OlsSalt

I have been ordering them on HAL for years now, just to see their evolution. First one was a stuffed large green bell pepper that had been tempura battered to look like a giant baseball. Others never quite got the cheese melted. Or kept using the"wrong " chile. Last on on the Konigsdam was getting better, but still way off the real deal when it is well executed Mexican cuisine. But it was a reasonably tasty, battered fried cheese stuffed pepper. Kind of. Just need to change expectations, when ordering to what it says it is: a cheese stuffed pepper.. Providing full vegetarian options has been a challenge though the "crew food" puts this out everyday. HAL's attempts for the MDR often are a nice change of pace, even for non-vegetarians. Providing full vegan an even greater challenge I am sure. I remember when "vegetarian" meant only a plate of steamed vegetables, by special order ...... way back when on HAL ships.

Quick price scan; balcony cabin - 11 day Eastern Canada New England Oceania - $650 a day HAL Voldendam - $230 a day

There are as many Beef Stroganoff recipes as there are electrons on the internet. Start at the bottom with Betty Crocker "classic" and work your way on up: https://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes/classic-beef-stroganoff/c17a904f-a8f6-48ae-bedb-5b301a8ea317

Old cruise line trick seen across brands for decades - change the menu item name, but still serve basically primarily chicken, beef or fish. Wait until you order their "chile rellenos". You will get a cheese stuffed chile - so truth in advertising is not 100% compromised. But you will need to wait until you can visit La Simpatia in Guadalupe, CA for the real deal. This is not a fine dining cruise line nor does it pretend to be, even though it can do some dishes very well. Best liver and onions at sea in my book, but that is more of their Dutch pride heritage showing than anything else.

Lobster rolls were created to get rid of the junk broken lobster they could not sell as whole pieces. Canny marketing.

Here is the cruise port calendar for Santa Barbara in October. Celebrity is a new addition with three stops; Royal Caribbean too. The growth of the larger ships coming into Santa Barbara may have raised the local alarms. I see Konigsdam is still on for November, but alas the Noordam for early October has gone missing for good. 10/02/23 Celebrity Eclipse - 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, capacity - 2,850 10/03/23 MS Regatta - 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM, capacity - 824 10/04/23 Seabourn Venture - 8:00 AM to 7:00 PM, capacity - 300 10/06/23 Radiance of the Seas - 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, capacity - 2,501 10/10/23 Celebrity Eclipse - 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, capacity - 2,850 10/17/23 Celebrity Eclipse - 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, capacity - 2,850 10/20/23 Seabourn Odyssey - 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM, capacity - 450 10/24/23 Crown Princess - 7:00 AM to 5:00 PM, capacity - 3,080 10/31/23 Crown Princess - 7:00 AM to 5:00 PM, capacity – 3,080

Many smaller ships would come to Santa Barbara, largest has been Princess ships -maybe 3000 passengers? But others are the boutique lines under 900, or the smaller HAL ships under 2000. We had 20 cruise ships this year so far -- not sure if only HAL was cancelled for the end of the shoulder season. Time will tell over the next month or so. Santa Barbara does require a long, and often rough tender ride. And we have seen in the past high winds that make re-connections to the ship very problematic. We watched one tender take and hour to finally re-board due to high waves and swells. It think it was luckily only the crew members onboard as the last one to embark again.

Coastal Calif cruises mainly serve the Alaska-Caribbean re-positioning shoulder seasons. Not yet a destination in themselves, since it requires the "foreign port" stop. Ensenada, Mexico a few miles south of San Diego has served this purpose for some and underwent a remarkable transformation from a very dusty little town known mainly for college kids going to drink beer at Hussong's.. I don't get the impression Ensenada is banning cruise ships. Yet.

Port Hueneme, south of Oxnard/Ventura, Calif, is a natural deep water commercial port which would appear on face value to have great potential as a regional Central California cruise port . However, ChengKP, our resident technical expert, lays out a good case why this would not be feasible, regardless of desirability of location and geology. Primarily because of the potentianlly dangerous cargo this commercial port handle. Port San Luis up north from Santa Barbara used to be a major passenger terminal, during the days of small passenger vessels traveling between LA to SF. Only a fishing port now, but has a wharf and a good location for exploring very scenic Central California towns and wine country. (Hueneme: why - knee - me)

Proposed Chumash Marine Sanctuary will cut off all entry into the Santa Barbara Channel from the north. Cruise ships and cargo ships. Pending. Lots of local heay hitters are backing this and the Santa Ynez Band of Indians' Chumash Casino in Solvang has the financial clout to get what they want: https://www.edhat.com/news/northern-chumash-tribal-council-applaud-noaa-marine-sanctuary-plan

Reviews for good food on HAL maybe are relative to other mainline cruise ship offerings. The food on HAL is good and offers decent variety. There is always something to enjoy. We sailed Crystal a few times known for its high end food offerings, and two things happened: you can only eat so much rich food every day, and we found we liked something superior on HAL ships, as well as having more variety. HAL variety particularly shines on the longer cruises when one settles into more limited personal choices, after the novelty of first impression indulgences wears off ... and the pounds start accumulating. I could eat a fresh breakfast crepe with butter, lemon and sugar every single day when on a 7 day cruise; but would pay in pounds if I did this on anything longer. (Boo hoo)

Just one question: Did you leave any plastic ducks for us to find when we board her in a few more weeks? 🤭 Thanks for the good report.

WSJ today touts round-the-world cruising, comparing the low end prices (HAL $23.6K) to high end (Regent - $91K).

I still have my bottle with CocaCola written in Arabic. Our trip was in the late 1960s, after the israeli War and everything was still bunkered, blacked out and sandbagged including the old Cairo Museum with tape across each glass display case. Later trips into Luxor from the Suez Canal port cities also required armed convoys due to domestic terrorism at that time. That said, I still think Egypt is definitely worth the effort and necessary hardships. But safety first.

Start polling for other people's Pinnacle Grill favorites - another menu to pick through carefully. Indulgent as it is, we love the Hanger Bacon as a starter, and after that it almost does not matter what else we order. It is fun food, and that is what the evening is supposed to be about. The Almost Baked Alaska with Cherry Garcia ice cream is not a bad way to put and end to a meal in a nice setting, that at least won't leave you hungry.

Hint: best to keep your expectations about Lido food to hotel banquet level standards; not fine dining. The immense variety of lunch time offerings will soon reveal some steady favorites. As well as one and dones.

Fall Colors: We did one of the last similar HAL New England-St Lawrence cruises before the ship returned to FLL and the colors were brilliant. Can't remember the exact time of the year, but it was the last cruise of that season. Gorgeous weather. Loved that cruise.

Great choice, Hank. Life is too short to make yourself so unhappy.

HAL seems to be recognizing its prior demographics -- a lot of quiet readers, was an early and huge attraction for us.

Be sure to tell them you have special dietary needs before you get on board, as well as follow up once on board. Contact Ships Services I believe, before you board. Helps them prepare for expected numbers of the various variety of dietary restrictions for that particular cruise.

This is great news. Thanks. Do remember how much of a non-fiction section they had?

They do provide the same ship's soap/shampoo products in the spa showers. I just like my own favorites, so I carried them along. I believe there was only a rolled up towel in the locker, but good question to ask one of the attendants about getting a wash cloth.

I hope ChengKP can offer us more insights regarding your report. He has long been the go-to guy on all technical issues onboard ships. We had seriously funky smells from our scuppers once on a cruise making our verandah unusable - the best they offered while on board (Amsterdam -Tales of the South Pacific) was to flush it out frequently and a later compensation. Not pleasant, did not get the cabin we had anticipated but we carried on. And on that cruise into the tropics the verandah was often too hot to even enjoy anyway. We did chalk this up to accepting these things can and do happen on closed system ships. 80% rule. All I can say is I am glad I did not let this one-off experience on a HAL cruise ruin our relationship, feel they did not "care" about us or keep the animosity festering months later hoping to score every tree in the forest. And yes, we too had plumbing issues too and a few days where we had to work around it. There was a siege of posts a number of years back with lots of similar plumbing issues being reported. And then nothing until this one came up again. I see in the dry dock report President of HAL did specifically state they would be modernizing these basic ship utility services on the Vista class ship. Your squeaky will probably played a big part in this.

Why would HAL not fix this? Which the OP claimed HAL refused to do, so he/she was forced to deal with "raw sewage" every day for the entire cruise.

I see they still label one area Northern Lights on the Noordam, which always seemed to be a very underused and wasted space. Transformation in the Gallery Bar for table games and more noisy group activities was a brilliant change. Sorry they did not do this on the Noordam .....yet .