Volendam Review

More of a Shopping Experience than a Wildlife Cruise

Review for Alaska Cruise on Volendam
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francisthetraveller
2-5 Cruises • Age 40s

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Sail Date: Jun 2016
Cabin: Large Ocean-View Stateroom

For a cruise that was marketed as about seeing wildlife, the crew seemed particularly lacking in knowledge on this area with apparently no ranger on board except for the short time when we were cruising through Glacier Bay. Most of the time we simply motored around at speed and the chances of seeing a whale or any other animal showed in the marketing seemed to be extremely limited. This was a big disappointment as the cruise felt more like a ferry taking us from A to B than a cruise to see the wildlife we would have liked to see.

However our biggest gripe with the cruise was the amount of shops on board and the endless focus of the staff on encouraging us to buy everything from jewellery to art. This seemed to have annoyed a lot of fellow passengers as well. In particular it was a shame that whilst trying to flog a lot of stuff we didn't need, they didn't seem to sell the basic things we might have wanted to buy on a cruise like sunhats, coats, memory cards for the camera etc.

Lastly the food was very mediocre in our opinion. We will be staying away from this line in future.

Cabin Review

Large Ocean-View Stateroom

Cabin EE

No problems with the cabin, which was fine if a little dated.

Port Reviews

Skagway

The town is quite a boring place, but the train ride looked great

Glacier Bay

Watching the glacier calve was a highlight

Ketchikan

Interesting enough town which can be walked around in a couple of hours hence I cannot see any need to buy any of the excursions if you are able bodied

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