This was a 14 day trans-atlantic from Ft Lauderdale to Rome with 4 ports: two in the Azores and two in Spain. I've done over 50 cruises and about 10 were on HAL. I've always liked HAL's vibe - which is to appeal to seasoned travelers who appreciate discovering new places. I like days at sea and purposely picked this smaller, older ship after being on the Nieuw Statendam last summer (whose ...
We just got off the ship after a 3 week transatlantic cruise from Ft Lauderdale to Barcelona.
The Oosterdam is becoming quite dilapidated. We encountered many serious infrastructure issues.
Firstly, there were many leaks that marred our cruising experience. The Lido dining room had water soaked carpeting that passengers were forced to walk on to get to the seating area.
We also ...
Joined others on this voyage to celebrate one of our travel family member's 80th birthday. She has some 40+ cruises on several different lines, but likes HAL as one of her top 3 lines. Over-all the cruise was enjoyable, but at a lower level in many respects when compared to pre-covid cruises. I think we all understand that the industry lost a ton of money, sold ships to the scrappers to offset ...
We had never been on a Panama Canal cruise even after having sailed on more than 50 cruises. Our cabin was a balcony and was very nice. This cabin was smaller than some we have enjoyed but was still fine. The fact it had a tub/shower was nice. The beds were comfortable with very nice pillows. The fact there was no turndown service was disappointing. This is the first time we have encountered this, ...
We chose this cruise since it was billed as a Big Game Cruise with a Slot Tournament. We didn't book for the Itinerary as we'd been to most of these places before. We booked at a casino rate in an Oceanview cabin. Since we had a room with no balcony we decided to rent a cabana in the Retreat so we could be outside when we wanted to be in our own area. This turned out to be wonderful. Two weeks ...
Boarded in Sydney and with the VeriFLY app in hand we were onboard in 15 minutes. Our suite was ready and we dropped off our carry on bags and headed to the Lido.
We had a signature suite which we received via an upgrade offer. We had booked a veranda cabin, and the upgrade offer to a suite was too good of a deal to pass up.
Overall we enjoyed the ship and the 25 day sailing. We had 2 very ...
The main focus of this trip was to visit relatives in New Zealand and Australia. After spending a month travelling around the 2 countries we decided to board the Noordam to sail back to Vancouver. We found the ship very clean and well maintained. The cabin was adequate with a great balcony. There was an issue with the air conditioning in our stateroom which took 3 days to fix but we were ...
I have wanted to see the Panama Canal for longer than I want to talk about! Had an offer which made the two week cruise reasonable enough to pull the trigger, and had a great time!
I saw a previous review that said this was the worst ship ever, I just don't see that. Is it older? Yes. But it is aging pretty well. The carpets, furniture, and other fittings have clearly been kept up. The ...
We started in San Diego and ended up in our home state, which made this a fun trip! We had several family tragedies the months leading up to the trip and it was nice to get away, just the two of us.
We have been in the canal before but never end to end. The history and discussion the cruise director did really brought the history of the canal to life.
The stop in Guatemala we so ...
I am incredibly disappointed with HAL. I have traveled multiple times with this line and was always delighted.
That is not the case with my recent sailing on the Nieuw Amsterdam. Cleanliness was not a priority. In my cabin room, debris, old contacts, and gooey stuff were left in the trashcan, the bathroom floor wasn't clean, and neither was the area around the sink. The countertops in the ...