HAL, you READING this?

[Linda&Vern]

I think this is partly true, and it's upsetting to me too. I'm 23 and my husband is 24. We will be going on our first HAL cruise next week for our honeymoon ( the Zuiderdam ). We normally do RCL but he's in the military, so a Sunday to Sunday cruise wasn't practical when he needs to be at work Monday no questions asked, and we have a layover so any flight issues could cause a problem for him. Last time we had to cancel the final leg of our trip because of a flight cancellation, rent a car, and drive home through the night. We looked at Carnival, but have heard of the " party ship " reputation and that just isn't us. We would rather have a nice relaxing week , enjoying good food, a "classier" atmosphere, and each other's company. I've always heard excellent things about HAL but based on what I've seen lately on these boards I'm a bit worried about our vacation but I am hoping for the best. I think there's still a younger audience of cruisers who value what HAL used to be.

Please don't worry. I think a HAL cruise is a perfect Honeymoon trip. The last time we were on the Z there were several honeymooners on the cruise also.

 

For your info, when we booked our first HAL cruise in 2004 (for Christmas/New Years), everything I read on these boards told me the Maasdam was falling apart, the engines didn't work, the ship was in awful shape. :eek: We had already paid our $$$, so we decided to make the best of it and try to have a Happy Holiday. Guess what? We absolutely loved the ship, had no troubles, and have sailed HAL since then. Have a great cruise!

[Fouremco]

The issue should not be whether HAL is making money or sailing full. The real issue is :"How happy am I sailing with HAL?" Over the years I have been growing increasingly more disenchanted with HAL. I only sail them because they have Catholic Mass. But there are other forms of tourism which also offer that including chaplain-escorted cruises on other lines as well as land travel. I would not give HAL a two-star rating at this point; there has been massive degradation of their product over the years in all aspects -- service, tours, food, shows , lectures and dock or tender locations in port. I still have one lengthy cruise booked but I am open to cancelling if something else comes along.

While we all like to be treated as someone special, the reality is that HAL has no particular desire to keep you the individual happy as long as its broad passenger base is happy. Making money really is the issue for them, as I'm sure its stockholders would support, and sailing full is a means to that end.

[geocruiser]

I think this is partly true, and it's upsetting to me too. I'm 23 and my husband is 24. We will be going on our first HAL cruise next week for our honeymoon ( the Zuiderdam ). We normally do RCL but he's in the military, so a Sunday to Sunday cruise wasn't practical when he needs to be at work Monday no questions asked, and we have a layover so any flight issues could cause a problem for him. Last time we had to cancel the final leg of our trip because of a flight cancellation, rent a car, and drive home through the night. We looked at Carnival, but have heard of the " party ship " reputation and that just isn't us. We would rather have a nice relaxing week , enjoying good food, a "classier" atmosphere, and each other's company. I've always heard excellent things about HAL but based on what I've seen lately on these boards I'm a bit worried about our vacation but I am hoping for the best. I think there's still a younger audience of cruisers who value what HAL used to be.

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I think you will like HAL. If you want to try another main line later, try Princess. They give you onboard credit for being military. This can be combine with other did counts.

14 days or longer $250 per person in the military.

7 - 13 days $100 per person

6 days or less $50 per person

Edited December 14, 2013 by geocruiser

[scamper]

I have said it before, and I will keep saying it, as long as people demand the lowest possible fares they are going to go where they can find them. Then the lines have to depend on discretionary spending by passengers in order to make up for the low fares. Which is a huge reason, I suspect, for HAL changing their bring aboard wine rules.

 

Another factor for some lines are all the new builds. Obviously, HAL isn't a problem here but face it, there are too many berths out there for the number of people who cruise, or plan to cruise. A lot of lines have to cut their fares to practically rock bottom in order to fill berths. They then have to hope for greater discretionary spending and start charging (or reduce the quality) for amenities that they used to offer for "free". The airlines discovered recently that they had to park a lot of seats, aka airplanes, in the desert in order to justify higher fares. The cruise lines may discover this is something they need to do as well, not so much docking their ships somewhere but more likely cancelling their new builds.

[Hlitner]

Just have to jump in on some of the comments. Regarding HAL sailing with all their cabins full, our experience in the past 3 years is NOT TRUE. On a 62 Day Grand cruise on the Prinsendam we never had more then 585 passengers on the entire cruise (often were fewer) which meant over 100 empty berths. Last December we decided to take a 14 day Westerdam Carribbean cruise (actually back to back 7 days) because HAL was selling veranda cabins for less then half the price of a 14 day Celebrity cruise (same dates). That Westerdam cruise was not nearly full...and they could not fill that ship at bargain basement prices. Meanwhile, Celebrity Eclipse was sold-out at more then double the price (for similar cabins. On some of our other recent HAL cruises there have been very few empty cabins. Oh, and by the way, we just returned a few hours ago from a 14 day Celebrity Eclipse Cruise (Caribbean) which again sold at much higher prices then 14 day HAL cruises (although they were again back to back rather then true 14 day cruises). The Celebrity ship was totally full (not one cabin available) even thought Celebrity does not allow any smoking in the interior of their ships (there are 2 smoking areas on the outside decks). The real shocker was we had many Europeans (over 150 Germans and many Brits) despite the tough anti-smoking rules. Times are a changing...and HAL needs to change with the times.

 

Hank

Edited December 15, 2013 by Hlitner

[sail7seas]

I actually do believe more people who do not wish to be around second hand smoke are leaving HAL ships than smokers are coming to HAL. The smokers would only be coming for verandahs and the "S" and "R" class ships do not have that many verandah cabins. While Vista and Signature do, I think more non-smokers are vacating those verandahs than smokers are occupying.

 

At some point, HAL will figure out we are tired of losing use of our verandah to second hand smoke and they will realize some people are loudly speaking with their pocketbooks.

 

[chrispb]

. The Celebrity ship was totally full (not one cabin available) even thought Celebrity does not allow any smoking in the interior of their ships (there are 2 smoking areas on the outside decks). The real shocker was we had many Europeans (over 150 Germans and many Brits) despite the tough anti-smoking rules. Times are a changing...and HAL needs to change with the times.

 

Hank

 

Celebrity prices are cut to the bone here plus intensive advertising, far more than for any other line. I don't think they're finding it easy to fill their ships this side of the pond :cool:

[TexasCruiser90]

Please don't worry. I think a HAL cruise is a perfect Honeymoon trip. The last time we were on the Z there were several honeymooners on the cruise also.

 

For your info, when we booked our first HAL cruise in 2004 (for Christmas/New Years), everything I read on these boards told me the Maasdam was falling apart, the engines didn't work, the ship was in awful shape. :eek: We had already paid our $$$, so we decided to make the best of it and try to have a Happy Holiday. Guess what? We absolutely loved the ship, had no troubles, and have sailed HAL since then. Have a great cruise!

 

Thank you ! I think we will have a great time enjoying each other's company. With him in and out of the field and my job, we don't have a whole lot of time to just be together and he actually deploys soon so I think the ports are great and the company is good, can't be too bad, right ? But it is discouraging seeing so many bad things about the Zuiderdam on here, hopefully it's mostly over exaggerations or a one off bad experience.

[TexasCruiser90]

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I think you will like HAL. If you want to try another main line later, try Princess. They give you onboard credit for being military. This can be combine with other did counts.

14 days or longer $250 per person in the military.

7 - 13 days $100 per person

6 days or less $50 per person

 

Thank you for that info, I had no idea ! Princess is a line we've been interested in trying so that's definitely good to know for future reference.