light on inside and the curtains are not drawn. Don't be fooled by the mirror glass in the daylight.

This is a great review and analysis of this category of cabin.

 

It gives people a good idea of things to look for when they are booking this type of cabin.

 

Thanks so much for the in depth report.