Here we go! 28-DAY CIRCLE HAWAII, TAHITI & MARQUESAS

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We're in a San Diego hotel in anticipation of boarding the Statendam in the morning (Friday Nov 23) for this wonderful adventure. There's an active roll call going here on CC so we know that around the city excited adventurers are gathering, eating Thanksgiving dinner away from home and picking up last-minute items so they'll be here bright and early and ready for sail away with no last-minute arrival stresses.

 

I hope the internet will permit a live blog; I guess we'll see!

[vicocala]

I'm looking forward to it. Bon Voyage! It will keep me busy during my own countdown.

[erewhon]

Have a fabulous cruise.

 

Will be interesting to read your blog.

[Krazy Kruizers]

Bon Voyage!!

Have a great cruise.

Hope you can do a "Live" blog.

[hal lover]

Bon Voyage! Looking forward to your blog! One day... I want to do that cruise!:)

[ger_77]

Bon Voyage - this itinerary is on my bucket list!

 

Smooth Sailing! :) :) :)

[Viesczy]

Have a great time! We had a great time on our Westy's Hawaii/South Pacific crusie!

 

Derek

[KirkNC]

Bon Voyage! Hope you have a great time.

[solocanadian]

Bon Voyage - have a great cruise. Will be following Captain Albert's blog.:)

[Spinner2]

Good morning from a foggy,yet sunny, morning in San Siego. From our hotel in the Gaslamp Quarters of the city our view is of the Coronado Bridge, not the cruise terminal, but from marine traffic.com http://marinetraffic.com I can see the Statendam in port. We'll enjoy the free, fast Internet at the hotel for a bit longer and then gladly trade it for the joy of being aboard a HAL cruise ship. Giving up fast Internet service is a minor concern when the trade-off is 28 days at sea!

 

We have a bit more luggage than our last cruise, a trans-Atlantic on the Ryndam last May. Some may remember my "triumph" :) at managing a month- long cruise-and-stay over land travel to various points by train with a single 29-pound suitcase plus day bag for my electronics, necessitated by needing to board trains quickly, luggage in hand (and on my back). DH was equally frugal, weight-wise, last time, including a first-ever tux rental from the ship. It all worked out splendidly but this time, able to drive to and from the port with no side trips we've sort of thrown caution to the winds, luggage wise, and I'm somewhat abashed to say that we each have two pieces of luggage, not particularly light, and the ever-present day bags for our electronics.

 

In addition to the usual pleasures of embarkation day I am looking forward to getting our door decoration up. We usually do this, using a wide ribbon loop with an elastic insert on which I fasten seasonally-appropriate items but this year we are going to make our door the equivalent of our Christmas tree at home. Obviously not a tree, the red ribbon will, I hope, if all goes well, feature a big red bow with small ornaments fastened to the loops. I will post a photo if it works out.

[PathfinderEss]

In addition to the usual pleasures of embarkation day I am looking forward to getting our door decoration up. We usually do this, using a wide ribbon loop with an elastic insert on which I fasten seasonally-appropriate items but this year we are going to make our door the equivalent of our Christmas tree at home. Obviously not a tree, the red ribbon will, I hope, if all goes well, feature a big red bow with small ornaments fastened to the loops. I will post a photo if it works out.

Can't wait to see your door decorations, hope you can post a picture of it. Wishing you a great cruise, we did this last year and it was an awesome. Looking forward to your blog. Like to hear more about the Statendam as we are planning to be on her for 31 days next year.

[NoobCruise]

I'm looking at the Statendam right now from our balcony at the Holiday Inn across the street and am drooling, wishing I was boarding her! What a beautiful day to sail out of SD! I wish you all a fabulous cruise!

[HamburgAvonLady]

We just returned from the 30 day on the wonderful Westerdam ---- hope you have the same gorgeous weather we did --- Try the tour with the famous Patrick in Bora Bora --- fantastic tour and wonderful island ! Enjoy ---------

[Spinner2]

My intent to do a daily account of this trip has been somewhat altered by our having no internet connection for the first three days while technical issues having to do with the relationship of the ship’s position to that of the satellite was resolved. So I think I’ll do a quick assessment of a few issues I’ve seen mentioned in regards to the Statendam, San Diego, product sales, etc. and what I’ve personally observed. Then as we start to reach our port stops there may be more value in daily accounts.

 

San Diego Embarkation: We experienced no problems. Boarding and cabin availability was on schedule despite a large turnover in crew here. Apparently customs and immigration worked efficiently in dispatching the previous cruise passengers because they were observed leaving the ship at the usual times.

Mariner Embarkation Lunch was available, with several new menu additions. Service was a little slow (probably the large crew turnover) but the food was delicious.

Passenger Safety Drill was delayed for the arrival of one missing couple; pointed comments were made regarding their continued participation in this cruise but eventually they were found and the drill continued as usual. Silence was required and enforced.

What beverages are included in the cruise fare? has been raised here on CC with the addition of a new filtered water option. I’m sure this varies ship by ship at this time, but after a few days here (with every lunch and dinner service in the MDR for us and the Pinnacle for breakfast) it doesn’t seem to be a big deal. There is a dining steward walking around with the carafe on a little tray. The carafe, by the way, is very attractive! I’m not sure how anyone knows what he’s doing; the carafe is often empty and he’s never actually stopped at our table or any table near us. We did see, across the room, at the Embarkation Lunch, someone purchase the water and we saw them hand over the room card to pay for it. That purchaser certainly knew he’d bought something extra. And we saw a full bottle on someone’s table at breakfast. Water from the usual pitcher is still poured as you sit down to eat; we’ve not been asked if we wanted either bottled or filtered water for an additional charge. And in the same vein, we’ve been served at our request, cappuccino following dinner each night at no additional charge. It’s still on the dessert menu along with everything else that’s available at no charge.

Ship’s condition: Seems fine to us. True, there are some little rust spots here and there. Doesn’t bother us; most are out of eye level. The usual scraping, priming and repainting is going on all around the ship despite the fact that the ship will go to dry dock in a couple of months. The carpets looks ok to us; haven’t seen any rips and the furniture is in good condition. At least all that we’ve seen.

 

The crew is just splendid and that begins right up at the top. Captain Albert Schoonderbeek came to our Meet and Greet and even mentioned us in his blog (hollandamericablog.com/albert). Our roll call had planned on the side, on our roll call site, to help a humanitarian group that serves the Fanning/Christmas Island area; our efforts to work with Seattle to let the ship know of our intentions didn’t pan out but once we were on board the event staff has pitched right in to help; even putting a notice in the daily newspaper about it and inviting any who want to help to do so by contributing items through the room stewards. The help they’ll provide to get these items (mostly school supplies) to shore is invaluable; this will be a tender stop and the water is expected to be pretty choppy. I’m blown away by their willingness to add this task to their already-busy daily chores.

 

Tomorrow we’ll be in Honolulu; we’ve had a fair amount of rough seas and I’m sure many are looking forward to sun and a quiet floor beneath them.

 

This is really shaping up to be a wonderful cruise!

[Spinner2]

Well, this turned into the daily blog that wasn't. I got so caught up in ship activities and soon came to realize that any information I might provide would be fairly useless because really, how often is the weather so bad in the South Pacific that you miss 3 ports--one with weather worse than any local could recall?--surely that won't happen to the rest of you planning this trip and since the Statendam is headed to dry dock, ship information's pretty useless too. So I'll just sum it up by saying that we still loved this cruise. I would highly recommend that anyone with even a tiny interest in sailing and the sea arrange to sail with Captain Albert so you can hear his wonderful explanations of the sea and read about it in the blog that he keeps. You'll learn so much! While we were aboard we got notes from cruise-friends, expressing regrets over our port cancellations and while we were looking forward to these ports, you know . . . it didn't, in the long run, matter very much. They'll still be there for another day and we had wonderful days, doing whatever we did.

 

So, instead I'll offer up another idea: gracious living aboard the ship. Not that there's a thing wrong with cruise ship life as it comes, but I'm the sort that likes a few personal touches--especially when it's nearly Christmas and our home for a whole month is the ship. AND, thanks to a wonderful upsell, we're in a deluxe verandah suite! So, as promised, first up is the photo of our door decoration. Then I'll show your our verandah.

 

 

This is terribly simple to do and leaves no residue on the door for anyone to clean. The ribbon is a loop--you need a 4-yard spool from a craft store--and about 6 inches of elastic. Before you leave home sew the elastic to the two ends of the ribbon after turning back about 3 inches of ribbon at each end so there's a firm surface for the elastic to be sewn to. Then I bought an ordinary purchased Christmas bow at the craft store and took a few little ornaments with me. Before we left I glued our name letters (tiny, from the craft store) to the two sashes on the bow and took a needle/thread with me. Once aboard it took less than 10 minutes to slip the loop over the door and adjust it so the elastic was on the inside of the door, facing the room. I used the twist tie on the purchased bow to secure it to the loop and adjusted it so the peep-hole wasn't obscured. A few stitches with the thread made sure it wouldn't slide down the ribbon and a few more attached the little ornaments I brought. And two tiny stockings! We were very pleased with it; for this year it served as our "Christmas tree" and we got many compliments. I brought it home and next time we cruise at Christmas it can go back up just as it is; it won't need a thing. That paper between our little stockings is a tiny version of "Silent Night" sheet music.

 

Ribbon loops are wonderful for door decorations; they just slip over the door like a ribbon band would slip over a package and anything seasonal--or a notepad, whatever, can be easily fastened to them. For those who like this sort of thing; my guess is that most cruisers don't, although I saw a lot of door decorations on this cruise because it was almost the holidays.

 

Next, the verandah.

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This beautiful cabin class has a verandah large enough to include a table and 4 chairs in addition to the usual deck chairs. It was our intention, and the main reason for paying the extra for the upgrade since it was reasonable, to eat out there a lot. And we did. Even with the rough seas and wind, the port side where we were was usually pretty calm and except for the 2 days or so each side of San Diego, warm. We often took our Neptune coffee out there, ordered in club sandwiches for lunch, had high tea, etc. We'd thought we'd do a course by course dinner but we were enjoying the MDR so much that we just never did.

 

But before we left I thought about the verandah, and the South Pacific, and somehow thought it should be a festive place during this holiday cruise, and I knew that the provided table wasn't particularly pretty. So I got a piece of orange cotton fabric and cut/hemmed a square about 40 inches. It took up no space in the luggage and whenever we were ready to eat or drink out on the verandah I snatched it up from the cupboard by the verandah door and put it on the table, securing it from any wind blowing it overboard with the dish of flowers from the cabin--how nice that the color scheme was a perfect match! We felt so elegant sitting out there, dining in such splendor! I'd thought the cloth could just go into the laundry with our other stuff if it needed it but we were careful and nothing spilled on it--we kept a supply of napkins handy to put under soups and such. Outdoor dining at its most luxurious!

 

[sail7seas]

Thanks so much for the great report and particularly the photos. You made your lovely cabin so 'homey' and warm. Lovely........

[iflyrc5]

Which ports did you miss? We did this cruise a couple years and thinking of doing it in 2014.

[PathfinderEss]

Thanks so much for posting pictures of your door decoration, it is awesome and so is your tablecloth.

Sorry to hear you missed 3 ports, I know on our trip we missed 1 because it was a tender port and no way to get in because of the rough seas/wind. Still all in all I know what a wonderful trip it can be.

Hope the rest of your cruise goes well and thanks so much for the update.

[Spinner2]

Ports we had to miss:

Christmas Island (Channel silted in so water depth was a problem)

Fanning Island was substituted but winds made tender use too dangerous there as well.

Raiatea (not a tender port!)

Rangiroa

 

The Captain's blog provides an excellent explanation of the weather conditions that caused the problems.

 

The failure to make Fanning was disappointing to more than the passengers as our CC Roll Call had a plan worked out to deliver school supplies and such to needy communities in cooperation with the ship's staff, who were wonderful partners in working this out and communicating the plans to other passengers who also wanted to help. Those items are still aboard the Statendam and another attempt will be made to deliver them when the Statendam calls there in February.

 

We sailed in circles near these missed ports, as the Captain explained in frequent updates what the wind was doing and how it was affecting the ship's plans to call at the port in question. Thus, there were many opportunities to take pictures from afar and based on our success in long-distance shots in other situations we may have some nice photos of the area anyway (we're still working through the photos!) although of course that's not like the actual visit. I was particularly looking forward to a river trip on Raiatea, but now we have another reason to try this wonderful cruise itinerary again.

 

Even the ports visited offered their own adventures. The arrival into Papeete was pretty rough; we were all asked to "sit down for the next 20 minutes" as the ship successfully made its way in. However, a missed port call at Fanning had allowed us to do a daytime cruise-by of a seldom-seen island, Starbuck Island.

 

The tendering at Nuku Hiva was very challenging. At the ship side the transfer to the tender was challenging for everyone and downright frightening to watch crew members successfully help mobility-challenged passengers transfer from the platform onto the tender, pretty much carrying some aboard. At the Nuku Hiva side the transfer to land wasn't too bad when the tide was in but in the afternoon, when the tide was out, the step up/down was very steep, even with the box step that is carried on the tenders. This led to very long, slow lines at both the ship and ashore as only one tender can get into the small docking area at Nuku Hiva. Even so, while waiting in the line to reboard we noticed that tenders were returning with some of their passengers who looked at the steep step that would have to be negotiated to go ashore and realized they wouldn't be able to do it, even with the help of the crew.

 

Don't let these anecdotes keep you from considering this wonderful itinerary, though. We heard from experienced sailors in ports that the winds, part of a long chain of weather events that began as far away as north of Alaska, were most unusual, unlike anything seen previously, in their experience.