4 Celebrity loyalists back from first HAL cruise

[Galaxy2004]

After 9 cruises on Celebrity ships (1 Galaxy, 6 Millenium class, 2 Solstice class), we chose HAL (ms Zuiderdam) because its Panama Canal partial transit schedule worked best for us. We found HAL and Celebrity comparable in many ways (high levels of service, friendly staff and officers, etc.), but different in other ways. We had a great cruise and will likely try HAL again when it debuts its new ships. That said, for us here are some pros and cons we found on HAL.

 

HAL pros:

BB King’s Blues Club – Seriously, this is probably the best entertainment we ever experienced on a cruise ship. We never have high expectations in that department, but we enjoyed this venue, which was full almost every show.

Bread – loved almost every offering, maybe even more than on Celebrity.

Desserts – I love chocolate and HAL has some really good chocolate desserts. Celebrity has such limited chocolate offerings IMHO.

Bathroom layout and storage

Free fresh squeezed orange juice and lemonade

 

HAL cons:

Lido buffet - cafeteria style layout, cold food, warm beverages, mushy sushi, limited cheese selections, poor salad offerings, etc. Good waffles - but not Celebrity good!

Dining room – Lights were never dimmed and curtains were left open to the promenade deck (so we had to watch walkers watch us all night). Even on formal nights, there was nothing special about the dining room ambiance. Celebrity wins big on this.

No outside jogging track.

Midday time changes (instead of overnight)

Activities announcements (limited to 2-3 per day, but we prefer Celebrity's no-announcements)

 

HAL mixed:

Promenade deck – Nice for walking but terrible at night when the dining room curtains were open and you had walkers outside.

Pinnacle Grill – Very nice dining room and excellent service but IMHO not on par with Ocean Liners.

 

For us, Celebrity wins in the following: Solstice class atrium and decor (we went to a talk on the upcoming Ms Koningsdam and were underwhelmed with its proposed atrium and overall décor); buffet layout (self-serve, individual stations); ice cream (oh how we missed the fresh made ice creams), pizza (horrible on HAL), cookies (small and limited options on HAL), dining room ambiance, outside jogging track, and outside public spaces.

 

Overall, we 4 Celebrity loyalists enjoyed our first HAL cruise, are happy to have HAL as an option, and are looking forward to HAL's debut of its new ship next year. Also, just like Celebrity, their Cruise Critic followers have a wonderful forum with lots of detailed reviews and recommendations which we used in preparing for our trip and our trip was better because of their advice.

[Celebrity Cruises]

Thank you for sharing your review!

[Cruise Junky]

I'm glad you enjoyed Zuiderdam. I don't consider myself that picky or attached to any one line but I loathed that ship. Nice to see she's improved.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[ghstudio]

Thanks for the report. We'll be on our first HAL cruise in August (as shown below)....chosen for it's itinerary (note all the stops in iceland) and a bit of curiosity as well.

[TeaBag]

Thank you for your good review showing the comparisons.

[foodgirl]

Thank you for your review. As someone who has been on HAL a good bit .... See my profile....I totally agree with the pros and cons you listed. We are cruising celebrity for the 2nd time in April and are glad to have options that work for us on both lines.

[hulamoon]

Thanks for sharing..we have a future certificate with HAL and I can say sometimes I miss the Tamarind resturant, the chocolate, the warmth and the promenade.

 

The crazy slow evening service and the smoking blew us away so to speak. But we nevertheless booked their new ship

[hulamoon]

I'm glad you enjoyed Zuiderdam. I don't consider myself that picky or attached to any one line but I loathed that ship. Nice to see she's improved.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

I wrote something like that too. It was the worst cruise ship I was ever on. But then I decided not to say it. So glad it was better. My suite toilet flooded the carpet three times. The first time as we checked in. Apparently the entire eight deck had issues that cruise. As compensation we got three plates of chocolate strawberries delivered as we left our cabin. Which was way just bizarre.

[julia]

Thanks for the comparison.

 

Our last cruise was on the Eurodam, and we enjoyed it a great deal, but still felt that Celebrity was a better fit for us. I did enjoy HAL's larger cabins, and their stateroom bar setup is half the price of Celebrity's (all drinks were much less expensive). BB Blues Club was awesome, but production shows just so-so.

[shipshape sam]

Good comparison and glad you enjoyed your cruise. We sailed ms Zuiderdam about 4 years ago and had a good time. I think HAL is pretty close to Celebrity, but we do like Celebrity!

 

For me, we went to my favorite private beach in the caribbean, Half Moon Cay. I loved it because of the view of the half moon beach from the high bluff sitting in a shaded tiki bar with a cold beer on a beautiful day and a slight breeze with good friends!

 

I would sail HAL again to go to Half Moon Cay again........along with a good itinerary. :)

[foodgirl]

Good comparison and glad you enjoyed your cruise. We sailed ms Zuiderdam about 4 years ago and had a good time. I think HAL is pretty close to Celebrity, but we do like Celebrity!

 

For me, we went to my favorite private beach in the caribbean, Half Moon Cay. I loved it because of the view of the half moon beach from the high bluff sitting in a shaded tiki bar with a cold beer on a beautiful day and a slight breeze with good friends!

 

I would sail HAL again to go to Half Moon Cay again........along with a good itinerary. :)

 

I so love Half Moon Cay and really missed it on our celebrity cruise. It is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. "I wish I could stay here forever" is just the best spot. I could look at that view all day! I agree many similarities in the lines.

[Turtles06]

Thanks for the comparative review. We love Celebrity and have been concerned about HAL, but they do have some very interesting itineraries (like the Voyage of the Vikings TA).

 

One thing you didn't mention was the smoking. As I understand it, HAL still allows smoking on balconies. Did you have any problems with smoke on HAL?

[C 2 C]

We wecre docked next to Westerdam today as the only ships in St Maarten.

Seven years ago we visited the same ports on Westerdam as our present Reflection cruise. All i remember is low ceilings, strange configuration from front to stern but beautiful elevator doors.

 

We have not been tempted to go back to HAL even though we started our cruising life with them.

[fleckle]

Good comparison. Thanks for posting it.

 

On the whole, we still prefer Celebrity to HAL, but there are some things that HAL does better.

 

Where HAL really excels is in the sensible and orderly way they handle departures on the last day. Passengers can save a lot of time by ordering room service breakfast on the last day, the very day when we most need and appreciate the efficiency of room service breakfast.

 

HAL's entire disembarkation procedure is surprisingly well organized and civilized, so there is little of the chaotic rushing back and forth with crowded hallways and lounges that are so typical of Celebrity ships on the final morning.

 

 

The libraries on HAL ships are outstanding, not only for their well-stocked and varied book and magazine collections and puzzles, but for the attractive and appealing rooms themselves.

 

Even today when more people are using e-readers, it is still nice to browse through that large collection of reference books and magazines, especially the reference books and maps for the locations we will be visiting.

 

HAL's libraries have comfortable recliners facing large expansive windows looking out to sea, with beverages and snacks readily available nearby.

 

In contrast, Celebrity's S-class libraries are located beside a noisy interior atrium that could just as easily be in the center of any downtown metropolitan office building or hotel. We do not find them appealing at all and spend almost no time there.

 

We also liked HAL's fruit basket that came with a form to let you choose what kinds of fruits you want in your cabin each day just by marking it on the form at your convenience.

 

 

Like many other Celebrity enthusiasts, we cruise on other cruise lines when they have an itinerary we want that Celebrity does not offer, or they offer a much better deal for an equivalent cruise.

 

 

[sprockie]

We just returned from our first Celebrity cruise - a B2B on the Constellation after sailing with HAL 8 or 10 times.

We had some definite ideas about what Celebrity does better and vice versa. We haven't been on HAL in 2 years, so maybe some things have changed, but this is what we observed:

 

HAL pros:

Debarkation process - permitted to stay in stateroom until your number is called instead of waiting in a public area (we waited in the theater for over 2 hours on Monday waiting for a slow customs process)

 

Deli in the Lido - always were able to build a great grilled sandwich with good quality cold cuts (roast beef, pastrami, roast beef, black forest ham, etc.). You could get a dynamite rueben sandwich with a big deli pickle. The cold meats on Constellation were not what I expected for a cruise line of that quality - bologna, pressed meat loaf, turkey "roll".

 

Ocean View Cafe we found to be repetitive and the quality of food lesser than the dining room. We never found this on HAL. We always found lots of choice and good quality salad bar with many items, eggs benedict station, excellent pastries freshly made in the Lido.

 

Better mattresses (maybe that was just our cabin, who knows)

 

Overall, I would say we prefer Celebrity's experience over HAL's. We prefer Celebrity over HAL for the following reasons:

 

Awesome family verandah cabins - highlight of our trip

The beverage package was great

Coffee in the Ocean View I thought was very good

Offering of escargot, french onion soup, shrimp cocktail in the dining room (had it every night)

Fewer announcements

[tangerinebunny]

After six HAL cruises in a row, we tried the Silhouette in December and now have two more X cruises booked.

 

Service was great on both lines, but the smoking issue loomed big after a while.

 

And there's always something exciting about trying a new ship.

 

Then there's the joy of coming back to one that you love.

[sprockie]

After six HAL cruises in a row, we tried the Silhouette in December and now have two more X cruises booked.

 

Service was great on both lines, but the smoking issue loomed big after a while.

 

And there's always something exciting about trying a new ship.

 

Then there's the joy of coming back to one that you love.

 

I too liked the smoking policy on Celebrity, however, we had to chuckle that our hallway smelled of smoke, and it was very obvious some idiot was smoking in their cabin - and heavily to stink up the hallway.

Edited February 5, 2015 by sprockie

[Cruisin'Lady]

Having been on 4 different ships on HAL, we had really enjoyed most all of their ships except the Neiw Amsterdam. Which was in the inaugural season when we sailed her and they had a defective air exchange problem that blew the pizza oven exhaust in ours and a few surrounding cabins, but hopefully they have it fixed by now. Anyway, IMO, I was and still am impressed with HAL's staff and the friendliness as well as their ability to learn names and remember them within the first couple of days. Even staff that we didn't have anything to do with, like stewards from maybe another part of the ship, would always make eye contact and smile with a greeting spoken to us. Didn't get that on my first Celebrity cruise and we will see if that stands On the one coming up.

 

Also, I really loved the old time paintings and artworks on the HAL ships. Celebrity's artwork seems rather tacky and some of it is downright aweful with out of focus photography on the wall (On the Infinity). However, the Celebrity MDR decor is so much better than any of HAL's ships I have been on.

 

I like HAL's food better and I agree with the poster who said HAL knows how to do chocolate!

 

HAL's shows and entertainment is a step above Celebrity.

 

However, this is the biggest part for me, Celebrity is number 1 when it comes to accessibility. They have the lifts for the pools, which I utilize and its so nice to be able to swim (or at least float) on a cruise again. Their hallways are more accessible for wheelchairs as long as no one leaves their freaking walkers in the hallway. (A big pet peeve, I can't get around them so someone has to lift it over my head.). The automatic doors to accessible cabins and low thresholds (for the most part) are wonderful! The elevators also for the most part, seem to have availability for me. Its a nightmare on HAL elevators, with wait times that sometimes would be up to 20 minutes long because of crowding.

 

I am excited to go on my next Celebrity cruise at the end of March!

[justcrusn]

It's interesting that you considered mid day time changes a "con".

We have always wished on trans Atlantic cruises that the time change could be done mid-day instead of costing an hour of sleep.

[Turtles06]

It's interesting that you considered mid day time changes a "con".

We have always wished on trans Atlantic cruises that the time change could be done mid-day instead of costing an hour of sleep.

 

Well, there's an easy solution for that. Sail a westbound TA! :)

[bradpole]

...

HAL cons:

 

Midday time changes (instead of overnight)

 

 

Not that anyone really cares, but on HAL it is the captain's decision when to do the time changes. Captain Albert (he has a blog where he talks about being a captain) and he talked about how he handles time changes once and what the policy is or isn't.

 

The first time I experienced a daytime time change I thought it was stupid, but actually preferred it over the night time change. When loosing the hour during the day the body handles it better (at least my body did!)

[Galaxy2004]

I wrote something like that too. It was the worst cruise ship I was ever on. But then I decided not to say it. So glad it was better. My suite toilet flooded the carpet three times. The first time as we checked in. Apparently the entire eight deck had issues that cruise. As compensation we got three plates of chocolate strawberries delivered as we left our cabin. Which was way just bizarre.

 

I agree. When we booked this cruise we wanted to go on Celebrity but just could not find a workable itinerary. Obviously, based on # of sailings on them, we love Celebrity's Millenium class ships, and the Solstice and the Equinox (the 2 we have sailed) are absolutely beautiful ships IMHO. We tried to keep our expectations low for Zuiderdam because of its age, and, well, it met our expectations. Zuiderdam was built in 2002 and it's decor shows that. Not our style at all. But the year built does not alone explain its stylistic shortcomings, with the Millenium class being built around the same time. It may just be that HAL style is not our favorite. But, there was enough about HAL itself that will keep it on our options list, maybe just on other ships. That said, we still love and prefer Celebrity.

[Galaxy2004]

Thanks for the comparative review. We love Celebrity and have been concerned about HAL, but they do have some very interesting itineraries (like the Voyage of the Vikings TA).

 

One thing you didn't mention was the smoking. As I understand it, HAL still allows smoking on balconies. Did you have any problems with smoke on HAL?

 

We were also concerned about the smoking policy but lucked out, for the most part, on this cruise. We did have someone in another aft cabin that smoked a pipe a couple of times, but that was about it. The casino was a bit worse. The Zuiderdam casino is rather small and had one side dedicated to none smoking machines. All of the table games as well as the higher-priced slot games were placed beside the smoking machines, so maybe HAL stats showed them that smokers spend more in casinos?? Anyway, the smoking was not terrible in the casino on our sailing, but it was definitely there and for the most part we avoided that area of the casino. Definitely prefer Celebrity's more limiting smoking policy.

[Galaxy2004]

Fleckle, I agree with your additional comparisons. The departure day was the best we had experienced, until we got to customs, which was a mess that day because of a computer problem, so not HAL's fault. As a matter of fact, HAL made some changes on departure day that actually lessened the customs chaos so definite cuddos to them in that area. The only problem we found with the library was it sharing space in the crow's nest, which resulted in problems later in the day when they had noisier activities there. Otherwise, a very nice area.

[Galaxy2004]

It's interesting that you considered mid day time changes a "con".

We have always wished on trans Atlantic cruises that the time change could be done mid-day instead of costing an hour of sleep.

 

The only issue we ran into was it shortened the lunch time, which made it a bit more chaotic at lunch on the sea day.