Zuiderdam 11/27/04 Sailing Review

[snipboy]

I'll start off by saying that this board was tremendously helpful and reassuring about taking this ship and HAL in general. So many thanks! I'll do little summaries and then an overall summary at the end with my final thoughts:

 

Docs: Awesome. Very impressed.

 

Phone communications with HAL: Very impressed.

 

Embarkation: Impressed. We arrived around noon and while the line was long, we got through in less than a half hour. It wasn't the circus and disorganized mess RCCL was.

 

First Impression on the Ship: Poor. I was barraged by people trying to sell drink stickers. IT was RELENTLESS. My wife lost her patience at one point and demanded we lower our tip based on that (which we did). The ship itself was impressive to us. Classier than RCCL, yet with a style all its own, it seemed.

 

The Cabin: Oh man. What a disappointment. We got a BC on the upper verandah deck. It was dirty. And not just dirty, but gross dirty. And what made it worse was that it was obvious that the room had towels stocked and the bed made and nothing else was checked or cleaned (I want to emphasize that we only went to the room after we were cleared to at 1:30 PM).

Here is a list of dirty gross things, so pass over it if you are squimish:

 

-Hair on the bathroom floor and sink. The tub was not clean.

-Clipped toe nails on the floor. Man, that was a killer for us.

-The remote control was taped together and was gooey.

-The stool for the vanity was badly stained.

-There were stains on the walls.

 

After that, the room itself didn't work like it should have. The TV didn't ever really work correctly, despite getting a new remote, and that mini-bar didn't cool drinks. It was explained to us that it "not meant to cool, but to keep cool items that were already cool, cool". Uh, that's not cool.

 

So we did complain and by 7 PM the room was finally up to snuff for the most part, and they comped us a real mini-refridgerator. Unfortunately that took up most of the vanity. We were frustrated that it wasn't cleaned right in the first place, and that it took as long as it did. But it was an embarkation day, and I know those stewards work 16 hour days that day.

 

Had everything worked generally right and it was reasonably clean, we would have thought the room was awesome. Slightly smaller than our Balcony cabin on Enchantment of the Seas, but still nice. The balcony was a good two-three feet bigger on Zuiderdam as well.

 

Shipboard Experience: We were endlessly lost on this ship. Corridor after corridor of cabins had us constantly confused in what direction we were headed, and where we were. Even on the 2,3,4 decks we were often lost and headed in the wrong direction. You just don't have an open feeling with this ship. I guess it is a personal preference on whether you like this or not. I thought the wrap around "real" promenade deck made up for much of that. I loved that. I was also very fond of the aft pool.

 

Dining Experience: Mixed. I was surprised that Lido cafe wasn't a real buffet. You were served. I liked that, my wife didn't. The food quality was decidedly better than RCCL, but the selection was lacking. "The Wok" was consistently bad. Very bad. The pizza was awesome and all the entries were very good. In the Vista Dining room, the service was noticably slow and inaccurate, even when we emphasized preferences. We could tell those waiters were totally stressed out. I felt bad for them. As far as quality goes, I was satisfied and happy. As was my wife. Our table mates who also frequently cruise Celebrity said that the food was much better there. We enjoyed our table mates immensely. I am not sure how they pair people up, but we never would have met these folks otherwise, so we were glad we did. We ate at the Pinnacle Grill for the first night (thanks for the 10$ per person tip!!). It was outstanding.

 

Itinarary and Ports: HMC is hands down the loveliest island I have ever been on. That sand is like talcum powder. We were there with the Westerdam and while it was busy, it didn't feel crowded. Food at the BBQ was good and the whole little village they have is charming and interesting. We wanted to be there longer.

 

St. Thomas is a hell hole. There were five other ships there with us, including Carribbean Princess and the place swamped. We felt unsafe. We wandered only slightly off the beaten path in the city shopping area and we were in a red light district. We saw an ugly incident there. Kind of disturbing. The Synagogue is a neat visit and we liked that. Magens Bay was a dirty disappointment and other than alcohol, the whole idea of a shoppers paradise is grossly overblown. We were glad to get out of there.

 

BVI was awesome. Great people and they went out of their way to take care of us everywhere we went. We took Speedy's to Virgin Gorda and had a wonderful adventure. I'd highly recommend Speedy's again. Those sea caves and rock formations are amazing. I went through them to Devil's Bay and when I got through low and behold a German-language adult magazine is doing a photoshoot there. Wow. I was kind of stunned. Later the photographer was stopping people asking if they accidently took her camera. Uh oh!!!! There are lots of snakes and reptiles there, but I like that kind of stuff. It's easy to get lost in the hills around there, but that was part of my adventure! We want to go back to BVI for a week sometime in the future. We were very impressed. Nassau was another interesting spot. We decided to take a tour of the city on one of the Taxi Tours. Our first choice of a driver got into a fight with a competitor. That scared me quite a bit, so we decided to go with yet another competitor. His name was "Greg" and he was great. He gave us a very personal tour of the island and gave us significantly more time. The tour was originally supposed to be 2 hours, he gave us nearly 4 for $25 per person. He also took us to Atlantis and got us in to part of the acqurium. Nice. The juxtaposition of extreme shanty poverty and Atlantis disturbed us. As an affluent American I felt very conflicted about how to react. I was relieved to leave Nassau, but my wife wanted more time there--not for the shopping but to meet more people like Greg.

 

The onboard itinarary during the Sea Days was frustrating. It focuses on a lot of early morning events, bare afternoons and then evening events that are centered around the early dinner at the Vista Dining room. We felt like we were constantly rushing or didn't have enough to do. So that promenade deck was great to just give in to relaxation. We won the Trivia contest on Thursday. That was fun.

 

The Shows: The song and dance shows are a little unsophisticated for our tastes. I can tolerate them for the camp and cheese factor, my wife as a professional actress can not tolerate them at all. The juggler Edge was awesome and highly entertaining, even though he struggles as a juggler! Julie Barr the comedian appealed to the lowest common denomenator. Not a whole lot original there. She didn't seem to want to be there. Her adult act was horrifying. It was just uninspired childish joke after joke modified to replace teenagers with gentarians. We watched a nice selection of movies on the ship and that was nice. Showing "Troy" in the Vista Lounge instead of the Queens Lounge was a nice thing, but you could hear music leaking in from some other location. It was very amusing to hear Tom Petty "Learning To Fly" while Achilles is pondering his fate. I could tell other audience members were very annoyed.

 

The Toilet Sewage Problem: Our cruise had it too. We couldn't smell it from our cabin, but the smell was definitely apparent on day 5 on the 2,3 decks. One of our table mate couples said it was really cramping their style.

 

Crew: The crew was generally very helpful and cheerful. Standouts are the photographer Vicki and an assistant cruise director, Craig.

 

Disembarkation: Smooth as silk. Very impressed. I loved that we could stay in our room while we waited for them to call our number. We ordered room service and it was prompt and hot. Wished we did it prior to that.

 

Value: We felt we got what we paid for. Had I paid more, I would have been annoyed. I was frustrated to hear that one of the couples got a b2b in an category SS for just 200 more per person than we did. But I didn't get details on just how they got that.

 

 

 

Overall Summary: The ship is flawed and I get the sense that it just doesn't know what it wants to be. It is conflicted. Is it a megaship or is it not? The design leads me to think they tried to take a small ship experience and put it in a big one and it failed. The fit and finish of the ship was poor. For a two year old ship it shouldn't look worn like a 7 or 8 year old one does. The crew was mostly great and the service was as well. We are going to try Celebrity before going back to HAL, but I definitely want to try one of their smaller ships and get in on the buzz everyone in this forum has for them. Our cruise vacation was awesome though. No one complaint other than the dirty room severely affected the trip overall.

[dakrewser]

Thanks for the honest report which confirms much of what others have said about this ship - it can be very good, but that's the exception.

 

-dave

[ColoradoJuli]

I keep reading about the sewage problem. I am really beginning to become concerned about if I want to go on the Zuiderdam in May. Should I look for another ship? We are currently booked in a BA, can't remember which deck.

[FrankenLouis]

Hello Coloradojuli,

 

Stay booked on your May cruise. I am sure you will have a great time and never regret going. These boards can be very helpful, but like everything else you can not read these post and take it all for granted. Granted his cabin I am sure had the problems he speaks about , but is this really worth making such a big deal about for the whole week??? I say someone made an error. You call someone to come clean the room, and be done with it. The mini bar... yet another drama... what is his idea of cold and what is mine or yours?? He was endlessly lost on the ship? Could this be that he had trouble reading a deck plan? Instead it is the fault of the ship. In the end the cruise was awesome in his own words. ??? Ok fine.. great he had a good time in the end. I just do not get all the drama about small issues that can easily and quickly be fixed. I feel often when I read these boards that people go on these cruises with the idea that they are looking for problems. As they say... we all travel to see and experience different places and people, if you want it to be like home, simple, stay home.

[doone]

I agree with the above poster, don't cancel your cruise. I had read many bad things about the Volendam when I had booked her a few years back. I was going to cancel my cruise on her based on what I had read here. Thank god I didn't, it turned out to be one of the best cruises. Once onboard, my worries were quickly unfounded and we enjoyed this cruise. We enjoyed the Volendam so much, we booked her again for March.

 

Take what you read here with a grain of salt.

[Krazy Kruizers]

Thanks for taking the time to post your honest review.

Enjoyed reading it.

[xznwfd]

Please don't even think of canceling your cruise! I was on the Zuiderdam last February, and had none of the problems mentioned in the review. We had a fantastic time, thought the ship was immaculate, and never caught even a whiff of sewage smell. Everyone has a different opinion of their experience. For example, I adore St. Thomas, loved Megan's Bay, and can't stand Nassau! I won't even get off the ship there any longer. So go and enjoy, our differences of opinion are what make life interesting!:)

[DoctorFeelgood]

It sounds very fair and well-balanced.

 

I hope that the things you mentioned get corrected before my New-Year's Eve cruise.

[ColoradoJuli]

Thanks for the input. I will keep my reservations. Plus I started looking at other options last night and didn't really see anything that interested me. I also got an incredible price on a balcony on the Zuiderdam.

[Lokalona]

I must say I felt a lot like the original poster in his review of the ship, entertainment and food. I like St. Thomas but only long enough to catch the ferry to St. John, and maybe buy something in the crystal shoppe....Nassua you can have, as we all feel about the same on that. HMC is a great little island getaway.

 

As for sewage, we not only smelled it, but it backed up into our cabin and remained on the floor for 7 hours until it got cleaned up...2 phone calls, 2 visits to the front desk and me taking the bucket from the storage and heading off on my own to clean before someone arrived.

 

The Zui is in need of a facelift, in the way of management...poor managers make a unhappy staff and an unhappy staff do a half baked job keeping things clean and customers happy. IMO