LAFFNVEGAS "LIVE" from the Nieuw Amsterdam, First HAL Ship to Sail!!

[zelker]

45 minutes ago, Vict0riann said:

 

 

 

I was going to ask about that, too.  But then I thought that perhaps it only ever appears closer to the equator than Alaska is!

On our last cruise in Alaska (2019), we saw an amazing green flash from the Lido.

[vicd1969]

Sorry to hear about the state of the WiFi. It's frustrating to hear that HAL's stablemate Princess has the reputation for having one of the best WiFi on their Medallion equipped ships, yet HAL's is still below par. Hopefully the system on the Pinnacle class ships is better. 

[Coffeeluvr05]

I think the wifi issues are mostly to do with being in Alaska.  Geo satellites are not very reliable when you are that far up on the planet.  Unless HAL has hybrid technology (combining geo and low earth orbit (LEO) satellites) then it's just going to be subpar up there in that territory.  At least that is how I understand it.  The Princess MedallionNet is based on this hybrid system, as I understand it.  

[Oceansaway17]

19 hours ago, Sharon in AZ said:

Because your flight is not the same day. Airport transfers upon disembarkation are only for flights leaving the same day. 

 

yes I said that much and implied that much as well

[VMax1700]

I know it is a minor problem, but could someone onboard advise the CD or whoever is responsible for the Where and When, that "laughs" is plural, not possessive nor an abbreviation, therefore it does not require an apostrophe!  "Laughs", not "laugh's" at BB's

With best wishes from the apostrophe police! 

[RGEDad]

13 minutes ago, VMax1700 said:

With best wishes from the apostrophe police! 

Which of course is a sub-unit of the Punctuation Police, and under the control of the chief of the Grammar Squadron. Best not to get too involved with the Colon Contingent - at all - ever.

[atexsix]

12 hours ago, LAFFNVEGAS said:

Good Evening from the MS Nieuw Amsterdam, not a surprise at this point WiFi went down shortly after my last post. Not sure how long it will last now so May not go into much detail.

First there is Logo Wear in the shops, quite a bit of it.. Even restock of cosmetics, I did not see the color lipstick I wanted but they called me this evening that they found it. The pricing is slightly less than I would pay at Macy’s and no tax so I am good with that.

Our excursion today was of course through Hal but something that was surprising was that they were keeping your groups with our own ship. Which I would prefer since Hal was requiring 100% vaccinated RCI was doing the 95% for Alaska. So it ends up both ships in port and we are sharing the shuttle bus into town. Our excursion did not meet at the pier most of the excursions required you take the shuttle bus into town. Half of the bus was passengers from Serenade if the Seas.

once on town we then met up with our group. We first went to Fortress of The Bear. They were actually entertaining, or at least the black bears were. The brown grizzlies were just hanging in the water.

Then went back into town where we got back on the boat St Maria that we were on last night at ICP. Otters were limited but we saw lots of whales. I got a great video of a breach but know there will be no way they will upload so may try to do it tomorrow.

Todays weather was sunny and beautiful but a bit cool.

We did not get back to the ship till 3 and I was starving since had not eaten dine 8 this morning so we had a Dive Burger, I love the Cannonball. 
Service in the Dining Room has definitely improved. 
Let’s see now if I can upload photos 

Lisa,

 

Would you say the bus to town to get on more buses was organized?  We've been in some total nightmare situations where it's not and of course no place to sit or there's one lonely little bench for 200 bad backs.  

[2inSETexas]

1 hour ago, zelker said:

On our last cruise in Alaska (2019), we saw an amazing green flash from the Lido.

We first saw the green flash on our first Alaska cruise at sunset of the sea day out of Seattle. Our best view (and a video, too) of the flash was on Oahu. I don’t think the location is as important as is a unobstructed view of the horizon. Any haze or clouds will obscure it.

[2inSETexas]

11 hours ago, Copper10-8 said:

 

At times, yes 😉 I like the style of former HAL captain Hans Mateboer who wrote several, if you include his children books. And a veteran Dutch security officer by the name of Cornelis "Cor" Meijer "Ome Cor" / Uncle Cor (the big guy on the left in the 2nd pic) also wrote a book (in Dutch) about his experiences. Having said that, I wrote a book about the history of the PD I worked for and it (researching/gathering and writing/typing) takes a lot of one's time. So then, I come back to my senses 🙂  

 

We’ve got that book. Captain Hans performed our renewal of vows ceremony in 2016 on the Rotterdam.

[cowmilker]

1 hour ago, Coffeeluvr05 said:

I think the wifi issues are mostly to do with being in Alaska.  Geo satellites are not very reliable when you are that far up on the planet.  Unless HAL has hybrid technology (combining geo and low earth orbit (LEO) satellites) then it's just going to be subpar up there in that territory.  At least that is how I understand it.  The Princess MedallionNet is based on this hybrid system, as I understand it.  

 This is correct, I believe.  We lived in Cooper Landing AK for ten years and we couldn't get satellite anything.  LOL  TV, internet, nothing.  We've been gone for several years and the situation may be better now, but it was just nonexistent when we lived there.

We had WIFI on board our South American Grand Voyage in 2020, and it was sort of abysmal when we were in Antarctica.  We were just too far south.  Same problem as Alaska, reversed.

[StLouisCruisers]

3 minutes ago, cowmilker said:

 This is correct, I believe.  We lived in Cooper Landing AK for ten years and we couldn't get satellite anything.  LOL  TV, internet, nothing.  We've been gone for several years and the situation may be better now, but it was just nonexistent when we lived there.

We had WIFI on board our South American Grand Voyage in 2020, and it was sort of abysmal when we were in Antarctica.  We were just too far south.  Same problem as Alaska, reversed.

 

We had very good wifi in Antarctica while on Seabourn.  I was surprised!  Plus it was inexpensive.  

[dfish]

5 minutes ago, cowmilker said:

We had WIFI on board our South American Grand Voyage in 2020, and it was sort of abysmal when we were in Antarctica.  We were just too far south.  Same problem as Alaska, reversed.

 

Internet in Antarctica on the Veendam in 2011 was not good.  In fact, it was pretty non existent.  However, I had excellent internet in Iceland and Greenland on the old Rotterdam back in 2019.

[aliaschief]

I would be interested about the quality of the evening entertainment along Music Walk?🎶🎶🎶

[Coffeeluvr05]

2 hours ago, Coffeeluvr05 said:

I think the wifi issues are mostly to do with being in Alaska.  Geo satellites are not very reliable when you are that far up on the planet.  Unless HAL has hybrid technology (combining geo and low earth orbit (LEO) satellites) then it's just going to be subpar up there in that territory.  At least that is how I understand it.  The Princess MedallionNet is based on this hybrid system, as I understand it.  

Since I can't edit my post now, I need to correct something...It should say MEO (mid-earth orbit).  Princess actually has a great video that explains this technology. 

 

[just_cruising_along]

17 hours ago, Copper10-8 said:

 

A heads up  - two pax were tested yesterday onboard Nieuw A because they displayed "Covid-like" symptoms (one had developed a cough and the other had "Montezuma's Alaskan cousin's revenge" is prob the best way to put it).

 

Both were Covid-19 tested onboard by Nieuw A's dedicated medical staff with negative results for the disease.

 

As a result. there are, as of today, zero confirmed Covid cases onboard Nieuw A and let's keep it that way!

Thank you for the update.  I am glad everyone is ok!

[albingirl]

Really, thank you for this cruise review.  I have been missing those for quite some time, and it's refreshing to read about something other than the state of covid.  Thank you.

[LawDog61]

17 hours ago, Copper10-8 said:

 

A heads up  - two pax were tested yesterday onboard Nieuw A because they displayed "Covid-like" symptoms (one had developed a cough and the other had "Montezuma's Alaskan cousin's revenge" is prob the best way to put it).

 

Both were Covid-19 tested onboard by Nieuw A's dedicated medical staff with negative results for the disease.

 

As a result. there are, as of today, zero confirmed Covid cases onboard Nieuw A and let's keep it that way!

Right now the positivity test rate in California is 5.9%.    So I would be much safer on board😄

[LAFFNVEGAS]

1 hour ago, atexsix said:

Lisa,

 

Would you say the bus to town to get on more buses was organized?  We've been in some total nightmare situations where it's not and of course no place to sit or there's one lonely little bench for 200 bad backs.  

Yes it was organized for first time having two ships, just not sure it was a good idea to co mingle ships. Taking the bus like this one would have no idea how to do contact tracing plus the buses were packed not separated seating like HAL did for transfers to the pier.

[LAFFNVEGAS]

4 hours ago, zelker said:

Probably still no logo masks though?

No, no logo mask but if you wore one you may be mistaken for crew, that what they wear. 😂

[zelker]

8 minutes ago, LAFFNVEGAS said:

No, no logo mask but if you wore one you may be mistaken for crew, that what they wear. 😂

I'm good with that, as long as I get tipped.  😁

 

(doesn't look like crew wears the one that has the logos all over it from pics I've seen so far, just the one that has the single logo off to the side)

[rkacruiser]

12 hours ago, DonahCBrown said:

Just heard about massive earthquake in Aleutians and tsunami warning for Alaska.  You folks okay?

 

 

Tsunami's do not bother ships at sea when they are in deep water.  I was aboard Noordam off Hati when there was a severe earthquake in that country.  There was a gentleman in the Crow's Nest that was panicked out of his mind when he saw the news on CNN.  He was certain that the Noordam was going to become the S. S. Poseidon regardless of how the bar staff and a couple of us tried to convince him otherwise.  

[LAFFNVEGAS]

1 minute ago, zelker said:

I'm good with that, as long as I get tipped.  😁

 

(doesn't look like crew wears the one that has the logos all over it from pics I've seen so far, just the one that has the single logo off to the side)

No they are all wearing the one that was on that website. Most wearing the dark blue which the logo is only on one side and is small. A few wear the white one. But absolutely every crew member is wearing one of these masks, I do not think they can wear a different one. Hal also supplies the disposable masks at the gangway. I got down to A deck today and forgot my mask and was pointed to the complimentary ones.

[Been There, Planning That]

3 hours ago, VMax1700 said:

 

With best wishes from the apostrophe police! 

It may be a 'loosing' battle but sure hope we don't defund the apostrophe police!😆

 

And neither should we defund the spelling ones.

 

Edited July 29, 2021 by Been There, Planning That

[Copper10-8]

3 hours ago, zelker said:

On our last cruise in Alaska (2019), we saw an amazing green flash from the Lido.

 

Overzealous Lido sous chef using too many avocados in the scrambled eggs?............🤓

[Copper10-8]

Nieuw A at Berth 4 in Ketchikan, AK today