Veendam - What do you Think?

[DJP]

DH and I just returned from a wonderful week on the Zaandam and I am looking to book something on HAL for next Thanksgiving week. It doesn't appear that the Zaandam is going to be sailing out of Port Canaveral next year:-( So, I found the Veendam sailing out of Tampa that week, but I haven't seen much on the boards about this ship. The ship's reviews on this website are less than stellar and I'm a little concerned. We live in North Carolina and drive to the ports and prefer Tampa or Port Canaveral instead of driving all the way to Fort Lauderdale and Miami and this limits our HAL choices. Any of you who have been on the Veendam recently care to comment? Thanks.

[doone]

I sailed the Veendam a couple of years back and throughly enjoyed her.

[Charlie2na]

Well , last March we did our first cruise... Veendam 03/27/04 . We loved it soooo much we booked her sister ship Maasdam for next month . Wouldn't hesitate to cruise her again, just not same itinerary. Loved Ocho Rios, Grand Cayman... didn't care for Costa Maya.

[RuthC]

It's coming up on two years since I've sailed the Veendam, but she was as nice as I remembered her from 1998.

I did the 7-day Western Caribbean out of Tampa on her; I must say it was a good time. I'm not fond of heat and humidity (hadn't been to the Caribbean since '79), but did enjoy the ports. Tulum (not listed as available with your ports) took all my energy in that heat, but I would do it again.

The itineray was a nice balance of sea and port days. Tampa is not terribly busy since there are not too many ships there at a time.

[FlorenceItaly]

in August of this year, to Alaska...GREAT CRUISE!!

Marie

[cruzincurt]

We just came back from our second Veendam on 11/20. No complaints, very nice cruise and ship. Nice size, not to big, not to small. Lots of older cruisers. The Veendam is on a 12 of 14 day cruise that started on 11/20 and took it through Thanksgiving. That's why we had to take the 7 day starting on the 13th. May be same schedue next year.

[Sierrachik]

Well , last March we did our first cruise... Veendam 03/27/04 . We loved it soooo much we booked her sister ship Maasdam for next month . Wouldn't hesitate to cruise her again, just not same itinerary. Loved Ocho Rios, Grand Cayman... didn't care for Costa Maya.
Hi Charlie,

Anything specific you didn't like at Costa Maya? We've booked our second cruise, for October 2005 on the Zuiderdam (again!) for the Western itinerary and this is one of the stops. Just prior to booking I was certain the port was Cozumel, however, a couple of days after booking the cruise, the port was listed as Costa Maya so I've started researching that.

Thanks for any info.

Erlene

[sail7seas]

We haven't cruised Veendam for several years but have enjoyed a number of great cruises on her. We are booked for 12 days in January and are very much looking forward to cruising Veendam again.


BTW.......Veendam in recent weeks was inspected by USPH and scored very, very well at 96. Congratulations to the crew of Veendam....Good job!

[terry55]

We were on the Veendam in Aug. '03 to Alaska....loved everything about the ship and would book again in a heartbeat!!:) :) :)