The cruise to Alaska on the Holland America ship Volendam was a mixed experience. The places visited, Juneau, Skagway, Glacier Bay and Ketchikan were all great in their different and dramatic ways. We went on a number of excursions, whale watching, a train journey to the Yukon and sailing the misty wilderness waters, which were all very well organised with informative, enthusiastic, guides to provide information and answer questions along the way. The Captain did a great job of getting close in and turning the ship slowly in front of the Glaciers so everyone could get a good view. Life on board the Volendam itself left a little to be desired however. The staff were all very polite but not very effective when we needed something doing. The toilet blocked twice in a week. The first evening did not start well as we had to wait ages to get seated in the restaurant for dinner, then we waited over 20 minutes between courses. We complained and lots of notes of our complaint were written down but nothing came of it, no apologies, no offer of compensation, nothing. The restaurant service did improve during the cruise, however. I could not understand why we had to wait around for ages to be seated every time we went to the restaurant, despite having booked a table time. I have never come across such a slow system of table allocation and seating on any of the many cruises we have been on. When the food arrived the quality was reasonable but not that good as was the choice and variety on the menu. The Volendam only has two speciality restaurants and when we tried to book a table we were only offered 5:30pm, which is not the time most people want to eat in the evening. We did eventually eat in one of the speciality restaurants, but compared with other cruise ship speciality restaurants e.g. Marco Pierre White and Gary Rhodes, Holland America's just don't make the grade and generally don't compare well with other cruise lines we have been on, no fridge or coffee/tea facilities in staterooms, $4 for a bottle of water, poor toiletries in the bathroom etc, the nice little personal touches you get on most cruise ships are missing from the Volendam. I even had to ask to get a few nuts with my drinks. The visiting entertainers were good but the resident musicians and entertainers were not. There were two formal evenings but the number of men in tuxedos could be counted on two hands. Many people on board did not appear to change for dinner each evening, which says a lot. When I got my onboard account I had been charged twice for one item. When I queried it with the Front Desk I was told they would look into it but they never did and as they have access to my credit card I could not prevent the wrong amount from being taken. I never did get a refund.

The landscape and scenery of Alaska are magnificent and I would recommend an Alaskan cruise to anyone, but I cannot recommend Holland America. There are much better cruise lines out there.