My wife and I did a similar cruise on the Zaandam from San Diego to Hawaii several years ago and wanted to try it from a different port, and to see what changes may have occurred to the ship and/or ports of call. The ship seems brighter and refreshed, except for the TVs in the cabins which are from the 70s, or so they appear based on the very poor picture quality. Speaking of which I can't ...
Just returned from this cruise,I do really like sea days but there just was not any thing to do during the day
Cooking class MEH who ever goes home and makes this stuff,because of this there were no movie during the day.And when they did have an evening movie it was so very old "Hawaii" come on, that movie must have been 30 years old!
Trivia on the ships has become very old
All the fun stuff ...
We embarked in Vancouver in a timely fashion. No problems, no surprises other than our bags had already arrived at our cabin and we were only slightly delayed in the boarding process. Very pleasant. After everything we had been told on this site, we expected, as 1 star Mariners we would be able to eat in the main dining room for lunch, but alas, we were turned away and ate our first meal in the ...
There's other reviews for this Hawaii Circle Cruise on the Zaandam, and I won't repeat all that I agree with here. However, there are some additions worth noting. This review is more of a supplement to the other reviews for this particular itinerary/ship than a standalone review.
As background, we've cruised eight or so times previously on other cruise lines - this was our first on HAL. ...
This was my family's first-ever trip to Hawaii - so we were looking forward to this trip w/ much anticipation. We went with a group of experienced cruisers - some had cruised to Hawaii before aboard Zaandam, others had been to Hawaii but not aboard a ship, and others had cruised but not to Hawaii.
Our friend and travel agent made the arrangements for our group and also for our shore excursions, ...
Boarding in San Diego went well. Once on board, we were told by the Captain that departure would be delayed until 5:45 pm. Had the required life vest and lifeboat drill before leaving port. This was the worst drill I have ever seen. Disorganized large groups. Crew members could not be heard.
At 5:15 pm, we feel the ship moving. No announcement from the Captain so we were well away before ...
We live in San Diego so embarkation was a breeze for us. We arrived at the terminal around 2:30 and experienced a short wait to check in.
We like inside staterooms and chose this one because there were not other staterooms behind or next to it. The one thing that we didn't count on was the vibration and constant engine noise! It was so bad the first night my husband couldn't sleep at all. ...
First a bit about us. My wife and I are 48 & 50 years old, and have been married for four years. We have taken nine cruises together (HAL, Princess, Norwegian, Carnival, and MSC). Our Honeymoon was on the HAL Westerdam (inaugural Atlantic crossing 11/04).
Embarkation We arrived at the port at 11:30am and were on the ship by Noon. We were asked to go to the Lido deck and await the call to our ...
Background Information - I am 36 and my husband is 44 and in the last three months we have cruised transatlantic, caribbean and now most recently Hawaii. We have never been displeased with a cruise experience aside from a few details that were missed on our recent RCCL experience that were actually rectified when we arrived home from our HAL cruise in a letter. Hotel Info 4 nights at the Holiday ...