Lemur

Note the name of the quay in Ijmuiden is named as Halkade. I wonder why? Or is should be written as HALkade ?!!!!!

Hi Topsham,

Sorry, it is a coincidence. Hal is short for Vishallen (Fish halls) and kade means quay. So, it's the quay at the fish halls.

And the decision to have ships in IJmuiden has nothing to do with space in Amsterdam. It's entirely financial. When the quay in Amsterdam is full, the extra ships are sent out to an industrial area of Amsterdam called Westpoort (West port).

I know because I can see those ships from my office window here in Amsterdam.

Happy sailing,

Lemur

There is a double door closet for hanging clothes and a single door closet for the safe on a shelf and 4-5 drawers. I believe there is one shelf above the safe.

Dear Wine-O,

Thank you for the information, I can now plan my wardrobe accordingly!

Lemur

Thanks for a great review! We will be on the Summit next year. I have a question for you though.

The photos of the cabin show the closet (thank you for that!), can you confirm that there is only one shelf for clothing in the closet?

Thank you again,

Lemur

We will sail HAL because they allow smoking on balconies.

Good Luck,

Lemur

That evening the food arrived with no problem and we were invited to order off the menu for the following night. However we declined this offer preferring to use the informal Lido buffet. It did strike me that ordering in the morning (rather than the previous evening) may be a better option as you could easily check what the veggie option is on the main menu as an alternative?

 

 

Also the Dive-In burger bar (by the covered pool) does a grilled mushroom burger. The first time I ordered it, they brought it to my table, the 2nd time I watched them cook it on the griddle alongside the burgers, so wouldn’t eat it. There are fries and salad at the Dive-in bar though.

Hi Alder,

I'm a vegetarian who sails with a serious meat eater. We take as many meals as we can in the MDR, preferring the service and also the warmer food there. I asked for the vegetarian menu on the first night and also for the regular menu for the following evening as well. I did this every night and it was not a problem. If there was nothing particularly alluring for the next night, we just told our server that we would not be there. You can do this whether you have fixed seating or not, the order is tied to your cabin number.

As for the veggie burgers at the pool grill, I asked for the chef to cook it with fresh tools on a clean part of the grill. It took a bit longer, but was worth it.

Kind regards,

Lemur

Has anyone done a dyi in this port? It doesn't look too interesting. Is there a hop off hop on bus

 

Thanks

Rita

Hi Rita,

We were here a couple of years ago and had a great time walking around the old town. If younend up there, have a quick look in the Bo Bendixen store. Greatest t-shirts and kids tees ever.

Have a great trip!

Lemur

We are just back from the Nieuw Amsterdam Trans-Atlantic (April 30-May 15).

We have always used the launderettes, but this was our first trip on a larger ship without self-service laundry.

We purchased the unlimited laundry package for $109 for 12 days. We were on a 15-day cruise, but could not turn in laundry for the last two days, probably because of the 48-hour turn around time.

I marked each of the laundry lists with "Cold water wash and warm dry please."

We got our laundry back in perfect condition and often on the same day. Nothing had shrunken and everything was as fresh as I can manage at home.

After adding up what our costs would have been for regular laundry service ($240), we certainly were happy with the value.

We had absolutely no complaints and will never darken the door of a HAL launderette again.

We also were intrigued by the Black Label Photography and agreed to a free session. At that point, we probably should have asked the price of the prints and saved everyone some time and effort.

But I was foolishly expecting to get a couple of prints for a couple of hundred dollars.

The photographer was a lovely young man and we enjoyed the photo session and were excited by the resulting photos. The price however, when we finally got up the courage to ask, bowled us both over. For five prints (8x10) we would be paying twice what we paid for our wedding photos in 2001.

Granted, they looked good and we probably would never do this again, but I still found the price about twice what it should be (like a lot of things on the ship).

Despite that, we did buy the five prints, figuring we never looked so good :D.

We didn't complain to HAL, figuring that since we were given the option to say no, it wouldn't do much good. But in future we will steer clear of the Black Label photography.