Volendam Review
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Choose this cruise because it was highly discounted due to my wife's play in the casino. We were looking for sometihng special as my 70th birthday and our 50th wedding anniversary occured during the time we were on this vacation. We have sailed twice before on Holland America and found them to be not to our liking due to fair food quality and boring activities while onboard. We really wanted to see Alaska as we have been on over 30 cruises with several other lines, Celebrity and Oceania are our favorites, and HAL was be best land tours. We spent 3 days on the Volendam in a Neptune Suite sailing the inside passage. Not really sure where we were as the weather was lousy, foggy, rainy and windy. Never saw anything but water and a faint outline of the coast. Time on the ship was so-so. Never saw the Cruise Director. Ate at the main dining room one night, can't remember what I had,
Lido buffet the next and the Pinnacle Grill the last night. For a restaurant that you have to pay an extra fee I think you should skip it. My wife had the King Crab Legs and she thought they were nothing special. Anyway, the Neptune Lounge was nice. We got off the ship in Juneau to begin the land portion of the trip. The 8 days travelling around the Yukon and Alaaska was great. Our tour guide, Crystal Letourno was wonderful. She really made the adventure look easy, with all the different hotels and changes. We took buses, trains and a short flight during the journey. HAL's hotels ranged from 3 to 4 stars and the handling of our luggage was amazing. We put the baggage outside our room at night and they magically appeared in the next day in your room. Anyway, see so much of the Yukon and Alaska in such a short time was great and HAL really knows how to do it.
Cabin Review
Neptune Deluxe Verandah Suite
Huge cabin and veranda. Very nice sitting room off the bathroom. Had an expresso and coffee maker in the room. Our cabin stewards Edgar and Sugi were great as was the guest relations associate in the Neptune Lounge Cristine Alma Jose. Cristine was always helpful
Port Reviews
Vancouver
Very pretty port and excellent embarkation. Took less than 5 minutes because we had a Neptune Suite cabin and we bypassed the very long line that the other passengers were waiting on.
Juneau
There was a huge rock slide next to the dock that we were going to stop it and we moved over to the other side of the port. We booked our own excursion to the Mendenhall glacier, saved 4 bucks each!!
Skagway
Not much to see in Skagway. Lots of tourist traps and jewelery stores. Looked a little like the shops you see in the Caribbean. We did walk over to a stream near the bus stop and watched the salmon jumping over the small waterfall.