wendybf1

This was posted on HAL's facebook page yesterday:

Hurricane Irma Update 9/11/2017: Holland America Line has one ship, ms Maasdam, scheduled to call in Ft. Lauderdale on Sept. 13. The Panama Canal cruise originated in Boston and is scheduled to embark more guests in Ft. Lauderdale on Wednesday. The ship is safe and currently sailing toward Ft. Lauderdale

If you are scheduled to embark on Maasdam, you should contact your airline to confirm your specific arrangements. We understand that South Florida airports should be operating under typical circumstances starting Tuesday, September 12th and expect airlines to start resuming service as early as tomorrow, depending on the carrier.

Should any adjustments be required to future sailings as a result of storm damage to ports, booked guests and their travel agents will be notified. We endeavor to maintain itineraries as published and will continue to monitor closely.

Our parent company, Carnival Corporation, has already begun outreach and support for those islands already impacted on behalf of the family of cruise lines. They have been in communication with officials in many of the Caribbean islands and have activated a plan to begin delivery of supplies on both an immediate and sustained, longer-term basis. These deliveries will be worked into ships’ cruise itineraries as part of ongoing operations.

Our thoughts and prayers are with all those in communities impacted by Hurricane Irma.

I am booked on the Nov. Koningsdam. I'm actually looking forward to having something additional to do on board. My last cruise on the Noordam left us with nothing but disappointment in terms of the on-board activities. I've never been on the themed cruise before so I might have another opinion after the cruise.

Just got off the Noordam. They had a new option I did not see in the past. You could use a limited free options on your phone/computer/tablet where you could log into the ship's wifi. I used it to look up what was going on that day when activities were etc. Nice thing was the dinning menu for the day was also there, although we found a couple mistakes on it, they dinning room staff said it is new and they aren't used to updating it yet. I also used it to look up my account so didn't have to use that pesky kiosk to print out my statement, it was so up to date I would see the charge for my drink before I got the drink. They also had some other options for free web sites including NYTimes. I would think they might be adding a option for person to person texting.