We live close to Vancouver, so a cruise to Alaska is one of our favorites. Even though this was the fifth cruise to Alaska for us, we never tire of the spectacular scenery. This cruise was actually two separate cruises back to back, a 7 day northbound and a 7 day southbound. We had been on this identical cruise two years earlier and ended up with an onboard credit which we wanted to use.

The Zaandam is an older, smaller ship, but we prefer that to a mega-monster. It has been well maintained, with new carpeting throughout, and constant cleaning and upkeep happening during the cruise. We especially all the big windows--it was never hard to find a comfy chair in front of a window to do some reading. There were some rustspots evident in places, but we all show our age at some point!

Embarkation was relatively quick, and we were on board by noon. We were surprised to be allowed to go to our cabin right away-no waiting until 1pm, and schlepping our luggage around with us til then. Read more