Review - Westerdam Eastern Caribbean 2/28/2010

[sparky-elpaso]

DH and I went on our first HAL cruise last week – Westerdam Eastern Caribbean February 28 – March 7. We had a wonderful time and will definitely be going on more HAL ships in the future.

 

 

We booked our first veranda cabin and while it was nice we probably will stick to outside cabins from now on. We just didn't use our balcony as much as I thought we might. We were either out and about on the ship or on shore – or occasionally taking a nap in the afternoon.

 

 

Our cabin was beautiful - and the bed – AAAAH! Plenty of storage space and I loved the tub. We were on deck 7 (7098) port side right across from the aft elevators – very handy. We heard very little noise from the elevator area – once in a while I would hear the bell but not often.

 

 

The Westerdam is a gorgeous ship. I drove DH nuts wandering around so I could get photos of as much as possible. Everything was spotless. And the crew is great. Always a smile and “good morning, madame / sir”.

 

 

We had pretty nice weather. Enough wave action to notice but not what I would consider rough seas – and we don't have problems with motion sickness so it didn't bother us. In fact, I miss being rocked to sleep at night.

 

 

I now have to get back on my diet. Although I think we did pretty good in the Lido – tried not to load up too much. I'm now addicted to bread pudding, raisin buns and chocolate croissants. Fortunately, the recipes for the bread pudding and raisin buns are in the cookbook so I can try them. Along with a bunch of other stuff. We only ate dinner in the Vista Dining Room once – the 2nd formal night. We had 2 BBQ's by the pool – very good. The rest of the time it was the Lido.

 

 

We went to 2 of the production shows and enjoyed both of them. The HAL singers and dancers are very talented. Charley and the HALcats played at the BBQ's and Zach the guitarist is really good too. We missed Joel Mason though – it was the night we ate in the Pinnacle Grill and we didn't finish dinner in time. I thought about the 10:00 show but we probably would have fallen asleep in the middle. Maybe next time.

 

 

Of course, dinner in the Pinnacle was incredible. Filet mignon for DH and Steak Diane for me. And onion soup – and crème brulee and chocolate bread pudding.

 

 

I overheard someone say we had 15 kids on board. From what I saw the age range was babies to 12 or 13. All of the children we saw were very well behaved – and of course the little ones were getting lots of attention from crew members. We had one little guy about 2 and his parents on the elevator with us one day who announced at each deck we stopped at that it was “daddy's floor” and then would look and us and tell us it wasn't our floor – in an adorable British accent.

 

 

GRAND TURK

Didn't do a lot here. Checked out the shops, walked along the beach for photos (the area to the right of the dock as you come off) and checked out Margaritaville. Had an early lunch there – expensive, but one of the best burgers I've had in a long time.

 

 

SAN JUAN

The Captain opened up the bow for us so we had a good view of sail-in to San Juan Harbor. WOW – incredible views. The problem with San Juan was we didn't get in until noon. I had a nice walking tour all planned – we did about half of it. Walked along the bay to the Red Gate, up the hill and then to El Morro. At that point we were running out of steam. We're not as young as we used to be, apparently. And arrival time being noon didn't help – if we'd arrived in the morning we probably would have done better. So we caught the next free trolley and went back to the port area. But we saw most of what I wanted to see with the exception of the interior of the 2 forts.

 

 

ST. MAARTEN

We had our only excursion here. The America's Cup Regatta – and I highly recommend it. We had a ball. They pick you up at the dock and you take a small ferry type boat out to the sailboats. We were the first group of the day - 25 from the Westerdam – 13 for our boat, the Stars & Stripes and 12 for Canada II. I was wondering if DH and I (ages 63 and 64) might be the oldest in the group since it's a more physical type of excursion – but we weren't. We did choose to do non-active jobs – he was time-keeper and I was “bar wench”. Ian from England was our captain and there were 2 other crew members. Ian was really good about teaching everyone their jobs – and explaining the why of what they were doing. We had several people in our group who have boats so that helped. And WE WON!!!!

 

 

We looked around the port area a bit and then went back to the ship. Didn't really have time to take the water taxi to town.

 

 

HALF MOON CAY

HMC is everything everyone says about it – and more. It was a little chilly in the morning but started warming up around noon. So not a lot of people were going in the water in the morning. We just walked around a bit, did some shopping and then found a hammock and relaxed until lunch time. We found that getting into a 2 person hammock takes a certain amount of coordination – and it doesn't help much when you're both having a fit of the giggles. But we finally managed and then just kicked back and watched that incredible aqua water. Lunch was good – salads, steak, burgers, chicken, hotdogs, fruit. We shared the island with the Noordam that day but it still didn't seem crowded.

 

 

When we got back to the ship we found the dreaded “LUGGAGE” pads on the bed – a not so subtle reminder that we were on our way home. We decided to pack during the afternoon and get it out of the way. We went to the Lido for dinner rather than the Master Chef's Dinner – it didn't sound like our type of thing. We overheard several people complaining that they had to go back to their cabin after dinner and pack – were we ever glad we had it done. We could go back to our cabin and relax for the rest of the evening.

 

 

We had arranged for the express luggage service and transfer to the airport. So we put our bags out before we went to bed – and the next time we saw them was in El Paso. Leaving the ship in the morning was easy – handed over our customs forms and out the door to the bus.

 

 

My pics of our cruise are at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sparky46/sets/72157623599528928/detail/

[IRL_Joanie]

Awesome review of my favorite ship!! I adore the Westerdam, so it is good to hear that she is still making people happy.

 

I did notice you said "Charley" and the Hal Cats... Did you mean the singer or the Band Leader?? We had a female singer on the 7-21st Feb cruise and David was the Band Leader and he was supposed to be on the ship until November.....

 

May I use your stateroom photos??

 

Joanie

[Riverpig]

Thanks, Sparky for your nice review. My only regret from my last cruise on Westerdam was not doing the America's Cup Regatta in St. Maartin, and now you have doubled my regrets. ;)

[sparky-elpaso]

Awesome review of my favorite ship!! I adore the Westerdam, so it is good to hear that she is still making people happy.

 

I did notice you said "Charley" and the Hal Cats... Did you mean the singer or the Band Leader?? We had a female singer on the 7-21st Feb cruise and David was the Band Leader and he was supposed to be on the ship until November.....

 

May I use your stateroom photos??

 

Joanie

 

Hi Joanie,

 

Charley (Charlene) was the singer and she did all of the intros and used "Charley and the HAL cats" so I don't know if there was another leader other than her. She's great.

 

And feel free to use my photos. If you can't pick them up from Flickr let me know and I'll e-mail them to you.

 

Judy

[Krazy Kruizers]

Welcome home.

 

Glad you had a wonderful cruise.

[woody14h]

We loved your review and thanks for sharing the beautiful pics. Westerdam is one of our favorites as well. We were on her in Nov but couldn't stop at HMC, 40 ft waves. On the Noordam next month, hopefully we'll stop then. Still a favorite and a disappointment when unable to stop.

[IRL_Joanie]

Hi Joanie,

 

Charley (Charlene) was the singer and she did all of the intros and used "Charley and the HAL cats" so I don't know if there was another leader other than her. She's great.

 

And feel free to use my photos. If you can't pick them up from Flickr let me know and I'll e-mail them to you.

 

Judy

 

Ah that explains the Charlie, I never saw her or heard her name. She must be the same singer that we heard from our verandah (just below where they played on the aft Lido). The Band Leader is Daved Brady, he is the black guy and excellent!

 

I was able to download the original size photos and am getting ready to get them up and running, along with your descriptions.

 

ALL of your photos make me long to be back in the Caribbean again, which is quite surprising as I really did not like it as much as Alaska...Ah the fickle mind of a woman:D

 

Thank you so much!!

 

Joanie

[sparky-elpaso]

Ah that explains the Charlie, I never saw her or heard her name. She must be the same singer that we heard from our verandah (just below where they played on the aft Lido). The Band Leader is Daved Brady, he is the black guy and excellent!

 

I was able to download the original size photos and am getting ready to get them up and running, along with your descriptions.

 

ALL of your photos make me long to be back in the Caribbean again, which is quite surprising as I really did not like it as much as Alaska...Ah the fickle mind of a woman:D

 

Thank you so much!!

 

Joanie

 

You're welcome. I don't know if anyone else has ever done this but my sewing kit included a measuring tape and I was curious so I took some measurements.

 

Cabin size - 9 ft x 21 feet

The area that included the closet and bath - 9 ft x about 7 ft

So main cabin size is 9 ft x 14 ft.

 

Veranda - 9 ft x 6 ft.

 

Bathtub is 28 in. x 51 in. - 14 inches deep

 

The 2 beds together - 72 in. wide x 82 in. long

[pj-atsea]

You're welcome. I don't know if anyone else has ever done this but my sewing kit included a measuring tape and I was curious so I took some measurements.

 

Cabin size - 9 ft x 21 feet

The area that included the closet and bath - 9 ft x about 7 ft

So main cabin size is 9 ft x 14 ft.

 

Veranda - 9 ft x 6 ft.

 

Bathtub is 28 in. x 51 in. - 14 inches deep

 

The 2 beds together - 72 in. wide x 82 in. long

 

Good to know, Thanks. pj

[PathfinderEss]

Nice rewiew, thanks for taking the time to posted it and glad you had a great cruise. We sailed on the Westerdam when she was new and yes we thought she was a lovely ship.

[englishtitanfan]

I really enjoyed reading your review and you took some great photo's! Me and my husband will be sailing on the Westerdam on 3/21 to the Eastern Caribbean. It will be our first cruise. Your photos have added to my excitement :)

[sparky-elpaso]

I really enjoyed reading your review and you took some great photo's! Me and my husband will be sailing on the Westerdam on 3/21 to the Eastern Caribbean. It will be our first cruise. Your photos have added to my excitement :)

 

Thanks. I'm sure you will have a great time.

[IRL_Joanie]

You're welcome. I don't know if anyone else has ever done this but my sewing kit included a measuring tape and I was curious so I took some measurements.

 

Cabin size - 9 ft x 21 feet

The area that included the closet and bath - 9 ft x about 7 ft

So main cabin size is 9 ft x 14 ft.

 

Veranda - 9 ft x 6 ft.

 

Bathtub is 28 in. x 51 in. - 14 inches deep

 

The 2 beds together - 72 in. wide x 82 in. long

 

 

WOW!! Great info!! Have it posted !! Thank you! You are one amazing Lady!!!

 

Joanie

[Willsot]

Nice review. From my two cruises on the Westerdam, I have found the crew is hard to beat.

[moethetoe]

DH and I went on our first HAL cruise last week – Westerdam Eastern Caribbean February 28 – March 7. We had a wonderful time and will definitely be going on more HAL ships in the future.

 

 

We booked our first veranda cabin and while it was nice we probably will stick to outside cabins from now on. We just didn't use our balcony as much as I thought we might. We were either out and about on the ship or on shore – or occasionally taking a nap in the afternoon.

 

 

Our cabin was beautiful - and the bed – AAAAH! Plenty of storage space and I loved the tub. We were on deck 7 (7098) port side right across from the aft elevators – very handy. We heard very little noise from the elevator area – once in a while I would hear the bell but not often.

 

 

The Westerdam is a gorgeous ship. I drove DH nuts wandering around so I could get photos of as much as possible. Everything was spotless. And the crew is great. Always a smile and “good morning, madame / sir”.

 

 

We had pretty nice weather. Enough wave action to notice but not what I would consider rough seas – and we don't have problems with motion sickness so it didn't bother us. In fact, I miss being rocked to sleep at night.

 

 

I now have to get back on my diet. Although I think we did pretty good in the Lido – tried not to load up too much. I'm now addicted to bread pudding, raisin buns and chocolate croissants. Fortunately, the recipes for the bread pudding and raisin buns are in the cookbook so I can try them. Along with a bunch of other stuff. We only ate dinner in the Vista Dining Room once – the 2nd formal night. We had 2 BBQ's by the pool – very good. The rest of the time it was the Lido.

 

 

We went to 2 of the production shows and enjoyed both of them. The HAL singers and dancers are very talented. Charley and the HALcats played at the BBQ's and Zach the guitarist is really good too. We missed Joel Mason though – it was the night we ate in the Pinnacle Grill and we didn't finish dinner in time. I thought about the 10:00 show but we probably would have fallen asleep in the middle. Maybe next time.

 

 

Of course, dinner in the Pinnacle was incredible. Filet mignon for DH and Steak Diane for me. And onion soup – and crème brulee and chocolate bread pudding.

 

 

I overheard someone say we had 15 kids on board. From what I saw the age range was babies to 12 or 13. All of the children we saw were very well behaved – and of course the little ones were getting lots of attention from crew members. We had one little guy about 2 and his parents on the elevator with us one day who announced at each deck we stopped at that it was “daddy's floor” and then would look and us and tell us it wasn't our floor – in an adorable British accent.

 

 

GRAND TURK

Didn't do a lot here. Checked out the shops, walked along the beach for photos (the area to the right of the dock as you come off) and checked out Margaritaville. Had an early lunch there – expensive, but one of the best burgers I've had in a long time.

 

 

SAN JUAN

The Captain opened up the bow for us so we had a good view of sail-in to San Juan Harbor. WOW – incredible views. The problem with San Juan was we didn't get in until noon. I had a nice walking tour all planned – we did about half of it. Walked along the bay to the Red Gate, up the hill and then to El Morro. At that point we were running out of steam. We're not as young as we used to be, apparently. And arrival time being noon didn't help – if we'd arrived in the morning we probably would have done better. So we caught the next free trolley and went back to the port area. But we saw most of what I wanted to see with the exception of the interior of the 2 forts.

 

 

ST. MAARTEN

We had our only excursion here. The America's Cup Regatta – and I highly recommend it. We had a ball. They pick you up at the dock and you take a small ferry type boat out to the sailboats. We were the first group of the day - 25 from the Westerdam – 13 for our boat, the Stars & Stripes and 12 for Canada II. I was wondering if DH and I (ages 63 and 64) might be the oldest in the group since it's a more physical type of excursion – but we weren't. We did choose to do non-active jobs – he was time-keeper and I was “bar wench”. Ian from England was our captain and there were 2 other crew members. Ian was really good about teaching everyone their jobs – and explaining the why of what they were doing. We had several people in our group who have boats so that helped. And WE WON!!!!

 

 

We looked around the port area a bit and then went back to the ship. Didn't really have time to take the water taxi to town.

 

 

HALF MOON CAY

HMC is everything everyone says about it – and more. It was a little chilly in the morning but started warming up around noon. So not a lot of people were going in the water in the morning. We just walked around a bit, did some shopping and then found a hammock and relaxed until lunch time. We found that getting into a 2 person hammock takes a certain amount of coordination – and it doesn't help much when you're both having a fit of the giggles. But we finally managed and then just kicked back and watched that incredible aqua water. Lunch was good – salads, steak, burgers, chicken, hotdogs, fruit. We shared the island with the Noordam that day but it still didn't seem crowded.

 

 

When we got back to the ship we found the dreaded “LUGGAGE” pads on the bed – a not so subtle reminder that we were on our way home. We decided to pack during the afternoon and get it out of the way. We went to the Lido for dinner rather than the Master Chef's Dinner – it didn't sound like our type of thing. We overheard several people complaining that they had to go back to their cabin after dinner and pack – were we ever glad we had it done. We could go back to our cabin and relax for the rest of the evening.

 

 

We had arranged for the express luggage service and transfer to the airport. So we put our bags out before we went to bed – and the next time we saw them was in El Paso. Leaving the ship in the morning was easy – handed over our customs forms and out the door to the bus.

 

 

My pics of our cruise are at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sparky46/sets/72157623599528928/detail/

You did a great job on the review and your pictures were magnificent. I can't believe there's another woman out there that takes as many pictures as my wife! good for you.

[sparky-elpaso]

You did a great job on the review and your pictures were magnificent. I can't believe there's another woman out there that takes as many pictures as my wife! good for you.

 

Thanks. I think I took over 1,000 and after deleting, editing I wound up with about 840 or so.

[gaelan]

Sparky-Elpaso,

 

You don't know how much we enjoyed your photos from the Westerdam. We are taking our first HAL cruise in Dec 2010 on the Westerdam....and we are so excited...your photos were fantastic and what a beautiful ship.

[sparky-elpaso]

Sparky-Elpaso,

 

You don't know how much we enjoyed your photos from the Westerdam. We are taking our first HAL cruise in Dec 2010 on the Westerdam....and we are so excited...your photos were fantastic and what a beautiful ship.

 

Thanks. It's a beautiful ship - and the crew is wonderful.

[mrsltg]

Thank you for your wonderful review and photos! My husband and I sailed the same itinerary in November aboard the Westerdam. We had an amazing vacation! Looking at your photos brought it all back to me - oh how I need to book another cruise...

 

Welcome home and thanks again!