formal nights

[uofaboie]

hey everyone ,,we will be on the zuiderdam march 13.for our panama canal cruise and cant figure out if we will have 2 or 3 formal nights? :)

[sapper1]

hey everyone ,,we will be on the zuiderdam march 13.for our panama canal cruise and cant figure out if we will have 2 or 3 formal nights? :)
You neglected to mention how long your cruise will be but a general rule of thumb is 2 formal nights per week. If your cruise is a ten day trip, there would be three formal nights.

[Kween Karen]

I know on SOME itineraries they are cutting back the number of formal nights. I was expecting many more on my 67 day grand voyage.....we only had 9 and that was just short of 10 weeks. In the past they have had at least 12 on these grand voyages. The information will be in your docs when you get them.....and you can probably call and find out for sure if you need to know sooner.

[RevNeal]

You neglected to mention how long your cruise will be but a general rule of thumb is 2 formal nights per week. If your cruise is a ten day trip, there would be three formal nights.

The Zuiderdam is doing 10-day round trips out of Ft. Lauderdale to the Panama Canal, in-and-out of the eastern side of the locks. Hence, there should be 3 Formal Nights.

[Salzburg]

We just got off the Noordam, 10-day cruise. Two were formal nights, one was labeled formal optional. Salzburg

[SJSULIBRARIAN]

Dec 4 -18 Maasdam cruise, there were 3 formal nights. Had expected 4. Guess HAL is throttling back.

[Copper10-8]

"Formal optional" Things are changing again!:cool: Potential "lead in" into "bye bye formals?"

[momofmeg]

You neglected to mention how long your cruise will be but a general rule of thumb is 2 formal nights per week. If your cruise is a ten day trip, there would be three formal nights.

Zuiderdam partial Panama canal cruises are 10 day.

OP- the formal nights are the first three sea days.

[Salzburg]

First formal night on first at-sea day, as usual. Second one on 2nd to last day (sea day). There also was a 'Tropical Casual' on the St. Lucia port day. Seemed appropriate to me because of the lido pool party and barbecue. Very unprofessional guess - on formal optional night about one-third were formal. All in all, a wonderful cruise. Best stateroom we have ever had. Service and food also excellent. Piano bar too. Cannot say much for entertainment. Salzburg

[iflyrc5]

Don't know about the cut back in formal nights - on our 33 day Hawaii/French Polynesian Cruise on the Rotterdam in Jan 2010 they have 9 formal nights scheduled :mad: We have 17 sea days so that is one every other sea day - too many for us - I think a couple of those nights we will be hitting the lido or the Canaletto which was just added during the drydock.

[Krazy Kruizers]

We did your 10 day Zuiderdam cruise just recently.

We had 3 formal nights.

The first one was the sea day after HMC.

The second formal night was the day after Curacao.

And the final formal night right after Costa Limon.

[garydm]

On our recent 12 day cruise there were 3 formal nights, but the last one was "formal optional" which I think worked well. If you wanted to dress up, fine, and you were not out of place. If you did not, likewise.

Gary

[RMLincoln]

Just got home from 21-day Amsterdam cruise. We had 6 formal nights, 2 per week. No mention of "formal optional". No Master Chef's Dinner - seems that's history for HAL fleet-wide, according to our dining captain.

[bob brown]

"Formal optional" Things are changing again!:cool: Potential "lead in" into "bye bye formals?"
Let's hope so!

[prunes10]

Does formal optional mean folks wore tuxes/gowns in the very same dining venue with others who were wearing a casual mode of dress (or something slightly more elegant)?

[Krazy Kruizers]

Just got home from 21-day Amsterdam cruise. We had 6 formal nights, 2 per week. No mention of "formal optional". No Master Chef's Dinner - seems that's history for HAL fleet-wide, according to our dining captain.

The Master Chef dinner was still alive on our recent Zuiderdam cruise -- last night of the cruise.

[Salzburg]

Does formal optional mean folks wore tuxes/gowns in the very same dining venue with others who were wearing a casual mode of dress (or something slightly more elegant)?

That was the case on the Noordam Dec 11-21. Most men I saw were in suits, others smart casual. Many mixed, including us. I would guess the majority were smart casual. At our table for 10 in the Vista, open dining, it was half formal, half smart casual. Those were my observations. :) Salzburg