This was our 15th cruise, and our third on Holland America. The Oosterdam looked familiar, since we had sailed on the maiden voyage of its sister ship, the Westerdam in 2004. We chose this cruise for its itinerary, having taken a similar cruise to the Sea of Cortez on HAL's Statendam in 2003. We had enjoyed seeing the small towns in Baja California and were ready for another visit. Since we have generally sailed on Princess ships rather than HAL, I've made some comparisons between the two cruise lines in my remarks.

We flew from Portland, Oregon to San Diego the day prior to embarkation. This gave us a chance to see some of the center of this beautiful city and we slept better knowing that it would only be a short taxi ride to the pier from our hotel, the Westin Gaslamp Quarter, located right next to the Horton Plaza mall.

With our head start, we arrived at the pier at 11:30 a.m., and were checked in, on the ship and in our stateroom by noon. We had a friendly greeting in the ship's atrium and were invited to go up to the Lido for lunch. We spotted a reservations desk for the "as you wish" dining that we had selected for this cruise and quickly made a reservation for the first night's dinner at the "Canaletto" restaurant which adjoins the Lido buffet. Read more