Cruising Is Bliss

4 hours ago, westerdam said:

She has NOT been scrapped as of yet. However, it is looking like she will be as she passed through the Suez Canal yesterday and is currently sailing down the Red Sea destination unknown. Chances are the ship breakers at Alang, India though.

Probably. Still intact but she's been toast since last year when Celestyal Cruises parked her and bought the AIDAaura to replace her.

Working on my desktop now.

I got very seasick on my first cruise on the 4th day when we hit bad weather. I had taken Bonine the first day and then stopped and was fine until the storm on day 4. What I've found works perfectly for me is to take one 25mg Bonine an hour before I board the ship. After that, one every 12 hours for the entire cruise.

9 hours ago, 57redbird said:

The only smaller ship I didn't like was the Eurodam.

Same. Did not like Eurodam at all.

Normally captains do three months on, three months off.  A couple of weeks ago she was asked to do two additional cruises this contract. Her 4/17 instagram post was dated day #90 so her final cruise is probably either the one ending 5/05 or the one ending 5/12.

You will not feel crowded. Volendam (and her R-class sister ship Zaandam) have the most common space per passenger of any HAL ships. I was on Zaandam for a 15 day fully booked cruise with 9 sea days and it was fine, no crowding problems at all.

6 hours ago, peterde said:

I remember hearing Capt Kate saying that they don’t use the front of the ship for helicopter evacuation on the Beyond. They prefer using the top deck midship area. 

Yeah, she talked about medical evacuations on one of her daily video reports. They don't use that front deck helipad on Beyond because there's not enough clearance from the superstructure.

1 hour ago, Happy Cruiser 6143 said:

Mercury was my first Celebrity ship.  She's long gone, although we've seen her in her new livery in several ports.

Mercury was my first Celebrity ship too. We sailed on her twice and have very fond memories.

LOL wow Ruth you're fast 🙂

On 4/9/2024 at 8:24 AM, mcrcruiser said:

Personally when we need a veranda on this size ship ,we must buy into a suite where as on the larger ships we can just buy a veranda & not a suite . Additionally , the older ships do not have all the bells & whistles og the newer larger built ships . Both Volendam & Zaandam  were buily in 1999 , That makes them 25 years in service  ,Ships max out at 30 years  ,JMVHO

30 years is pretty pessimistic. The Prinsendam is still sailing at 36.  The old Song of America (my 1st cruise was on her in the 90s) went to scrap in December 2023 at 40 years old.

I'm very happily doing the world cruise on Zaandam in 2026.

I hate that people abuse this because OMG they can't possibly be separated for a minute from their pet and to h*ll with everyone else.

FWIW Max Domi, an NHL player who is Type 1 and was diagnosed as a child, does have a large service dog, a golden retriever.

A service dog for the deaf is trained to alert to specific sounds depending on the needs of their owner, and can be a small dog that would do very well in a stroller in large groups of people.

There's huge potential variance in the weather around Cape Horn and there's always the possibility of storms and gale force winds around Cape Horn even in their summer. In February 2002 on the relatively small Celebrity Mercury, we had mostly blue skies, a faint hint of tiny white caps, and not gale force but it was very windy.

Zaandam, no contest. Bigger cabins, more common space, more outdoor space for viewing the scenery.  I did a 15 night Hawaii cruise on Zaandam a few years ago and it was glorious. Maximum passenger count understates the difference between the ships by a lot. Far fewer passengers spread out over way more "common space" than their newer ships.

You can't buy points, they have to be earned. That's pretty standard in the travel industry. With Holland America, owned by Carnival, money prepays for the cruise, loyalty points are awarded AFTER the cruise, for days sailed plus an additional day credit for every $300 spent onboard. I'm doing a bunch of future cruises on HAL, sharing a cabin with my best friend. If she decides not to go, it doesn't even matter if insurance reimburses her. My fares would still double, because of HAL's solo supplement which my travel insurance would pay to HAL because I specifically have that covered in our policies. HAL would not give me days sailed points for the empty bed in my cabin, no matter who paid for that bed.

7 hours ago, FOXTROT said:

I know they don't transfer but a friend insists they did at one time. Does anyone know if they ever did? 

Never. Your friend has probably fallen into the assumption that reciprocal status would start with that many points on the other line and remembers it that way.

My first RCI cruise was before they bought Celebrity and reciprocal status has never had points attached to it. Your first cruise on the 2nd line earns your first points on the 2nd line. Your status on the 2nd line has never increased at all until you have earned ALL the points by cruising on the 2nd line, that the 2nd line requires for the higher status.

Since the package is unlimited laundry per room, not per person, we each send a bag every day. Even if all that's in a bag is underwear, socks, and a t-shirt, it still goes. Cuts way down on packing.

8 hours ago, islandwoman said:

I understand that HAL will not be taking bookings until May.  I have asked our TA to waitlist us for it.  Does anyone know whether HAL is taking waitlists?

You need to make a minimal place holder "future dam" refundable deposit to get in line for when actual booking opens for people who are not on the current world cruise. For the 2026 WC it's $200 which is applied to your booking.

9 minutes ago, Gail & Marty sailing away said:

It's addicting.

I know and this just might be the first of several WCs 🙂

49 minutes ago, KU1and2 said:

The Suez Canal again.?  Third year in a row……….

The current WC was massively re-routed and went nowhere near the Red Sea & Suez Canal.

Pete (the inside cabin) did a detailed report of Gus's presentation on 2026 and his Q&A. HAL is reviewing the itinerary for 2025 now and will probably make similar change away from the Red Sea & Suez Canal for 2025.

Thank you for taking the time to do this!

I'll be there. My first WC!

10 hours ago, Ipeeinthepools said:

 

That's the problem.  In just a few years everyone will be a 4* and then HAL will need to water down the benefits of the program.  4* will become the new 2*

Yeah. I'll go from 2* to 4* just this summer.

3 hours ago, The-Inside-Cabin said:

I was off the ship last year.    Don't recall seeing any photos.    I will check out old blogs 

 

Kimberly is a great Cruise and Travel Director.   Infectious enthusiasm!  

 

All the games were pretty crowded most of the night.  
 

They had deep fried Mac and Cheese Balls,  mini corn dogs, mini sliders, popcorn, cotton candy, candy apples, mini pulled pork sliders., ice cream in waffle cones.   More pics later. 
 

deep fried Mac and cheese was a first for me.  
 

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/186033/fried-mac-and-cheese-balls/

From Capt Mercer's blog on the 2015 WC ...

https://captainjonathan.com/ashdod-5th-haifa-6th-and-kusadasi-8th-april/

https://captainjonathan.com/8th-april-kusadasi-and-ephesus/

The post before those two was the Suez Canal transit.

10 hours ago, Rubyfisch said:

I wonder if it is the mocktail price. We have it booked for our May sailing as well - maybe I'll be about do some more math and figure out, as I'm not sure we are going to have much else onboard spending other that and gratuities.

The spend day calculation package for booze packages is 15 drinks up to the per drink limit for whatever package you have. 15 x the most expensive drink your package covers x the number of days. For the quench package that would appear to be mocktails? Is there any limit on number of drinks for anything covered under the quench package?

You get the full benefit of what would have been separately paying for each thing in Have It All. The drink package benefit calculation is 15 drinks per day at full price and that's a big number.