A Formal Night Question - PLEASE Don't Blast Me!!

[luvbluseas]

We have never sailed on HAL, but will next March. We sailed on Carnival and RC CL once each and their formal nights basically do not exist.
We almost always sail on Celebrity and LOVE IT!! They have real formal nights and we love them, it is one of the reasons we continue to sail on Celebrity.
We love getting dressed up, we do it for each other and for the romance. We are old folks (58 and 64) but we are still very much in love and enjoy the evening of great food, wine, flowers, after dinner drinks and his cigar on the aft deck. He always buys me a corsage. He is a romantic and why should I turn my nose up at that.
Anyway, my real question is:
On a 10 or 14 night Southern Caribbean cruise does HAL have a "real formal night"? How many men wear a tux? How many ladies wear a "real" formal? My DH has "always" worn a tux and YES he enjoys wearing it.

[jackjoy1]

We have never sailed on HAL, but will next March. We sailed on Carnival and RC CL once each and their formal nights basically do not exist.
We almost always sail on Celebrity and LOVE IT!! They have real formal nights and we love them, it is one of the reasons we continue to sail on Celebrity.
We love getting dressed up, we do it for each other and for the romance. We are old folks (58 and 64) but we are still very much in love and enjoy the evening of great food, wine, flowers, after dinner drinks and his cigar on the aft deck. He always buys me a corsage. He is a romantic and why should I turn my nose up at that.
Anyway, my real question is:
On a 10 or 14 night Southern Caribbean cruise does HAL have a "real formal night"? How many men wear a tux? How many ladies wear a "real" formal? My DH has "always" worn a tux and YES he enjoys wearing it.

You’ll fit in just fine. The majority of the men will wear a tux and most of the women wear formal gowns for the evening. It’s a sight to behold.

[catl331]

On our Caribbean cruises I'd say for men it's been about 35% tuxes, 60% dark suits, and 5% light colored suits or sports coats.

[Travalot]

I don't think the people that are dressed more formally ever look out of place. That being said, on our last half dozen HAL cruises I would say 10-15% of men are wearing tuxes and only about the same percentage of women are wearing truly formal gowns.

[tcook052]

The irony to me came after my Eurodam & Solstice cruises earlier this year when I noted how many more tux's I saw on CEL than I did on HAL yet somehow HAL has this reputation of being "formal". Go figure. I guess you believe stereotypes at your peril. :D

My point is that like CEL HAL does have "formal" nights and most, though not all, guests chose to participate and so you getting dressed in your best outfits won't feel out of place. Enjoy your sail!

[Krazy Kruizers]

Yes -- there are real formal nights.

The longer the cruise -- the more formal people will be dressed up.

My DH always wears his tux on formal nights. I wear either my long black skirt or 3/4 length skirt -- with fancy tops.

[world~citizen]

The tux and gown will be fine...really. Exactly right.

You are switching from X to HAL. You will notice a difference. Not better, not worse, just a difference.

Perhaps when you return you can write a review comparing the two lines. A lot of people who love HAL never sail X and vice-versa. A lot of us would love to read your opinion on the matter.

You are about to have a HAL of a cruise.:D

Enjoy.

[bradpole]

...You are switching from X to HAL. You will notice a difference. Not better, not worse, just a difference...

Exactly! X offers an excellent product and so does HAL. Both have a wonderful friendly crew, excellent service, and very good food!

[lorekauf]

There has been a real mix on my HAL cruises. I've noticed people seem to be going more and more casual. I always dress to the nines and I will as long as they have formal nights.

[excruisestaff]

We have never sailed on HAL, but will next March. We sailed on Carnival and RC CL once each and their formal nights basically do not exist.
We almost always sail on Celebrity and LOVE IT!! They have real formal nights and we love them, it is one of the reasons we continue to sail on Celebrity.
We love getting dressed up, we do it for each other and for the romance. We are old folks (58 and 64) but we are still very much in love and enjoy the evening of great food, wine, flowers, after dinner drinks and his cigar on the aft deck. He always buys me a corsage. He is a romantic and why should I turn my nose up at that.
Anyway, my real question is:
On a 10 or 14 night Southern Caribbean cruise does HAL have a "real formal night"? How many men wear a tux? How many ladies wear a "real" formal? My DH has "always" worn a tux and YES he enjoys wearing it.


Go for it! Remember what "they" say: If you look good, you feel good! Usually on these longer cruises, people get a bit more dressed up than on basic 3-7 day ones. But if you find you do feel out of place, you can always go back and change after dinner. Have a great time! And enjoy that darling hubby of yours (mine is the same way...lucky gals aren't we?)!

Maxine

[our turn]

We have sailed both lines and think they are pretty equal. The longer cruises to tend to be more formal for some reason. DH always wears his tux and I always wear either an evening gown or occasionally a cocktail dress.

Have a wonderful cruise!

[Seren Ap Gwalia]

We are just off the Rotterdam and each formal night I wore long evening gowns and DH wore a tux 2 of the 3 nights - dark suit other night because we had a dinner shirt problem (I left it at home!)

I love getting dressed up and felt right at home as nearly everyone was dressed up!

[George C]

thats good news, we are also going on 10 day cruise in 2 months and I will be bringing my Tux as normal.

[jimmy2x]

I'm really getting a kick out of the replies. From all the consternation expressed on the typical "dress code" threads, a newbie might think that there are a lot of the "I'll wear whatever I want" folks aboard.

All of our HAL cruises have been in the 10-14 day range and, although we've seen a few of the somewhat dressed down, the overwhelming majority of fellow passengers dress appropriately and in accordance with Holland's "suggested" code.

[Seavoyage]

We have never sailed on HAL, but will next March. We sailed on Carnival and RC CL once each and their formal nights basically do not exist.
We almost always sail on Celebrity and LOVE IT!! They have real formal nights and we love them, it is one of the reasons we continue to sail on Celebrity.
We love getting dressed up, we do it for each other and for the romance. We are old folks (58 and 64) but we are still very much in love and enjoy the evening of great food, wine, flowers, after dinner drinks and his cigar on the aft deck. He always buys me a corsage. He is a romantic and why should I turn my nose up at that.
Anyway, my real question is:
On a 10 or 14 night Southern Caribbean cruise does HAL have a "real formal night"? How many men wear a tux? How many ladies wear a "real" formal? My DH has "always" worn a tux and YES he enjoys wearing it.


Hi LuvBluSeas-

While DH does not wear a tux every night for dinner - he typically does sport a jacket and tie - we too tend to "dress-up" for dinner every night of the cruise (we take late seating). Further, I figure as long as I can manage to prance around in 5' heels - well I'm going to do just that...and the cruise is the perfect place!! If someone has an issue with that - who really cares! The worst part is the luggage - but someday I trust I will be one of those folks with just one suitcase and that will be just finel!:o

[delraydoll]

We've sailed with HAL several times and RC. Check HAL's website as they'll have recommendation as to how many formal, smart casual nites (usually 2 formal nights for a 14-day cruise). Hubby always brings a tux and a couple of shirts, bowtie/cumberbund sets, and I wear nice black pants and different Chico-type tops/wraps. I personally don't bring "formal" dresses as I always think they look like mother-of-the bride stuff. And the pants/tops takes up less room in suitcase.

Have fun. Be sure to go to Pinnacle for at least one night. Well worth the extra $$, especially if you like steak. Our last trip on Eurodam, we went twice (+ Tamarind for lunch and a dinner -- menu different).

[luvbluseas]

Go for it! Remember what "they" say: If you look good, you feel good! Usually on these longer cruises, people get a bit more dressed up than on basic 3-7 day ones. But if you find you do feel out of place, you can always go back and change after dinner. Have a great time! And enjoy that darling hubby of yours (mine is the same way...lucky gals aren't we?)!

Maxine


Maxine - YES!!! We are lucky! Thank you and everyone for answering my questions. We are looking forward to trying HAL, we LOVE Celebrity but I wish they would do some different itineraries. Also, I wish HAL or Celebrity would keep a ship in the Caribbean in the summer. I took our grandchildren on the Solstice in Aqua Class, in the summer of 2010 to the Caribbean and we had a wonderful time! They are VERY well behaved children, have great manners, and due to their Dad being a Naval Aviator, they have traveled the world and dined in 4* and 5* restaurants all over the world. They loved dining in BLU each evening on the Solstice and I wanted to take them again but Celebrity had nothing in the Caribbean this summer. Our granddaughter, now 13, was born in Sicily and our grandson, 11, was born in Monterey, CA, just before they left for Japan. They are wonderful children and a joy to travel with. We are SO blessed.
Perhaps we will meet on a cruise sometime.

Mary Ann

[Math Guy]

Over the past 2 years, we have sailed Costa twice...and one time on each of Celebrity and HAL.

These were all repositioning cruises with Costa and HAL travelling between Fort Lauderdale and Quebec City, and The Celebrity Mercury visiting Alaska, San Francisco and San Diego.

There was no discirnible difference in the formal attire among those 3 cruise lines, although I did have a preconceived stereotyped image of the European passengers aboard Costa which was quickly erased.

10% tuxes and 60% dark suits among men would have been the norm. The remainder wore jackets and ties, dockers and a minority of folks who sported jackets/no ties.

Among women, beautiful formal, glittering and elegant gowns were the exception...but women always look great on cruises anyway, no matter what they are wearing.

Our next HAL adventure..yes it is a repositioning cruise, leaves Sept. 25 aboard the Zaandam.

[debsjc]

We had 5 formals on our 17 night cruise, which felt like at least one too many.

I wore cocktail dresses, but a lot of the ladies were wearing black pants and evening tops. Some ladies were just wearing t-shirts with a touch of sparkle.

[SwissMyst]

Just back from the Ryndam and I think smaller, older ships tend to attract more traditionally minded cruisers so I scanned the main dining room on formal night to check out the over-all pattern of dress: Probably only 10% of the men wore tuxedos, including DH who likes to dress up too and they did not look out of place at all. There was a smattering of white dinner jackets as well.

The vast majority of the other men wore dark suits so I would say trying to keep the sense of formal night was alive and well on this ship. Women mostly overall dressed up with long gowns and cocktail attire and even on smart casual nights women looked great, while men dropped down to more tieless sport jackets and open shirts. I saw no real abuses of dress code expectations on this trip in the main dining room.

We had three formal nights on this 11 day cruise. With so many glittery easy care fabrics today, packing those extra special items for formal nights could not be easier and they all came through more wrinkle free than anything else I packed. Airline luggage limitations do put a damper on really packing the good stuff and particularly those heavy but always lovely beaded jackets. This time I did not take my long dress, but will do it when we take our next cruise on the longer TA cruise on Maasdam which will have more formal nights so I do want a little more variety then. As long as I can keep things working with only one pair of black silk high heels, the rest is easy.

[kazu]

Just back from the Ryndam and I think smaller, older ships tend to attract more traditionally minded cruisers so I scanned the main dining room on formal night to check out the over-all pattern of dress: Probably only 10% of the men wore tuxedos, including DH who likes to dress up too and they did not look out of place at all. There was a smattering of white dinner jackets as well.

The vast majority of the other men wore dark suits so I would say trying to keep the sense of formal night was alive and well on this ship. Women mostly overall dressed up with long gowns and cocktail attire and even on smart casual nights women looked great, while men dropped down to more tieless sport jackets and open shirts. I saw no real abuses of dress code expectations on this trip in the main dining room.

We had three formal nights on this 11 day cruise. With so many glittery easy care fabrics today, packing those extra special items for formal nights could not be easier and they all came through more wrinkle free than anything else I packed. Airline luggage limitations do put a damper on really packing the good stuff and particularly those heavy but always lovely beaded jackets.

Question please SwissMyst - on smart casual nights were a lot of men wearing jackets??? Not something I've really noticed before :confused: Dh dresses very nicely for formal night but doesn't usually wear a jacket on smart casual (unless we are going to the PG).

Getting ready for our P'dam cruise and just wondering if an extra jacket for dh should be thrown in? Thanks

[SwissMyst]

Jacqui,

On this cruise, it was about 50% sports jackets with or without ties on casual nights and 50% more "country club" casual with nice shirts and slacks for the men.

We also had a larger contingent of non-US passengers too on this Mediterranean cruise so that can also impact what kind of dress standards get followed. Plus with a large group from Spain itself, they maybe also did not have to worry about luggage limitations.

So I wouldn't worry about this too much about the extra jacket, but would expect the Prinsendam to be a bit more formal - wonder what others have found for this ship.

Looking forward to your report as the Prinsendam would be the crown jewel in our own growing collection of HAL ships. The smaller the better is our own preference.

[gelo7]

You and your DH will look grand in your tux and gown, and will be right at home on HAL.

[kazu]

Jacqui,

On this cruise, it was about 50% sports jackets with or without ties on casual nights and 50% more "country club" casual with nice shirts and slacks for the men.

We also had a larger contingent of non-US passengers too on this Mediterranean cruise so that can also impact what kind of dress standards get followed. Plus with a large group from Spain itself, they maybe also did not have to worry about luggage limitations.

So I wouldn't worry about this too much about the extra jacket, but would expect the Prinsendam to be a bit more formal - wonder what others have found for this ship.

Looking forward to your report as the Prinsendam would be the crown jewel in our own growing collection of HAL ships. The smaller the better is our own preference.

Thanks very much. Dh usually takes his sports jacket but I was trying to save a bag this year. I think we will pack/he will wear it to be safe:D

According to our roll call, the formal was about the same as I have seen on other Med/transatlantics. We have a lot of repeaters.

He always dresses nicely in any case, but I wouldn't want him to feel out of place:D appreciated.

[bizeemum]

I wear black pants and a very dressy top. My husband wears a dark blue suit. We wear the same thing every formal night.We only travel with one suitcase each and I don't want to take up a lot of room in my suitcase just for dinner wear. Honestly, I never noticed what others wore so I can't tell you how many tuxes and such were there.

[Sunshine91]

We've sailed with HAL several times and RC. Check HAL's website as they'll have recommendation as to how many formal, smart casual nites (usually 2 formal nights for a 14-day cruise).

Was this just a typo? :confused: The general rule-of-thumb has been 2 formal nights per week, not 2 for a 14-day cruise.

When you receive your Express Documents, the actual number of formal & smart casual nights is listed. For our upcoming 17-night western Mediterranean/trans-Atlantic repo cruise on Noordam, a member on our roll call posted that we have 4 formal & 13 smart casual nights (havent' done my docs yet). :o

To the OP - I noticed you are from FLA & suspect you will be driving or busing to the port for your Caribbean cruise. Meaning no real luggage restrictions. You and that fantastic husband take all the formalwear & gowns you want to. :) My personal suspicion is that luggage weight is one of the biggest reasons for the decline of the formality on-board.

All a gentleman really needs to wear is a jacket & tie (along with a shirt & trousers, of course) to follow the suggested dress code on formal nights. Ladies are asked to wear a dress or dressy pantsuit. That's it. But some of us still like to play dress-up (age is irrelevant) :D. I don't care what others are wearing. OK, so, maybe I might notice, but I certainly don't count. If a night is designated as formal, the husband & I will be dressed accordingly. He wears a tux & I wear a long gown or cocktail dress.

Have a fabulous cruise! :)

[jschm27]

The tux and gown will be fine...really. Exactly right.

You are switching from X to HAL. You will notice a difference. Not better, not worse, just a difference.

Perhaps when you return you can write a review comparing the two lines. A lot of people who love HAL never sail X and vice-versa. A lot of us would love to read your opinion on the matter.

You are about to have a HAL of a cruise.:D

Enjoy.

I agree with World Citizen, please write a review comparing X with HAL! I'd really like to read it.

On my 14 day cruise through the Panama Canal, we had 3 formal nights if I remember right. A vast majority of folks in the MDR wore tuxes or dark suites. But we were on the first leg of the World Cruise and the demographics of this cruise will probably not be the same as the cruise you are planning on taking.

John

[streakmarin]

It's hard to get all dolled up when it is so hot, but on our cruise only 35 per cent wore tuxes, but the women tended to go more all out. It seems anything goes nowadays and what ever you feel like should work for you, but heavy beaded dresses and deep decollatage wasn't seen much. Things are much more frumpy than you could imagine.

[SwissMyst]

It's hard to get all dolled up when it is so hot, but on our cruise only 35 per cent wore tuxes, but the women tended to go more all out. It seems anything goes nowadays and what ever you feel like should work for you, but heavy beaded dresses and deep decollatage wasn't seen much. Things are much more frumpy than you could imagine.

Dining room is often kept on the cool side for staff comfort because they work really hard so outdoor temps not a good indicator for indoor dress-up comfort. Everyone looked very nice on our last Ryndam cruise for formal nights and the main dining room seemed very full, so not sure many had opted out for the Lido that night.

"Frumpy" :confused: Probably, and so is the ship compared to today's edgy floating behemoths. Frumpy and traditional are parts of HAL's quiet charms that actually work for us- homey and old shoe comfortable are the words I use.

[soldham]

Remember the old adage - you can never be over dressed but your certainly can be under dressed!