Zaandam Review
Rating by category
Additional details
First, about us. South Alabama residents, D and I are 35 and 26. He is a contractor and I am a newspaper reporter. We don't have children -- yet -- and this cruise was one of the things to do on our "bucket list" before we have children. Because we're young and on a budget, we always look for a good deal when planning a cruise (this was our third). We also look for great ports, where we can have new and memorable experiences!
Our travel agent's parents took this same cruise a year ago, and she worried that the ship's passengers would be too "old" for us. We actually have a lot of friends who are older, so we enjoyed the older crowd on the ship. I would say the median age on the Zaandam was 55 or so. Because of that, the atmosphere was relaxed and people were well-behaved, which was a nice change from our cruises on Carnival.
Now for the information about our trip! I'll tell our story in chronological order.
Cabin Review
Large Ocean-View Stateroom
Our cabin was pretty spacious, with a large window, sofa, coffee table, vanity table and chair. The bathroom was roomier than on other cruises, and having a tub was nice (though realistically, I couldn't see myself squeezing into that small tub). There was tons of closet space in our cabin! The bed and linens were very comfortable, although truthfully, two twin beds put together will never feel like one big queen bed. It's just hard to have that big crack in the bed, you know?