Is there dancing in the evening?

[minniem]

We are new to Holland America.  Can anyone tell me if there is any dancing after dinner.  We like ballroom type dancing, swings,cha cha, waltz, etc. We are looking at the New Amsterdam in the Caribbean, if that makes a difference.  Thanks for helping us decide if this cruise line is good for us.

[billbunger]

No ballroom dancing. You can dance to rock,soul and funk but no ballroom. As stated on many other threads, if you want ballroom dancing try Cunard.

[tv24]

No dedicated room and orchestra for ballroom.  You might find some couples dancing  ballroom style in B B Kings to the band that plays R & B and funk.  Some may make it work (for instance disco style or bop), but others just look weird as they try to fox trot to Earth Wind & Fire.

[minniem]

Thank you for your responses.  I guess if dancing is a priority we better stick with Princess.  

[Krazy Kruizers]

There used to be dancing in the Ocean Bar.  But many of the ships don't have a dedicated group there any more.

[ew101]

58 minutes ago, Krazy Kruizers said:

There used to be dancing in the Ocean Bar.  But many of the ships don't have a dedicated group there any more. 

We have a been doing a minor poll on another thread.  There tends to be band and dance floor in the Ocean Bar on the smaller, older ships in the HAL fleet. So S-Class and R-Class.  The dance floor in Ocean bar seems to be literally missing on some newer HAL ships.    

This may, to be fair, reflect a broader demographic trend- on a March 2019 Rotterdam cruise, we and another couple had a lovely time ballroom and Latin dancing in Oceans.   But if the band is playing to only furniture, this sends a powerful and sad message back to headquarters.  I got this message recently- on a recent (1/2019), Vision cruse, they have a large dance floor and only a few couples showed up for a recorded ballroom event.  On a Majesty cruise, three couples danced to Latin in Boleros.  The next event, karaoke, packed the place.  On a Breakaway cruise, we and some children danced on the lovely and large dance floor in the MDR.  

 

For the moment, if you check a recent daily program, and your proposed ship seems to have a band in Ocean, book it 🙂  We feel the same way about libraries.  

[ontheweb]

3 hours ago, ew101 said:

We have a been doing a minor poll on another thread.  There tends to be band and dance floor in the Ocean Bar on the smaller, older ships in the HAL fleet. So S-Class and R-Class.  The dance floor in Ocean bar seems to be literally missing on some newer HAL ships.    

This may, to be fair, reflect a broader demographic trend- on a March 2019 Rotterdam cruise, we and another couple had a lovely time ballroom and Latin dancing in Oceans.   But if the band is playing to only furniture, this sends a powerful and sad message back to headquarters.  I got this message recently- on a recent (1/2019), Vision cruse, they have a large dance floor and only a few couples showed up for a recorded ballroom event.  On a Majesty cruise, three couples danced to Latin in Boleros.  The next event, karaoke, packed the place.  On a Breakaway cruise, we and some children danced on the lovely and large dance floor in the MDR.  

 

For the moment, if you check a recent daily program, and your proposed ship seems to have a band in Ocean, book it 🙂  We feel the same way about libraries.  

We were on the Maasdam, one of the smaller ships, last summer. There was a band in the Ocean Bar. We (and one other couple) did manage to get some dancing done, but not nearly as much as DW would have liked. She was also disappointed that there were no ballroom dance classes.

 

When speaking to the pursers and also with an e-mail exchange after I completed our post-cruise survey, I was told the larger ships had more dancing. Your post seems to say the opposite.

[tutumomickey]

On our Caribbean cruise on the NA last February we took matters into our own hands. Every night before dinner we would dance to the piano player in the Atrium. Some nights it was just us but, many nights others joined us. I hope HAL will get the message if we continue the trend. What cruise are you looking at? We will be on the NA February 1st-15th 2020. You could join us on our makeshift dance floor. P.S. This was not an original idea. We had noticed a couple doing it on our previous cruise on the Oosterdam.

[minniem]

Thank you. We were actually looking ahead to Dec 2020. But we would certainly join you if we were there.😀

[sevenseasnomad]

6 hours ago, ontheweb said:

We were on the Maasdam, one of the smaller ships, last summer. There was a band in the Ocean Bar. We (and one other couple) did manage to get some dancing done, but not nearly as much as DW would have liked. She was also disappointed that there were no ballroom dance classes.

 

When speaking to the pursers and also with an e-mail exchange after I completed our post-cruise survey, I was told the larger ships had more dancing. Your post seems to say the opposite.

As to the larger ships having more dancing. . .if it's ballroom, no.  Larger ships have BB Kings Blues Club with dance floor.  Pinnacle Class ships have BB Kings and Rolling Stone Rock Room, each have live bands with dancing, but definitely not ballroom.  If you want ballroom dancing until your feet ache, look at Cunard.

[ontheweb]

2 hours ago, sevenseasnomad said:

As to the larger ships having more dancing. . .if it's ballroom, no.  Larger ships have BB Kings Blues Club with dance floor.  Pinnacle Class ships have BB Kings and Rolling Stone Rock Room, each have live bands with dancing, but definitely not ballroom.  If you want ballroom dancing until your feet ache, look at Cunard.

It's actually DW who really wants the dancing, especially lessons.

 

It's funny because we really started dancing when I saw people enjoying it on a ship, and we joined in despite having no idea of how to really dance.

 

Then we started lessons and discovered a major difference between us. She wanted to learn steps, while I wanted dancing to be however the music moved me.

[Crusinsusan2]

Apologizing ahead for being vague as we don't partake. We just got off the Eurodam yesterday and there was Ballroom mentioned on the daily program and it seemed to be more than once during the week. I am not sure if it was daytime classes or evening events but it was definitley offered.      

[ontheweb]

8 hours ago, Crusinsusan2 said:

Apologizing ahead for being vague as we don't partake. We just got off the Eurodam yesterday and there was Ballroom mentioned on the daily program and it seemed to be more than once during the week. I am not sure if it was daytime classes or evening events but it was definitley offered.      

Good to know, thank you.

 

On the Maasdam, Boston to Montreal last summer, there was only one dance class listed the entire cruise, and it was for line dancing, not any ballroom dance.

[Kala89]

When there are no dancers on the dance floor, it could mean that there are no dancers on board.  More likely, the music being played is not suitable for dancing.  On our most recent HAL cruise, we went to the Ocean Bar every evening hoping to do a bit of dancing.  We were lucky to get 1 or 2 dances per night as the rest of the music was more jazz.  The cruise was around South America so they could have played rumba, cha cha, samba, tango or any of the other Latin dances but they did not.  We were very disappointed and will likely change cruise lines after being loyal to HAL for many years.

[billbunger]

4 hours ago, Kala89 said:

 

4 hours ago, Kala89 said:

 

 

 We were very disappointed and will likely change cruise lines after being loyal to HAL for many years.

 

Enjoy your Cunard cruise.

[ew101]

On ‎6‎/‎24‎/‎2019 at 2:34 PM, Kala89 said:

When there are no dancers on the dance floor, it could mean that there are no dancers on board.  More likely, the music being played is not suitable for dancing.  On our most recent HAL cruise, we went to the Ocean Bar every evening hoping to do a bit of dancing.  We were lucky to get 1 or 2 dances per night as the rest of the music was more jazz.  The cruise was around South America so they could have played rumba, cha cha, samba, tango or any of the other Latin dances but they did not.  We were very disappointed and will likely change cruise lines after being loyal to HAL for many years. 

You should go up and nicely ask the band leader.  If there does not seem to be interest in dancing they will default to jazz.  But they can and will dig in the song sheets and find dance music.  

[ew101]

On ‎6‎/‎23‎/‎2019 at 10:52 AM, tutumomickey said:

On our Caribbean cruise on the NA last February we took matters into our own hands. Every night before dinner we would dance to the piano player in the Atrium. Some nights it was just us but, many nights others joined us. I hope HAL will get the message if we continue the trend. What cruise are you looking at? We will be on the NA February 1st-15th 2020. You could join us on our makeshift dance floor. P.S. This was not an original idea. We had noticed a couple doing it on our previous cruise on the Oosterdam.

You can also find the Cruise Director (some lines have a Music Director) early on and ask if they can do something for you.  They have the ability to modify the weekly program a little and add a pre recorded session or round up a musician or two.