Koningsdam Dec 12-19 Review

[ohioNCLcruiser]

Hi Everyone,

 

We were a party of 5 (in 3 cabins) that sailed on the Koningsdam on Dec 12^th and I wanted to share my views. Overall, we had a wonderful time. The cruise started with one negative. I want to share that first to get it out of the way.

 

My mother and her partner had a Vista Suite on deck six. Obviously, they are fine with traveling, but they still have general concerns about covid. A big part of making them “at ease” with the cruise idea was how clean the ships are these days. When they boarded the cruise the cabin was ready for occupancy. Everything looked properly cleaned until they opened the drawers and the previous cruiser’s dirty clothes were still in them. Not wanting to ruin the trip, they pointed it out to the area’s housekeeping manager who apologized and offered to have the cabin properly cleaned and sanitized. Fast forward a few hours and they had finished and the cabin looked great. Around dinner time they went to put something in the fridge to discover old, half consumed food from the previous person was still in the fridge. This made them really question the true state of cleaning the ship however they moved to a different cabin and absolutely loved their housekeeping team after that. Our two other cabins had zero issues throughout the sailing.

 

Embarkation:

 

1.       We had a 2pm boarding time but found ourselves ready to check-out of our hotel around 10:30am. We went for a walk with our luggage down to the pier to see if we could drop off our bags early at 11:15am and they let us do the entire check-in process. I would say we were 5 of 50 total people at the time. From arriving to the pier to being on the ship was 15 minutes. Very easy process but it certainly helped we were the only ship there and was sailing with just over 1,000 passengers.

 

Ship:

 

1.       The ship is in great condition. This was my 5^th sailing since the restart (3 on Carnival, 1 MSC and this one) and you can tell HAL did a great job maintaining the ship during the downtime.

2.       I really enjoyed the beautiful décor of this ship. We all really enjoyed it more than the Westerdam. It felt modern and fun. The Koningsdam has such a great variety of artwork onboard. My favorite was the forward stairwell. Make sure you take some time to walk down each deck to check them out.

3.       My only negative is the ship has many areas where you can’t pass through without going up, over and down. Also the upper deck not as open as I like. Not a lot of lounging areas or places you can walk the full distance of the ship.

4.       Public areas looked like they were constantly being cleaned throughout the cruise. The crew did a great job with this.

 

Entertainment:

 

1.       The shows in the main lounge were great. It appeared (and I might be wrong) that they didn’t have a full production cast but they provided a wonderful experience regardless. The sounds and visual screens add so much.

2.       Some of the music venues were too loud for the small space. The performers themselves were great just not the best venue for them.

3.       Our group loves trivia on cruises. The 4pm trivia sessions were not fun like other cruises we had been on. It almost seemed like taking a test in school. At one point people asked the person reading the questions to slow down and repeat and she said, “I don’t have time to repeat everything or wait long between questions.” It just wasn’t like how it usually was.

4.       The casino had a nice amount of activity for its smaller size. The bar staff and waitresses were always around and it was never difficult to get service. They were wonderful!

 

Service:

 

1.       The service, besides the housekeeping incident I mentioned before, was wonderful throughout the cruise. Everyone was on their A-game.

 

Food:

 

1.       The included food was the best food I have had on a cruise in a very long time. The main dining and buffet offerings were always fresh and delicious. Honestly, everyone in the party was very impressed and we are all seasoned cruisers.

2.       We dined in the steakhouse and it was a special meal. The service, the quality of the food, the ambiance etc. I highly suggest it.

 

Those are my quick notes for now. Let me know if you have any specific questions and I'll be happy to answer them!

James

[Sea42]

Sounds like your group had a very nice getaway, thanks for sharing your thoughts.

While I understand how something in the drawers could be overlooked, it's just not acceptable to overlook something in the refrigerator not once but twice! Don't they at least check to see if anything had been consumed from the minibar? I would want to be moved to away from that housekeeping team also!

[igraf]

I am happy to hear that the food was regarded so well by experienced cruisers.

 

igraf

 

 

[ohioNCLcruiser]

2 hours ago, igraf said:

I am happy to hear that the food was regarded so well by experienced cruisers.

 

igraf

 

 

My next three sailings on Carnival are going to be so disappointing now in the included food department! 

[KirkNC]

Thanks for the review, sounds like a pretty good trip.