Live(ish) from Westerdam Xmas/NY cruise from Auckland 20Dec22

[sewgood]

Thanks Julie for the photos from the sounds and what a beautiful baby in the photo!

 

I know what you mean about the service in the dining room while the waiters are lovely it was the first time that we had seen waiters running in the dining room, they were rushed off their feet at times.

We were in anytime and changed tables every night and found the younger waiters needed more training while the older waiters rarely ever mixed up an order or appeared rushed.

We put it down to a lot of new staff.

[OzKiwiJJ]

Anytime dining might work better on this ship. Although we have one of the best tables in the dining room in terms of view, we are surrounded by other large tables. Of course, with traditional dining everyone arrives at the same time so the waiters are rushing around serving too many people at once. From memory Princess tended to mix up table sizes in each section so service wasn't so intensive in most areas 

[boeckli]

4 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Hijack away, Lyle. Par for the course on our threads.🤣

 

What ports does that cruise go to. Ours is a 14 day cruise so I imagine your cruise will have at least one extra port.

 

This is the itinerary Julie

[MMDown Under]

2 hours ago, boeckli said:

 

This is the itinerary Julie

Sounds a great cruise with a number of different ports of call.  Good season also. 

[Blackduck59]

8 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Hijack away, Lyle. Par for the course on our threads.🤣

 

What ports does that cruise go to. Ours is a 14 day cruise so I imagine your cruise will have at least one extra port.

 

Probably mostly the same as yours but there are 2 stops in Tasmania including an overnight in Hobart. I think there is a Melbourne stop as well but we will go back as part of our land adventure after the cruise.

[OzKiwiJJ]

9 hours ago, boeckli said:

 

This is the itinerary Julie

That's a great itinerary although oddly it misses Tauranga for Rotorua and Hobbiton. Do book a Cradle Mountain excursion from Burnie. It's beautiful. I'll let you know what the HAL Bruny Island excursion out of Hobart is like in a few days, though you really only have one full day in Hobart so you might want to do other things. Mt Wellington has gorgeous views but only when the weather is good - it took four cruises before it was fine enough for us to go up there

[boeckli]

56 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

That's a great itinerary although oddly it misses Tauranga for Rotorua and Hobbiton. Do book a Cradle Mountain excursion from Burnie. It's beautiful. I'll let you know what the HAL Bruny Island excursion out of Hobart is like in a few days, though you really only have one full day in Hobart so you might want to do other things. Mt Wellington has gorgeous views but only when the weather is good - it took four cruises before it was fine enough for us to go up there

 

Have been to Hobart several times (even made it to Mt Wellington with decent visibility last month) Only port on that itinerary I haven't been is Timaru.

I like that it includes Akaroa and not Lyttelton.

So far the price is fairly high (especially when solo), so I'll have to check on the possibilities of re-fareing when prices drop.

Edited December 27, 2022 by boeckli

[mr walker]

2 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

That's a great itinerary although oddly it misses Tauranga for Rotorua and Hobbiton. 

Yes Julie, that was my first thought. Quite unusual in my experience, especially not being able to visit Rotorua

[arxcards]

1 hour ago, mr walker said:

Yes Julie, that was my first thought. Quite unusual in my experience, especially not being able to visit Rotorua

Largely around piecing an itinerary jigsaw of available ports to fit, given the amount of ship traffic. Somewhat of a compromise to fit their schedule around those of other ships.

[Blackduck59]

Rotorua was something we were interested in, Hobbiton not so much. I guess we could get in to Auckland earlier and make that a trip before the cruise. There are a couple of VLOGers from these parts, one Canadian and one American that are going to be on Noordam in a couple of days. HAL is comping them the cruise so it will be interesting to see how balanced the reporting is. Of course the "Hobbiton" excursion has been cancelled so one of them is already choked about that. I am more interested in the Maori culture than some movie set.

[SilvertoGold]

1 hour ago, Blackduck59 said:

Rotorua was something we were interested in, Hobbiton not so much. I guess we could get in to Auckland earlier and make that a trip before the cruise. There are a couple of VLOGers from these parts, one Canadian and one American that are going to be on Noordam in a couple of days. HAL is comping them the cruise so it will be interesting to see how balanced the reporting is. Of course the "Hobbiton" excursion has been cancelled so one of them is already choked about that. I am more interested in the Maori culture than some movie set.

Do you have a website address for these VLOGers?  Might be interesting.

[Blackduck59]

1 hour ago, SilvertoGold said:

Do you have a website address for these VLOGers?  Might be interesting.

One is "Don's Family Vacations" on utube he is the Canadian but sometimes gets irritating,  the other is "la lido loca" also on utube. I'm not endorsing either of them. Just making people aware that they will be on Noordam. I think she is alongside for the fireworks in Sydney, either that or they will be staying in a hotel for it.

[SilvertoGold]

10 minutes ago, Blackduck59 said:

One is "Don's Family Vacations" on utube he is the Canadian but sometimes gets irritating,  the other is "la lido loca" also on utube. I'm not endorsing either of them. Just making people aware that they will be on Noordam. I think she is alongside for the fireworks in Sydney, either that or they will be staying in a hotel for it.

Thanks. Any info on the Noordam (or other HAL ships in NZ/Australia) is helpful for our specific planning.

[OzKiwiJJ]

5 hours ago, Blackduck59 said:

Rotorua was something we were interested in, Hobbiton not so much. I guess we could get in to Auckland earlier and make that a trip before the cruise. There are a couple of VLOGers from these parts, one Canadian and one American that are going to be on Noordam in a couple of days. HAL is comping them the cruise so it will be interesting to see how balanced the reporting is. Of course the "Hobbiton" excursion has been cancelled so one of them is already choked about that. I am more interested in the Maori culture than some movie set.

Rotorua is a three hour drive from Auckland and it's worth spending a couple of days there.

 

Hobbiton is on the way and is really worth seeing. Yes, it was a movie set but it's more like walking into a Middle Earth hobbit village. The only thing missing are the hobbits themselves. I found it fascinatingly beautiful.

[OzKiwiJJ]

We didn't cruise through Doubtful Sound but went straight up the coast to Milford Sound. This was our fourth time entering Milford Sound by ship and the weather couldn't have been more perfect. The air was crystal clear so all the mountains in the background stood out very clearly as well. 

 

Since we had a port side cabin we just stayed on our balcony. Port is always the best side to be on when entering Milford Sound.

 

No matter how many times I go there the sheer magnificence of the scenery always blows me away. As usual we went into Milford quite slowly. There weren't many seals on Seal Rock and we didn't go as close as past cruises to see them clearly. We spotted a couple of tiny waterfalls before reaching Stirling Falls so there must have been rain fairly recently. Both Stirling Falls and Bowen Falls were running quite strongly too. At the head of the sound the ship turned through 540 degrees to give everyone a good view and position the ship ready to leave again. We also did another 360 in front of Stirling Falls on the way out. We enjoyed basking in the late afternoon sun as we exited Milford, seeing distant mountains I'd never really noticed before.

[OzKiwiJJ]

The deceptive entrance to Milford Sound

 

Stirling Falls

 

Snowy background mountains steal the scene from Bowen Falls in the foreground

 

Bowen Falls

 

The shape of Mitre Peak is best seen from this angle but mostly hidden behind another smaller mountain

 

Evening light doesn't show Mitre Peak at it's best. It needs the morning light for that.

 

A mountain range in the background as we leave Milford Sound

[OzKiwiJJ]

Dinner service was much better this time as the large table of eight just next to our table weren't there. Plus our waiter has got the message about getting our wines to us in a timely manner to match the food service.

 

It was one of our tablemates birthday so his wife shouted the table a bottle of Prosecco to start the evening off. 

 

I had a lovely raw tuna entree, then the oxtail we had missed out on the previous night. I finished with a very decent cheese platter.

 

During dessert the birthday boy was surprised by a cake plus a birthday song in a language we didn't recognise but which was probably Tagalog as there is a large contingent of Filipinos amoung the crew. It was lovely.

 

We had a time change overnight so got an extra hour of sleep. 😊

Edited December 27, 2022 by OzKiwiJJ

[cruiser3775]

45 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Port is always the best side to be on when entering Milford Sound.

Is there a "best side" for viewing Doubtful and Dusty Sounds?

[OzKiwiJJ]

1 hour ago, cruiser3775 said:

Is there a "best side" for viewing Doubtful and Dusty Sounds?

If coming straight in from the Tasman Sea, ie with Milford Sound first, then the port side is best. If coming from the other direction then starboard. These sounds are quite complex and in both the ship goes between large islands and the mainland. Facing the mainland side allows you to see into some of the waterways joining the one the ship is in. However if you can find a spot where you can move from side to side then you'll get the best of both worlds.

[SilvertoGold]

1 hour ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Dinner service was much better this time as the large table of eight just next to our table weren't there. Plus our waiter has got the message about getting our wines to us in a timely manner to match the food service.

 

It was one of our tablemates birthday so his wife shouted the table a bottle of Prosecco to start the evening off. 

 

I had a lovely raw tuna entree, then the oxtail we had missed out on the previous night. I finished with a very decent cheese platter.

 

During dessert the birthday boy was surprised by a cake plus a birthday song in a language we didn't recognise but which was probably Tagalog as there is a large contingent of Filipinos amoung the crew. It was lovely.

 

We had a time change overnight so got an extra hour of sleep. 😊

The birthday song on HAL is in  Bahasa Indonesian. I think it is called Gelan Gelan.

[lyndarra]

16 minutes ago, SilvertoGold said:

The birthday song on HAL is in  Bahasa Indonesian. I think it is called Gelan Gelan.

Terimah kasi

[OzKiwiJJ]

1 hour ago, SilvertoGold said:

The birthday song on HAL is in  Bahasa Indonesian. I think it is called Gelan Gelan.

 

1 hour ago, lyndarra said:

Terimah kasi

Thanks. It was a lovely song.

[MMDown Under]

1 hour ago, SilvertoGold said:

The birthday song on HAL is in  Bahasa Indonesian. I think it is called Gelan Gelan.

Thinking of birthdays on board ship, my birthday wasn't acknowledged on my recent cruise.  This is the second time on a cruise.  I'm wondering whether you are meant to tell someone it is your birthday.  The Carnival on line girl picked up that it would be my birthday on the cruise, without being told!  However, I was surrounded by birthday celebrations on both cruises.  

[dillpickle48]

Have had the staff sing for both of us on our birthdays and anniversaries every time they occurred on our Hal cruises. Always enjoyed it. Especially when they brought a cake and a bowl of ice cream for me as well.

[OzKiwiJJ]

2 hours ago, MMDown Under said:

Thinking of birthdays on board ship, my birthday wasn't acknowledged on my recent cruise.  This is the second time on a cruise.  I'm wondering whether you are meant to tell someone it is your birthday.  The Carnival on line girl picked up that it would be my birthday on the cruise, without being told!  However, I was surrounded by birthday celebrations on both cruises.  

There is a section in the Princess Medallion app where you advise them of celebrations although sometimes they pick up birthdays from your booking DOB. That's not consistent though. I'm not sure about other cruise lines.

 

We usually try to avoid the birthday fuss but when we booked the 3rd Sept cruise B2B with our previously booked 13th Sept cruise the blasted Medallion app linked the two cruises and promptly lost our speciality dining booking. So I had to go to Sabatinis on the first cruise to get them to book us a table on the second cruise and when doing that Rolf mentioned it was my birthday that day. I must admit they did it beautifully and made me feel very special.

Edited December 28, 2022 by OzKiwiJJ