curiouscat

Reminds me of the "shrimp lady" story... about the woman who would stuff shrimp and everything else off the buffet into her purse....

Hoarding food on a cruise ship makes no sense and is tres gauche...

I guess I'll be sticking to diet... 3 square meals.. mo big deal :D

CC

On our first Princess cruise, we were amazed at the variety of high-quality items available in the International Café, 24/7, at no charge, refreshed frequently, changing throughout the day. It may seem like a small thing, but the IC was one of the most pleasant features of our initial Princess experience, and frankly when we had to choose between HAL and Princess for our Alaska cruise this year, our fond memories of the IC were a major factor in choosing Princess. The idea of having to pay for a cookie in Explorations - or else trek down to the Lido - is pretty off-putting. How many other cruise lines charge extra for a cookie?

Thanks I agree.. It's ridiculous. I've sailed all the major mass market brands and can't see paying for a cookie or pastry for that matter..

We love the IC and the wine bar... at the wine bar u just buy a glass of wine and u get tapas and sushi.. many times they get to know u and will give u the food even if u didn't buy wine....

I will report back as I know I will get a cookie w/out paying....:D I have my ways....

CC

Thanks everyone.. it's smilier to the other lines... Princess use to have the most liberal allowance( we use to bring 6 bottles on) until they changed to 2 per person...

CC

Uh no! On the Breeze, we had to purchase the treats. I don't remember any free treats on Princess aside from what was available at the Lido.

 

 

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On Princess to the right of the coffee is pastries in the AM and all day is sandwiches and salads offered for free. Many times I just eat a light lunch there....

I am not a "Lido" person... I maybe eat at the buffet once or twice on a 7 day cruise....

CC

Perhaps HAL will simplify it and just sell coffee there. Problem solved

NO... every ship has a venue w pastries in the atrium... what is this the dark ages

I have seen people load up a plate of cookies to take to their cabins to save for later. They even admitted that they had zip lock baggies for this purpose. I have never asked for a goodie reserved for the Explorations Cafe intended for coffee purchasers, but I have often purchased coffee there, and it was always fantastic. Even the Irish Coffee! Yum! If you think you need to take goodies from the coffee island case, go to the lido for christ's sake. Who doesnt know these rules?? Any star mariner would . If you go to a starbucks, you purchase a scone. no difference. it is an extended service. I hate to be negative here, but i dislike even more people who do not understand the cruising etiquette.

I'm beginning not to like this cruise already.. this is not cruising etiquette.. it's just "rules" set by folks that want to control others.. I 'm old enough to take care of myself and get what I want.. I guess I'll get order 2 dozen of everything

Way way too uptight around here... geez

CC

But who wants to go to the "lido" which I assume is the buffet... every major CL has a coffee/pastry shop... the only charges are for coffee/ specialty tea etc.

Paying extra for food because someone didn't get their crumpet...

CC

This is my first HAL cruise... I"m on # 39... never ever heard of having to purchase standard cookies , pastries etc.... that is lame if this is true.

CC

Do they typically do that? I don't recall other ships doing that post dry dock. And what is SMH?

Yes.. inaugurals and refurbs they will do an industry sailing. Most were really working there touchys off to bring back the most info, pics etc for guests. It was two days but most days I was working.... seeing rooms, going to meetings etc.. yes we had fun but that was to make sure the RCL experience was up to PAR. and yes.. the ice show was great the parades great... dining room had some improvements...

I would recommend Freedom any time of day.. this was my 4th time on her

CC

PS is SMH.. is Shaking My Head... meaning someone pointing a negative when not needed

Maybe they should have done a sea trial instead of taking her on a joy ride for VIP's. Just saying. :banghead:

That is why they did this "joy ride" .... it was to get the crew up and running, so the crew marine safety tests, training etc while we were on board ...SO u the clients could get the best RCCL experience.....SMH !!!!

CC

I'm not sure if the speculation comment was aimed at me, but I only passed on information from the Captains Corner and a discussion with Chief Engineer afterward. I am sorry I mentioned the slight possibility of a dry dock, since it got so many people wound up. I admit that was my educated opinion.

 

Unlike the travel agents on the 2 nighter, I am a retired engineer, have been on 20 cruises, and have a good grasp of technology. I noticed there were only 2 prop wash wakes behind the ship last night and wanted to find out why.

I was on the 2 nighter in an aft balcony deck 9.... there was a full wake. During the night we were up to at least 20 some odd knots.. other wise he was booking... However, we did feel quite a bit of vibration... even the ceiling panels were vibrating..

This was our first "aft" cabin and don't know if this is common... we won't take another aft cabin again due to the vibration..

Doesn't anyone read their cruise contract or go on the cruise company site? It is all there.

 

DON

Ouch.. thanks for the welcome...:eek:

CC

Welcome to Cruise Critic and to HAL.

 

We were on the Westerdam in Alaska last July and loved it.

 

Here is a link to my photographs of the Westerdam to give you a good tour of the ship:

 

http://www.rogerjett-photography.com/travel-2/ms-westerdam-pre-2014-dry-dock/

 

To give you an idea of on-board activities, here is a link to all of our On Locations (daily activities) from last year:

 

http://www.rogerjett-photography.com/travel-2/alaska-2014-westerdam-on-location-daily-activities/

 

For some help in your planning, here are the current Specialty Restaurant, Beverage, and Room Service (24/7) menus:

 

http://www.rogerjett-photography.com/specialty-2/hal-regular-and-specialty-restaurants/

The room service menu is so much better than Princess, RCL or X....

CC

Welcome to Holland America! You are allowed to bring on 1 bottle of wine per person on embarkation only. After that, you will be charged corkage at $18 per bottle.

 

Smooth Sailing! :) :)

Thanks... So if I bring on 4 bottles for 2 people they will charge me the $18 at the pier for the other 2 bottles even if I drink it in the room ?

CC

This will be my first HAL cruise March 22 on Nieuw Amsterdam...

Can u bring wine on board at embarkation? And if so how much ?

TIA

CC

Oh we had ,I believe, 7286 on Reflection.. It was great... larger balcony.. near the elevator and the coffee machine in the Hideaway... we loved it.

CC

Is it charge for food ???

CC

Karen

On my last sailing on Reflection I tried to get info but they had none.. they said corporate is the last one to let them know.. they say TA's and the trade find out before they do...:eek: SMH !!!

CC

It's up to Congress.. I may be long gone from the earth by the time we see that happen.. and I'm 50 ! :D

I would love to go... everyone else can go except the US...:(

CC

Got home after staying a few extra days in Florida after debarking from the November 21 - December 1, 2014 10 Night Celebrity Equinox cruise.

 

The cruise was good but after sailing both an M class and now an S class ship, it's clear that Celebrity isn't our cruiseline of choice.

 

Embarkation: Was smooth and pretty easy. We arrived around 10:30 and even with parking the car in lot 18 (ship leaving from 19), we were onboard by 11:25am. There were 5 security stations on our side of the building and I'm guessing 5 on the other side. There was not a lowered check in desk for the wheelchair line (it was regular height) nor did they offer a clipboard so my mom could sign the health questionaire. Otoh, the check in lady didn't bat an eyelash when I signed both mine and my mother's forms. When we got to the ramp, I was very happy to have 2 gentlemen push my mother's wheelchar as there were 4 long ramps up and they were at times quite steep. It would have been extremely difficult for my father and I to manage.

 

Cabin: We had accessible cabin 1028 (Concierge). The cabin itself was nice - spacious with more than adequate turnaround space for the wheelchair. The bathroom was very accessible though the shower area seemed more enclosed that it needed to be (considering it's a roll in shower). I found the main beds on the hard side and the duvets were very heavy. There wasn't as much closet or drawer space that I've experienced on other ships. There was also a weird lump in the floor in the short hallway between the entrance door and the bathroom. Made for a bad bump when pushing the wheelchair into the cabin.

 

The third bed: This cabin should not be sold as sleeping 3. The third bed is a fold out chair. When made up, the mattress is no more than 10 inches from the floor. It's closer to a camping mattress than a cruiseship bed. We returned to the cabin around 11pm the first night to see this attrocity and called down to guest services. It took several attempts before we could get anyone to understand or take any action. Finally around 1am, they came up with a second mattress for the bed that took it up to about 16 inches off the floor. We requested a rollaway bed for subsequent nights and after much back and forth with the housekeeping manager, we finally recieved one after late dinner on night two. For this reason alone, I will not book an accessible cabin for 3 people on an S class ship. (at least on the Summit, the 3rd bed was a fold out couch). I have never experienced a third bed that was so poorly designed or executed (and yes, I do have pictures and yes, I will be posting them).

 

Entertainment: If you didn't go to the main shows, there wasn't much that was going on. I'm not a fan of old style music ("Can I have this dance, for the rest of my life"). We're also not drinkers and it felt really limiting to find anything besides drinking and shopping on this cruise. The "speaker" was absymal (and there was only 1 lady on this cruise), the movies in Celebrity Central were generally second class (with a couple of exceptions like Malicifient and Non-stop). We spent a lot of time in the casino but that wasn't even that great (it was the tighest of any cruiseship I've been on and the machine selection was only okay). You could see that they had a bunch of old school 3 reel machines that were rarely ever played. They had a few popular modern mutli-line machines but even then, not much that I'd say is "new" (they had a couple of sex in the city, hangover, and breakfast at tiffany's machines and those were the newest and are at least 3 years old). Trivia was usually once a day and held by the pool (mostly musically inclined). There were many days that we'd go through the Celebrity Today and realize there was nothing that interested us.

 

Food:

 

Room Service - breakfast on our first sea day was not good. Our room steward had a number of trays on a cart and I'm guessing that he was delivering several cabins at a time. Ours came cold and with a lot of issues. The poached eggs came floating in water so when the yolk was broken, it was like egg soup. The yogurt was sour. The scrambled eggs and asparagus were very uncooked and because they were cold, they had congealed to a gloppy mess. The rye toast was only toasted on 1 side, and it was cold and hard. We only ordered room service breakfast once. Room service the rest of the time was good to great. The burger was available served medium and came hot and juicy, the chicken sandwich and ceasar salad with grilled chicken both came with large pieces of broiled, white meat chicken that were tender and hot. Pizza was okay but not as good as on the Summit.

 

Buffet - we had the buffet for lunch a couple of times, breakfast a few times and dinner twice. Meals were all good to very good. Lots of made to order options like pasta, stir fry, and at dinner, steaks, chicken, pork. Only issue is seating. often at lunch, seating was at a premium and difficult to find.

 

MDR - it was hit or miss. Most cruises we eat in the dining room every night but this cruise it wasn't a priority because it wasn't anything special. Service was meh, food was sometimes good and sometimes only adequate (and a few ick). We were in a small alcove on 3 just to the right of where you come in, it had low ceilings and the room didn't feel any different than any other land based restaurant - certainly not any grand dining experience.

 

High Points:

 

Cafe Bacio - once again, this is a standout on the Celebrity line. Fantastic coffee beverages, friendly wonderful service and tasty, free desserts and treats. Was my go to place for coffee and a baked treat for breakfast (while my parents enjoyed the buffet and fresh made eggs). Sometimes difficult to find a seat but usually waiting 5-10 minutes a table or space would open up. We shared our table with a number of people throughout the cruise.

 

On demand tv - worked very well. From ordering room service, to reviewing the onboard account, to free movies and other interesting shows and tidbits - everything worked well and made things very convenient.

 

Non-alcoholic beverage package - loved that there's a package for water, soda, and specialty coffees. We had 2 classic alcohol packages (we had a few drinks during the week maybe 9 drinks the entire 10 days between the 2 of us - amaretto sour, vodka sour, bahama mama, pina colada) and the third person had the classic non-alcoholic package which does suit our patterns.

 

I have lots of pictures which I will post once I've loaded them into my computer.

Nice review.. just curious what is your CL of choice? Do you Prefer Princess or HAL ?

CC

We were on the Century in Australia/New Zealand a few years back during Chanukah...and they had a Rabbi onboard from Tulsa, Oklahoma...It turns out that he was the Rabbi who had officiated at the Funeral for my Uncle-who lived in Tulsa-and he and his wife knew my Uncle and Aunt very well...Small world...

Wow, a small world indeed. I was on Azamara in the Med this May and ran into a woman who's family owned the venue where my hubby's cousin got married in Chicago. And the families were close friends with hubby's Aunt and Uncle... It was hysterical...

They will definitely have some type of service and the Menorah will be electric... lit each evening.

We were just on Reflection and they had a nice Shabbat service and it was interesting since there were Jews from all over the world.. I just love Shabbat services on board. ( Don't go at home).

CC

PS remember who CEO of RCCL is... Adam Goldstein :D

On the Emerald what balconies are not covered? Is it Dolphin ?

Is the Emerald deck covered or open..looking for the most privacy. TIA

CC

Has Host Andy said if he found out where Perry Grant will be playing on Eclipse once Cellar Masters is converted to the Gastro Bar this coming April?

Are all the Cellar Masters being converted to Gastro bars ?

CC

What a wonderful post. Thank you. :)

Jules

I wanted to respond to you about a post on the "other" thread that closed. I've been on these boards for quite some time . I want to assure you not to be concerned about those negative nellies. We just got off the Reflection and met many wonderful people.

Enjoy your cruise and ignore those :eek: folks.....:p

CC