Neptune Lounge

[Krazy Kruizers]

Dakrewer, you asked if we eat our dinners in our Neptune Suite and the answer is usually yes. After 37 cruises, we are tired of chit-chat with strangers and have requested tables for two on all of our cruises for a number of years. On our last HAL cruise, we decided to try having dinner in our suite and loved it. Casual, at our own leisure. and no waiting between courses. We did it all nights except the first night. We also do the hot breakfast room service every morning and more often than not, I order room service for lunch. DH goes to the Lido buffet for lunch. I have a high stress job dealing with lots of people and I need time to decompress on the cruises. Fortunately, I'm retiring next month and DH is already retired.:D

 

 

 

Congratulations on your up-coming retirement.

[sail7seas]

I'm glad you posted that. Wife and I are seriously considering doing most, if not all, of our dinners in our suite. Appreciate your sharing your experiences. We'll probably try the MDR on our first night. The second night is our anniversary and I'm sure we'll do that on our balcony. We'll go from there.

 

Enjoy !

 

Hope you have a Happy Anniversary and great cruise.

 

[CruisinHarvey]

Dakrewer, you asked if we eat our dinners in our Neptune Suite and the answer is usually yes. After 37 cruises, we are tired of chit-chat with strangers and have requested tables for two on all of our cruises for a number of years. On our last HAL cruise, we decided to try having dinner in our suite and loved it. Casual, at our own leisure. and no waiting between courses. We did it all nights except the first night. We also do the hot breakfast room service every morning and more often than not, I order room service for lunch. DH goes to the Lido buffet for lunch. I have a high stress job dealing with lots of people and I need time to decompress on the cruises. Fortunately, I'm retiring next month and DH is already retired.:D

 

Congratulations. I too am retiring. My last day is April 1st. If you've purchased the drink package, I'd be glad to buy you a celebratory drink. :p

[RocketMan275]

Enjoy !

 

Hope you have a Happy Anniversary and great cruise.

 

 

Thank you for noticing and taking the time to respond. As you know, this is our first Holland cruise and we're very excited.

[sail7seas]

I hope you'll come back and share some comments after your cruise. :)

[CruisinHarvey]

The last time we were on Holland was a year ago. Sorry, but that's a few cruises ago, not Holland. If we want to go to Taramind or Pinnacle, do we need to reserve a spot now? We're in a Neptune suite. Can our concierge reserve dining for us nightly, or do we need to book something further out? I have already booked Le Cirque.

 

thanks

Kerry

[RocketMan275]

I hope you'll come back and share some comments after your cruise. :)

 

Give me a day or two and I'll be back. I'll start a new thread.

[Nieuwuser]

I would reserve now.It seems like the Tamarind,Pinacle and Canaletto are getting booked pre-cruise by Guests,Travel Agents and HAL comps.:)

[Djptcp]

CruisinHarvey, I would book the specialty restaurants now so you are sure to have a reservation. I have already booked the Pinnacle Grill for our April 26th Maasdam cruise because we wanted the first night. Booking now may give you some piece of mind. The concierge can also book them for you, but you may not get the days and times you want.

[CruisinHarvey]

Thanks your tips. I was hoping we wouldn't have to reserve them ahead of time. We kind of like to see how the weeks going before we're committed to specific times. I sure don't want miss Pinnacle or Taramind though, because the food is very good. I guess we'll bite the bullet and reserve them, based on your info. Better safe and sorry.

 

We rarely eat in the main dining room. The MDR has gone down hill over the last decade. So, it seems a bit silly to get dressed up, at all, for that kind of food. Even when they serve filet and lobster on gala night, it's more outback quality now than fine dining.

[cbr663]

We rarely eat in the main dining room. The MDR has gone down hill over the last decade. So, it seems a bit silly to get dressed up, at all, for that kind of food. Even when they serve filet and lobster on gala night, it's more outback quality now than fine dining.

 

I agree with you on this point. We also rarely eat in the MDR as we find the service and food quality to be below fine dining. Beef tenderloin and jumbo black tiger shrimp are a regular for us at home during the BBQ season, and we enjoy a much higher quality product on the BBQ than HAL serves at gala nights.

 

Having the dining menus available in a Neptune Suite certainly does make dining on your cruise balcony more convenient.

[peaches from georgia]

..............

We rarely eat in the main dining room. The MDR has gone down hill over the last decade. So, it seems a bit silly to get dressed up, at all, for that kind of food. Even when they serve filet and lobster on gala night, it's more outback quality now than fine dining.

I was interested that you mentioned you thought that the MDR had gone downhill over the last 10 years. Usually people post that the cutbacks have been noticeable for a much shorter time than a decade, but we agree with you. As each Vista ship joined the fleet beginning in 2002 the cutbacks became evident. Definitely the MDR suffered in food quality and labor costs were cut as crew was moved to the new ships and service especially in the MDR suffered quickly. We traveled with friends in those years on HAL cruises and by 2010 they all had moved away from HAL to other cruiselines or land vacations.

[Jalex63]

We just returned from a two week cruise aboard the VEENDAM. This was our second trip in the last two years aboard her, having transited the Panama Canal on her in Nov.14.. We also note just in the two year period things have changed a lot. Much, much less staffing everywhere. Food quality definitely gone down hill. We had one of those Not Suites, a Vista, which is merely an extended verandah cabin with a few perks. Since we were not in an SA or SB suite we did not have access to a concierge directly and had a button on the phone labeled "at your service", but all I got when I used it was the front desk

 

Our major problem began when we attempted to make decent dinner reservations on the open dining. No matter when we called 88, we were told only two options were available 5:30 or 7:45. I called the concierge to help us and got no help what-so-ever. So, my wife promptly went to see the Dining Room Manager Phillip and he took exceptional care of us. We received a 6:30 reservation for the remainder of the trip.

 

One other thing about this trip is that I am certain that the Veendam went aground on a sand bar when departing Aruba. First off the ship sounded an alarm whistle of one long blast followed by three short blasts followed by one long blast. When I observed the motion of the ship, she was dead stopped then slowly reversed her course in order to free the ship from the bar. I would suppose that there was a pilot aboard at that time and it wasn't a big deal as I am certain that 99% of the passengers were unaware that it even occurred. Anyone else note this?:eek:

[sail7seas]

All HAL concierges rotate from Front Office. The telephone concierges work front office and the Neptune Lounge Concierges are front office staff who rotate to Neptune as Concierge. They do that for some limited amount of time, return to the front office to work and someone else rotates in as Concierge.

 

When you call Concierge in Neptune Lounge, you are technically speaking with someone from Front Office.

 

When you call the telephone Concierge from Vista Suite, you are speaking with front office.