Observations, The Legendary Rhythm & Blues Cruise & Caribbean Princess in January

This past January I was on the Koningsdam for the Legendary Rhythm and Blues Cruise, and the Caribbean Princess for a snooze cruise.

Obviously the Kdam is nice and new. The CB is showing it's age, but seemed to be in good shape.

Service was much better on Princess. By far. The Kdam was understaffed. It was terrible in the dining areas. We had a regular server in the Tamarind (she was from the NA) and said they only had 5 servers where they should have had 9. That seemed to be typical. Lots of empty tables in the specialty restaurants as no one to work there. No issues on the CB.

The food quality and hours were lacking on HAL. I have to say I really hate the cafeteria. Even more than usual. The food stations have bits and bobs here and there, so you have to walk all over the place to find things. Some things were just nasty. Sandwiches were good. And the damn thing closes up at 3. Ice cream closes at 3. The Dutch café is closed more than it is open. This is very typical. An Officer said to me to "order room service" while my charter cruise I was on was in full swing and most folks were trying to get lunch at 3. Dreadful. No issues on the week before on Princess. I guess they are used to folks who don't adhere to rigid schedules like those from retirement residences, who only eat at short, specified times.

The food was better in the main dining room on Princess. I don't know why, last time we were on it wasn't very good. The menus were improved, food was served hot. Lots of stuff was uneaten or sent back on the MDR on the Kdam. HAL has the worst "French Onion Soup" ever. Yuck.

Management. Oh my dear gawd, it is even worse than ever on HAL. Princess was far more passenger friendly.

I have a very upsetting example. On Princess, I was walking really, really fast (what else is new?) through the cafeteria to go somewhere. There was a water leak on the carpet and I slipped. Good thing I am bendy, I was shaken, but ok. A server ran up to me to check on me. Her manager came over and helped. He got me sorted out, sitting outside by the aft pool. His manager came up and filled out and incident report. They offered to take me to the doctor. They got me a glass of water. All good.

On the Kdam, at the mid ship pool, during a performance in the evening. I witnessed a man walking a bit staggered. He suddenly lurched over and fell HARD on his side, right under a table. Within seconds several passengers were there. I ran over to a group of Officers having beers maybe 60' away, right by the big hot tub. I said to them that there may be a medical emergency and a man had fallen very hard on the deck. It wasn't until I insisted that one fellow (the senior officer) put down his beer came with me, another fellow then tagged along.

This poor fellow was in trouble on the deck. Four passengers helped him up. His wife then took his arm. She was much smaller than him. The senior officer just said "he's drunk. I was beside him at the bar earlier". The two officers never bothered to see if he was ok. He could have had a concussion, broken bones, or a stroke. They didn't care. The senior fellow just said "his wife has him". I was so disgusted by the complete lack of caring. Also, the bigger picture is that if indeed the man was so drunk he was staggering and fell, he was definitely over served.

We had a VE8163 balcony cabin on the Kdam. Boy are they small! Not quite as well laid out as they could have been. We had a regular balcony cabin on the CB. Yes, there is no couch, but I do like the walk in closet area. The bathrooms are nicer on the Kdam, however, there was already issues with the grout in the shower and the door was missing the rubber stopper that keeps the handle from banging into the tile. I don't think these bathrooms are going to stand up very well. Very cheap construction. I went into a friend's cabin, an inside down the hall. OMG, it is the smallest cabin I have ever seen. Just enough room for the bed. There was an unusable dresser, the drawers couldn't be opened since there was the bed in the way.

I always enjoy several pool areas on ships. I enjoy the aft pools the most. However, on the blues cruise, the aft pool was covered with a stage and dance floor, as usual. It was a great venue. Was a really surprised about the mid ship pool was it is installed backwards!!! OMG what bozo put this in?! If you look at the photos you will see stairs going into the pool. They go into the deep end. If you start to swim, you will swim forward to the 2' shallow end. Oh dear!! The pool was freezing cold. On the CB I like the several pools, so there are quiet and noisy. The aft pool was cold too. I wish they were heated on every ship.

Crew. They didn't seem like a happy bunch on HAL. Many of the crew have worked the blues cruise in the past and loved it. Few complainers, big tips, happy crowd. They normally love us blues cruisers. Perhaps the hotel manager is to blame. I don't know. What I do know is that we had to complain at 3:00 in the afternoon to have our cabin made up. We had been gone since 9am, so no excuse. The cabin stewards normally work in shifts on the Blues cruise, due to the nature of the schedules. One crew starts about 9, the next at about 11. There was not a soul to be seen sometimes til well after 12. Perhaps there were major shortages of cabin crew too. Not good.

We had a terrific cabin steward on Princess. Awesome. Did everything he could to help. My hubby injured him self, and ended up in a wheelchair as the doctor said he had to stay off his foot for a few days. Fun times ;) Yep, I ran full speed pushing him down the hall, it was quiet and I was in no danger of hitting anyone :D Awesome Dr. on board as well. Cabin steward helped me fold up the wheelchair and tuck it away.

The public spaces. I really liked the venues on the Kdam. Far better for shows than the NA. Queen's lounge was terrific. World stage worked well for the bands, stages were craned in for the Lido pool and the aft pool. Good sight lines.

I give the CB Princess hands down for the small main theatre. I did the last time I was on it as well. Too small for the size of the ship. The entertainment was dreadful. All 70's disco music. I guess they have an older crowd for the most part, they loved it. They played the same 7 songs over and over, in all venues. It became painful. Oh well, we don't go on a snooze cruise for the entertainment.

The weather was great for the two weeks we were gone in January, it only rained the day we came back.

One major fail I must mention. HAL allowed smoking on the balconies on the blues cruise (yes, this was after the ban). The owner of the blues cruise told HAL he wanted it. LRBC says "jump", HAL says "how high?". It was disgusting. As many may know, on charters, just about anything goes. No dress codes (or many clothes at all), weed is smoked everywhere, some folks will smoke or vape anywhere. I had to formally complain on several occasions that if the management of the KDam was allowing smoking on the balconies, at least police the non smoking areas. Others complained as well. I figure, whatever you are smoking, do it in the designated areas. Bake cookies so you don't have to smoke weed, just ingest it. Don't say "complain to the captain" because it was done in front of senior officers, always has been.

HAL's head office assured me that the 2016 Blues cruise would be the last were balcony smoking was allowed.

I have booked the Blues Cruise for next February.

While I enjoy Princess for a snooze cruise, we are looking for a ship with better entertainment for the week before the Blues cruise.

Thank you for taking time to write your comments.

Did you mention the smoking situation on the post cruise survey?

Thank you for taking the time to write your review.

I enjoyed reading the comparisons between the 2 charter cruises.

Hope your next ones work out better in some areas.

I guess Princess is getting worried about the larger ship competition that Konigsdam is now offering. Time to bring out the heavy guns to trash HAL, which is pretty much one off from all the other reports about the Konigsdam. Sorry you were so miserable on a HAL ship. Everyone eventually finds the right mix for themselves.

You can't rate a ship/line by your experience on a charter cruise. Obviously you have a bias against HAL in general, so please take your complaints over to Princess, where you are a cheerleader......

I guess Princess is getting worried about the larger ship competition that Konigsdam is now offering. Time to bring out the heavy guns to trash HAL, which is pretty much one off from all the other reports about the Konigsdam. Sorry you were so miserable on a HAL ship. Everyone eventually finds the right mix for themselves.

Yes, this hatchet job was dramatically different than my cruise on the Koningsdam in November. I hope the original poster will stay with Princess, so that I won't have the misfortune to run into them. I detest whiners.

Been on Legendary Blues Cruise a few times also regular HAL cruises. Enjoy all HAL cruising. You described it "dreadful" Why book "dreadful" again??