Folks that never do the research and then complain

[draftxhorselover]

So just read a recent Westerdam/European cruise where the reviewer states:

 

This is our third cruise. We sailed with Raphosy of the seas and celebrity reflection both were really good and far superior to westredam in any aspect. The Celebrity was the best. We are not fussy in any sense and don't mind if things are not perfect but this was just a poor experience. And the sad things is it cost us more than the celebrity cruise. We paid quite a lot of money for this cruise but got nothing in return!! We are a couple in our mid-40s with 2 girls 15 and 9. The average age was probably 70.

 

So many old, unfriendly and grumpy couples that don't seem to like younger people and kids. They just everywhere you go on the ship. Entrainment was non-existent. Poor shows that lasted half an hour. Celebrity had the tenures of rock on for 2 amazing shows and 4 live bands playing all day all over the ship. We sadly had to go to bed at 10 every night and just watched a movie. No discos or parties to go to. :confused:No bands in the pool, no pool parties, no activities for younger the More crowd. The BBKING band was good but played the same oldies songs every night. The whole place was like sedated. It felt like old age home rather than a cruise ship.

 

The daily activities were mostly talks and seminars about how to fold towels, how to diet and bridge card game. Old people staff all day long. Great basketball court but no activities on it.

 

Food was repeatable. Sma every night. For instance, the celebrity had a theme night. If we docked in Greece they had Greek food and so on. Nothing like that on the Westerdam. Food was always the same. Eating time are very short especially for lunch which was 12-14. If you missed the time then no food! so if you onshore you have no chance of making it back for lunch. How stupid!! Celebrity had the dining room open till 4 for lunch which made life much easier. Not enough staff to clean the tables. They did not have one BBQ party on the pool deck for the whole 10 days!! It felt like the whole ship is running on a really tight budget.

 

The ship is also built really funny. It's an old ship very poorly decorated. Felt like in some sort of a rundown 80s hotel. No central area. Unless you are penthouse VIP passenger. you cannot access the front of the ship at the top deck so it was impossible to watch the ship entering ports from the front ogf the ship. The back of the ship there is a pool, and a bar it was always flooded with water and people were smoking there the whole time which made it really unpleasant. The Gym was but only strech classses which full of old ladies :eek: Destinations were fabulaous. Especially kotor and venice. Bot the ship dont giver you much time onshore. The had to back on the boat by 16:30 and some days it was 15:30! Less

 

Published 09/02/17

See Westerd

OMG.. WHY would you choose a cruise ship which doesn't fit your way of vacationing? If you want excitement and zing! Go on that kind of cruise! Yet I read her previous review and she complained that the rock wall was too busy and the music at the pool was too loud and always a party... AAACK!

 

 

Okay.. I feel better now :)

[Kwaj girl]

An experienced travel agent can help you avoid this kind of thing in the future by matching your family/interests/ travel experiences/expectations/budget to an appropriate cruise line and ship for the perfect vacation.

[ger_77]

Some people love to complain - especially when it was their responsibility to check things out in the first place. (Would you go to a theatre and think - this sounds like a great family movie - and walk into Friday the 13th?) Seeing as the person came on CC to do the complaining, you'd think they would have checked the HAL boards, maybe asked a question or two, before deciding to put their money down for a cruise.

 

No worries, they're not coming back - that leaves an extra room for those of us who want to cruise Holland America Lines!!

 

Smooth Sailing! :) :) :)

[Krazy Kruizers]

Some people don't like to research anything. Maybe the TA was getting a big commission if they sold cabins on the Westerdam?

[Kwaj girl]

Some people don't like to research anything. Maybe the TA was getting a big commission if they sold cabins on the Westerdam?

 

Maybe they didn't USE a t/a ? ! ? !

[Oregonpoppa]

We were on the Westerdam a couple of years ago on an Alaskan cruise. We thought the ship was beautiful and classy. We happen to fit the "older" profile, but we're very active olders. We took the stairs rather than the elevators and my wife thoroughly enjoyed the Dancing w/Stars dance classes, the line dance class and we both liked the food classes when we could fit them in. The highlight of the entertainment for us was BBKing. There were quite a few families onboard, probably because Alaska draws a younger, more active crowd. We'll be taking our kids and grandkids on a Caribbean Christmas week cruise and I know there will be a lot of youngsters on the Eurodam at that time.

I'm not sure we'd enjoy a cruise that was like a floating nursing home either, but we'd make the best of it because many of those old folks had fascinating careers and life stories and we'd have a lot in common with them. My wife is great with the older folks, while I am more comfortable with the younger, still productive ages. At any rate, all cruises go places and we do independent walking tours of every city and port of call.

Being waited on night and day, deciding what to eat and where to eat it (like dining out every day!), having great musicians playing music for us and seeing the world. What's to complain about?

OK, so there are always things to complain about...but why let them ruin your voyage?

[frankc98376]

They evidently didn't look for things very well. Observation top deck is accessible from a stairway- wouldn't see the bow from the Retreat area- Crows Nest is in front of it. Retreat isn't for Penthouse guests- it is available to anyone that wants to pay to use it. Pool BBQ's will be a thing of the past very soon due to health regulations. Cruise lines liked these BBQ's as people would fill up on cheap food and skip dinner and the more expensive menu items for the cruise line. There is a reason that we would never cruise Carnival- we did our research many years ago.

[Dunelm]

I read a great take on Adam and Eve in the Garden. It was Paradise, but was not "enough." We are all so different with different expectations. I guess that is what keeps us from boredom.:)

[OCruisers]

Often wonder why people don't that the time to make a good decision on the cruise line and itinerary that would best suit them. :confused:

[Cruise4food]

So just read a recent Westerdam/European cruise where the reviewer states:

 

 

 

 

 

OMG.. WHY would you choose a cruise ship which doesn't fit your way of vacationing? If you want excitement and zing! Go on that kind of cruise! Yet I read her previous review and she complained that the rock wall was too busy and the music at the pool was too loud and always a party... AAACK!

 

 

 

 

 

Okay.. I feel better now :)

 

 

 

A plausible explanation is that some of the accounts on CC are used by professional "writers" to convey a sense of uncertainty in the readers. This type of activity has been seen time and again in the big review sites for hotels, restaurants and so on.

 

 

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[Dancing Shoes]

My husband likes to tease me that I spend too much time planning a vacation. Ah, yes dear, how do you think we go and always find the right hotel, restaurant, cruise or whatever.

[ArtsyCraftsy]

Hmmmm ... well, when I first broached the idea of taking a cruise, my friends recommended HAL as a potential good fit. These people know me well, so I trusted their opinion. But I still spent a lot of time doing my own research. I joined CruiseCritic, started reading reviews, reading the fora, and ultimately came to the conclusion that HAL was, indeed, the best option for me, given the givens.

 

I couldn't imagine spending a significant amount without some confidence that it wouldn't be wasted on a mediocre experience.

 

Day 5 on the 14-day Alaska cruise on the Amsterdam, I know I made the right decision. [emoji851]

 

 

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[3rdGenCunarder]

My husband likes to tease me that I spend too much time planning a vacation. Ah, yes dear, how do you think we go and always find the right hotel, restaurant, cruise or whatever.

 

Being the travel planner seems to run through the female line in my family. My father used to call my mother "the cruise director," and I am a compulsive planner. DH and I have an early discussion or two about what we want to see, and then I plan the nitty-gritty. He is pleased that he can sort of "discover" places as we go along, and I'm happy because I can make sure things I very much want to see get included. (Oh look, Honey. A yarn shop!) I also ferret out potential places for treats, like ice cream or bakery stops.

 

My niece and her husband are the same. That's sort of my fault. Before their first big trip, I emailed her a sample itinerary format that I use, and she took it and added her own touches to it.

 

Whether one person does the planning or everyone works together at it, I think it's essential to making the most of a trip. I'm amazed at how many people don't bother with planning. They just expect to figure it out as they go along. That wastes valuable time, especially on a cruise where you may have as little as 6 hours in port.

 

And to get back to the review that was quoted by the OP, has anyone else noticed that a lot of reviews are from people who never post on forums or roll calls?

[Daisyloo]

"And to get back to the review that was quoted by the OP, has anyone else noticed that a lot of reviews are from people who never post on forums or roll calls?"

 

 

I have noticed that many of the really negative, critical reviews are by people who have never posted anything on CC before. Their first and only post is just full of negatives. I usually read them but don't take anything they say very seriously.

[wander]

Reviewer reminded me of a woman on a HAL cruise a number of years ago. We were sitting at a table in the Piano Bar, Perry Grant was the entertainer. (Now - that takes us back a number of years.) Anyhow, the place was very full and "hopping" when a younger woman and a friend came into the area with her two youngsters in tow. They were about 5 and 2 yrs. of age and was past 10:00 PM. She sat them at a just vacated table next to ours and then she and her friend preceded to stand in front of our table and carry on a rather loud conversation. The boys were perfectly well behaved and the younger one fell asleep. As the women's conversation preceded, getting louder as it went of interfered with our enjoyment of Perry. Finally after about 5 minutes I asked (very nicely - really) if they perhaps could go into the "hall" if they wanted to talk. She glared at me, turned to her very well behaved son and said to him in a very loud voice "See, I told you old people don't like children". As she gathered up her sleeping child I said to the older one - I really do like children and you have been very well behaved.

 

Now granted perhaps some "old" people do not like being around children, but neither do they like being around very rude and inconsiderate adults.

[harrodsfan]

Yes homework is important! We have traveled on most of the major cruise lines and have had good experiences on all from Regent to Seabourn to Carnival. We pick by the itinerary. Overall we liked Celebrity the least. And our best cruises were on Royal Carribean, Regent and the old Royal Viking known to Hal as the Prisendam.

[cruzin4us]

In a blink of an eye the OP will be old and HAL won't be so bad

[GUT2407]

Hey I've heard people complain about the number of Sea days or the ports on an itinerary classic lack of research and after that no complaints based on research will surprise me.

[Essiesmom]

I'm confused about the 'no central area' comment. Doesn't this qualify?

 

 

So, it's not a grand as the Solstice class of Celebrity, but the ship isn't that big, either. And unable to get anything to eat after 1400? This strains credibility. EM

[DaveOKC]

My husband likes to tease me that I spend too much time planning a vacation. Ah, yes dear, how do you think we go and always find the right hotel, restaurant, cruise or whatever.

 

You sound just like me and my wife. Although she has figured out (after many trips) that this planning is why our trips usually go so well. I have even convinced most of my family and friends!

 

After one cruise someone commented on how good and easy the entire trip was. Credited the cruiseline of course!

[iancal]

Once we have narrowed down itinerary we do as much research as we can on either the ship or the class of ship.

 

We were fortunate enough on a cruise several years ago to be seated with a marine engineer who had worked in the cruise industry. He gave us a fair amount of insight and some good tips. One of our table mates had experienced issues on another cruise and he provided a fairly detailed explanation as the probable reason for it.

 

We travel quite frequently. We spend a fair amount of time researching the trip, etc. The decor is also a consideration for us. We don't like gaudy nor do we like dark and confining. So we have only done two Carvival cruises. Enjoyed them both and have been surprised at some comments that we read about Carnival. We chose the ship, the itinerary, and the time carefully. Both were very enjoyable. We would never consider selecting a ship based on cruise line alone. Too many different ships, ages, and classes of ship in most cruise line fleets.

Edited September 16, 2017 by iancal

[SetAnOpenCourse]

"And to get back to the review that was quoted by the OP, has anyone else noticed that a lot of reviews are from people who never post on forums or roll calls?"

 

 

I have noticed that many of the really negative, critical reviews are by people who have never posted anything on CC before. Their first and only post is just full of negatives. I usually read them but don't take anything they say very seriously.

 

Possibly, after their experience they searched out a forum to share their impression. In this case, the person's needs were way out of control - sounds like they weren't well - but some negative first-and-only posts may be valid, reliable, and relevant.

[iancal]

Much depends on the complaint. We dislike Princess coffee. It is awful. But rather than moan and groan we simply skate around it and buy a coffee card. We are fairly easy going. We no longer have any expectations on entertainment. We would be happy if there was no entertainment director and would trade this for even one enrichment lecture. As long as the cabin is in good nic and we have choices on amenities we are happy. I think the most important thing is to match cruise demographics and ship size/decor to your personal preferences. Everything else on the mass market lines is very much a crap shoot in our experience.

[Lady Chew]

I think the reviewer in this case just likes to complain ... and for some reason, can't stand to be around older people.

[VMax1700]

It is reviews like this that have stopped me reading the review pages. Rubbish is posted and the editors do nothing about it and there is no option available for incorrect reviews to be commented on. I am not talking about personal viewpoints or opinions but incorrect facts being published. It is possible to 'Thank' the reviewer, but it is not possible to tell the reviewer they are a bit of a whinge-bag.

 

To quote the Westerdam review "So many old, unfriendly and grumpy couples that don't seem to like younger people and kids". However, to quote the reviewers "Raphosy" (sic) of the seas review "The climbing wall was always very busy with long queues and i only managed one climb the whole week. So was the table tennis always busy with really little kids. You really have to push to get a game and its not nice. I don't know why they do not have age restrictions or give one table to adult and one for the kids".

The the pool bands - Westerdam - "No bands in the pool, no pool parties," and the RotS review "The pool is small and was loaded with kids and there is always loud music playing which makes it difficult to relax or have a chat".

I think they do protest too much!

(and if you are Italian........:rolleyes:)