Veendam Review
Rating by category
Additional details
We are a couple in our mid 50's from Central California. This was our eighth cruise and our fourth one to Alaska. We flew to Seattle a day ahead of time to see our daughter and son-in-law and then took Amtrak from Everett to Vancouver which was a great way to go. We left Everett about 8:30 am and arrived in Vancouver at 11:30 am. Amazingly we were on the ship by 12:30! Embarkation was the fastest and easiest we have ever experienced.
We changed from an inside cabin to an outside a few months back during a three day sale and saved $300. In order to do this we had to cancel our original booking and rebook. In the process we were assigned to the new As You Wish dining. We weren't pleased with that change but decided to give it a try for the first week and then try to change to traditional, assigned, seating for week two. We found that the AYW dining worked out very well with the show times and the Alaska itinerary so we decided not to change. While we miss having the same table mates and waiter each night the AYW dining works well for an Alaska cruise. We have asked for a table for two a few evenings and joined others a couple of times. The Veendam is a beautiful ship. It is a bit smaller than others ships we have sailed and we could feel the sea a bit more, but that is not an issue with us. Our stateroom was an obstructed view outside cabin, but we could see the ocean. It was located on the promenade deck so we were only steps away from an outside deck where we could enjoy the ocean up close. Our stateroom was a bit noisier than others we have had. We could hear people in the cabins next to us and we could hear the music form the theater which was above us, but that wasn't a huge issue. A couple of mornings the crewman who was cleaning to promenade deck woke us up quite early when he hosed down our window which was only a foot or so from our heads.
The shows on the Veendam were quite good and the singers and dancers did an excellent job. We were quite pleased since we had been a bit disappointed in the show quality on a previous HAL cruise. The non-cast shows were also quite entertaining and we were pleased that only three of the seven shows were repeated the second week.