Detailed review B2B Sept 10-24th

[Italian Nancy]

Here is our detailed review of our B2B cruise on the Zuiderdam September 10th-24th

 

 

 

We arrived in FLL on Friday Sept 9th and checked into the Renaissance Hotel, it was a wonderful hotel, the room was outstanding, however I had recently changed from the RiverSide Inn, I think I made a mistake, while the hotel was 5* there wasn’t much around it for restaurants, there was a Winn Dixie and Crown Liquor a few block away..

 

 

Embarkment:

 

Smooth and Easy… We took the hotel shuttle at 12 noon and arrived at the Ship less than 15 minutes later.. $4.00 per person. On board by 12:45 . Had a nice lunch on the Lido deck and the rooms were ready by 1:40

 

 

Cabin:

 

We had booked a VA cabin # 7131 on the AFT-Rotterdam deck.. The balcony was at least 3 times the depth the normal size, however during the Western Caribbean cruise it was way to hot to enjoy. You needed shoes to walk out onto the deck, there was no breeze to enjoy. We would have preferred to be on the side like before. We had heard before the cruise that people could overlook the deck, that was true, but not many, the heat was more of a problem. The bed was comfortable, the fruit bowl and the constant refill of the ice buckets was great.

 

 

HMC

 

We had booked the Turquoise Cabana, it was nice to have, didn’t care much for the BBQ food, we had read that the Cabana boys in some case were almost non exquisant, not for us.. they could have gone away a lot more for our likely, they were almost a pest.. since there was no wind that day we got bitten alive by mosquitoes, I am not sure the fee of $218.00 was worth the trouble.

 

 

Sea Day Sept 12th was fine

 

 

Sept 13th, Grand Cayman.

 

This was our 2nd time here, very hot and humid, didn’t take a tour, just walked around, and bought calamine lotion for my insect bites.

 

 

 

September 14th, Costa Maya

 

Prior to docking at Costa Maya (scheduled for 11:00 am) the Hotel Manager, Beverage Manager and Cruise Director held an informal meeting for any Cruise Critic passengers in the Hudson Room on Deck 3, they had coffee, tea, water and wonderful cookies, The three men sat at the front of the room and let us talk about our cruise so far, they asked questions of us and freely wanted our feedback. I think it was a great gesture for them to free up an hour to talk with us.

 

This port surprised me, I had read before that they was nothing to do, etc, I loved this port, I got the silver jewellery I wanted to buy, Mexico vanilla for my Christmas baking etc.. We wore our bathing suits under our other clothes and made use of the swimming pool, watch out for those huge frozen drinks they serve at the swim up bar, one of them knocked me for a loop.

 

 

 

September 15th – Sea Day

 

 

September 16th Key West

 

 

This was our second visit to Key West and it was at the same time as last which is Bike Week, where bikers from all the place come to have their bikes “blessed” what a sight to see so many bikes and their owners, rather loud noise but not rowdy.

 

 

September 17th – return to FLL for week #2

 

 

Since we had cleared immigration/customs in Key West, we did not have to leave the ship on Saturday. We waited around the pool for the next group of travellers to arrive. It was fun to watch them come up to the Lido deck, everyone amazed at the décor, the pool, the polar bears. Two of our roll call member – Deb & Chip hosted a get to know you sail-away just off to the side of the Crow’s nest. It was so nice to finally meet the people you have been chatting with for months now. We had a fabulous time.

 

 

September 18th – HMC (or suppose to be)

 

When we awoke you could tell the seas were rough, since we had been at HMC the previous week and had planned on making it an “at sea day”. During breakfast the Captain informed us that Rita had upgraded from a Tropical Depression to a hurricane and it was heading straight towards the Bahamas, so they made the decision during the night to head out to sea to avoid her. We would have an additional sea day and still arrive in Tortola on Tuesday as scheduled. I know some people were disappointed.

 

 

September 19th – at sea

 

 

September 20th Tortola & our 2nd wedding anniversary

 

We booked the See & Sea excursion, we had heard there wasn’t much else to do in town and since we don’t snorkel and my husband doesn’t swim this seemed like the best choice for us. Tortola is a very beautiful island, but there isn’t much to see.

 

We sailed away with some champagne and went to the Pinnacle Grill for dinner. After dinner in the Casino we heard people talking about the switch from Nassau to HMC for Friday. We were some of the ones going to the main desk to complain, we wanted to go to Nassau. HAL did not have the right to make this decision on their own and they handled the entire situation badly. They not only got the Nassau fans upset, they then got the people who wanted to go to HMC upset when they reversed their decision. For us, it put a damper on our anniversary celebration as my husband was very unhappy.

 

 

September 21st – St. Thomas

 

This is my favourite shopping port, and this was our 3 visit. We allowed only time for shopping this time, anniversary gifts to each other and a daughter’s birthday gift was on the list. Plus some duty free alcohol.

 

Another wonderful sail-away with Deb & Chip & the gang

 

 

September 22nd – at sea

 

 

September 23rd – Nassau

 

We missed visiting Atlantis the last time, so we took the water taxi over ($6.00 return per person.) Very beautiful, reminded me of Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. Lost a few bucks in their casino (unlike on board the ship). We checked out lunch menus there, they wanted $18.00 for just a hamburger. We took the water taxi back to the ship, had lunch and then came ashore again to finish our shopping. We wanted to get Donnie Walker some candy, he was so funny, had the darndest time remember my husband’s name and it drove him crazy.

 

A final sail-away with Deb & Chip and whomever from the group was around.

 

 

September 24th – FLL

 

Our flight was at 2:00 p.m we were some of the last passengers to get off, sat around the airport until flight time and got home to Toronto around 5:00 p.m.

 

 

Other Services:

 

Spa – wonderful, I won in the great giveaway the 2nd week a pass to use the therma suite and the hydro pool, both very soothing, especially when my back and right leg acted up. I also had a spa treatment one sea day, massage, coconut milk wrap, mini facial, foot and neck massage.. regular price was $175, on sale that day for $99.00 a good deal

 

 

Pinnacle Grill- we ate here twice for dinner and once for lunch, they are open for lunch on the first sea day. All meals were outstanding. The first week they were shooting photographs of all the menu items for an upcoming HAL cook book, guests were invited to stop in from 10-2 I think it was to watch them. Got to meet all the chefs and photographers.

 

 

Galley tour – Took the tour both weeks, forgot the camera the first week, you get to walk through the galley, staff were on hand prepping food, making the fruit and vegetable carving, samples were provided.

 

 

Shows- we are not show people and did not attend any. My husband do go to the movies a couple of times, popcorn included.

 

 

Casino – it was very good to us.. the first week my husband was the lucky on, unfortunately he lost it the 2nd week. The 2nd week was my lucky week and I think I walked away with $1,000.00 and I am not normally lucky.

 

 

Staff – everyone was extremely friendly, competent. Our cabin Steward Fajah was outstanding, waiter Eddie and wine steward Antonio made our meal time. The Hotel Manager handled himself extremely well in light of the situation around Nassau/HMC change. At a reception the following night with the Captain, my husband went to the Captain and informed him how well the Hotel Manager held up under pressure. The Captain’s response was “that is what he is paid for”.. to funny.

 

 

Food – Lido deck was good not great, we had expected a different dinner menu the 2nd week but it was a repeat. So we had what we like from the previous week and tried something new when we didn’t like last week’s choice.

 

 

We went to some of the mixology classes they held, by far was the martini one, for $10.00 per person you got to try 4 full size martinis. While not on this sample, the Espresso Martini was outstanding, Rafael wrote down the recipe for us to try at home.

 

 

I have tried to cover as much as I can remember. I have the daily planners from the 2 weeks if anyone has a specific question.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[vicocala]

Thank you very much for the review. I am sure fans of both ports were upset at one time or the other.

 

My question would be are the menu's the same as the one's that Candy posted for last May?

[vicocala]

Oh,

 

and what movies were playing this week? I would expect them to change in a couple weeks, but ya never know. :)

[Italian Nancy]

The menu was very very close to what Candy has posted.. some of the items have different seasonings (Cornish Game Hen) There was no meatloaf or Venison. The first formal night of each cruise had King Crab Legs.

 

 

 

I have the daily planners at home, I will let you know what the movies were later tonight

[KCat]

So there was no meatloaf on the menu, does that mean you did not have a dutch night either of the weeks? We avoided it on our last cruise and went to the Pinnacle Grill that night and was hoping to do it again-if I could figure out what night it would be.

 

Thanks.

[vicocala]

Thanks, I appreciate that. :)

[shirljean]

We haven't heard anybody talk about teatime - have they discontinued this? We so enjoyed it the last time we went with HAL.

[Italian Nancy]

They had tea time every afternoon in the Explorer's lounge I think it was at 3:00pm, on the 2nd sea day (Thursday's) it was the High Tea with all those decadent chocolate desserts, sculptures and crepes suzette. Chocolate fountain which the servers dipped in fruit or cake for you.

[shirljean]

Thanks Nancy! Four days til sailing!!!

[Italian Nancy]

Vic the movies were :

The Interpreter - Nicole Kidman & Sean Penn

Hitch - Will Smith & Eva Mendes

Rebound - Martin Lawrence & Megan Mullally

Mr. & Mrs. Smith - Brad Pitt & Angelina Jolie

Games of their lives - Gerard Butler & Wes Bentley

Herbie - Fully Loaded

Hostage - Bruce Willis (good movie)

Longest Yard - Adam Sandler

Be Cool - John Travola.

 

not every day, sometimes in the Queens Lounge sometimes on your in cabin tv.