I have cruised on Princess and Carnival cruise lines with very good experiences. I tried Holland America because of their broader list of options for port embarkation. I will never try them again....

I will say on-boarding was very smooth, as was leaving the ship. Beyond that, I will say Holland America has a lot to learn about how to service customers. I will start with the ports:

The ports are the most important part of a cruise. Many customers will only have one chance to visit an area. Our ship was scheduled to stop in Bergen, Norway. According to the captain, it was too windy to dock our ship. However, other cruise ships were docked that same morning. Apparently, Holland America paid for a cheap place to dock that is next to shallow water. Any wind can push the boat to shallow water. One might say you can't blame weather. However, that area is windy. After making 100 trips, you can't tell me they are not well aware of the problem at that port. Holland America.....lets cough up the money for a better place to dock. Also, have a plan B in place. If you know the dock is shallow, and it is a problem to dock in windy conditions, provide better service to your customers by preparing options for when that happens. We spent the day on the sea.....completely missing the port....on the nicest, sunniest day of the cruise. As we cruised out of Bergen....watching other passengers from other ships visiting the port, my family (and most passengers I talked with) wondered why we did not book our cruise with one of those companies. There was no storm...... just an above average breeze. Read more