The food was sub-par. Some examples are sandwiches with 1 piece of paper-thin meat and fish that had an ammonia taste (meaning it's old and not edible). Most, not all food tasted as if it came out of a can or box-example, coconut shrimp. At best the food was inconsistent, upcharges for steak and lobster in regular dining. little entertainment on the ship. For 16 days, 2 different comedians, ...
The Nieuw Amsterdam is definitely dated. Looks, smells, and feels like an old ship. The Pinnacle class ships are much nicer than this Signature Line ship or the even older Vista Class ships. Will never go on HAL on other than a Pinnacle Class ship.
The entertainment was horrible. Almost non-existent. There is literally nothing going on-- day or night. Main entertainment was watching a ...
We chose this ship because we wanted to go away for the Christmas Holiday.
Embarkation was easy for us. This was our 4th HAL cruise and the 2nd on this ship. We have also sailed Carnival, Princess, RCL, Celebrity and Azamara. We had always enjoyed HAL, but we won’t sail the Nieuw Amsterdam again.
Pros:
Band in BB King’s Blues club is fabulous! The live entertainment in all venues was ...
We had cruised 19 times before this cruise and chose HAL because we like their service and food on the other HAL ships. This being our first cruise since COVID started, we also wanted a smaller ship.
Both embarkation and disembarkation were very smooth and we received our luggage within 2 hours.
The ship was nicely decorated for the holidays and is still in fairly good condition, although ...
We scheduled the cruise as a retirement gift for my wife and I as we read many great reviews for food an service. Not True. Stay away, they wasted our money and time, don't let it happen to you.
1. The service was so bad I was convinced that they did not care about us as paying customers.
2. The food in the Lido Market was nothing better than cafeteria food. I was more than convinced they ...
This was our second cruise on the Nieuw Amsterdam. The first was the last week of February 2020, the week before Covid shut down cruising. We enjoyed the ship and crew the first time around and decided to try her again. This was the southern Carribean trip to HMC, Aruba and Curacao. Love HMC and it had been a few years since we visited the other two ports. This cruise includes three sea days which ...
Embark & Disembark
We are not extensive cruisers, but this was the most haphazard embarkation we’ve experienced. Security were surly and borderline rude. Passport kiosk didn’t work at all for my partner and myself, so we were directed to the desk. PA announcements were almost impossible to hear, with the echo. The terminal should place electronic screens with instructions.
Disembark was very ...
November 27 to December 4th
This was my 5th time on this ship. 3 times on the LRBC chartered cruise, once with my elderly MIL and this time with a friend.
Normally HAL is never my go to cruise line. The last two times are because my MIL is a long time HAL cruiser (she is 91 now) and my friend is 4* HAL.
Embarkation was a breeze. The ship apparently only had 1500 on this sailing. It was ...
Chose cruise to join family members. On the first morning we went to the main dining room. My cold breakfast came quickly the remainder of our party waited 45 minutes for their hot food. At dinner I ordered a wine package and chose a white wine the bottle was placed on the table instead of in an ice bucket, we were then forced to help ourselves. The practice of not allowing shorts in the dining ...
We took this cruise because it was Available for back to back while visiting differs ports on each segment. Entertainment in the main theater was only BBC and dancers. While both were excellent, we’d like more of a variety. Also missing was Americas Test Kitchen, though it’s still listed. There was the same comedian in BB Kings on several nights. The music in that venue was good. We have not ...