mjwood77

When my hubby got it they did reimburse his fare for the scheduled shore excursion since he was on quarantine.

HAL does not run nearly as many activities as other cruise lines. You will often see things they do run like trivia, bingo, art auction, dance classes, special shops, gambling classes, name that tune, etc probably wouldn't interest your son. There are example hal kids club and daily programs on halfacts.

I expect the 7 day Boston to Bermuda are going to be quite popular with families. Itinerary and # of days greatly affect the population on a HAL cruise. So there will probably be plenty of kids in the kids club for these cruises.

Depends on what you would like to do on the sea days. There are board games in the library. The pool is quite popular with families. There is table tennis, shuffleboard, the sports deck, movies, and the arcade.

We preferred fixed dining, but it wasn't available last time. I've come around to open seating especially on nights there was something we wanted to do (pub trivia, name that tune, karaoke) we won't miss it if conflicts with dinner.

The only times we have found long wait times were formal nights (upwards of45 minutes). That seems to be the one night everyone wants to go to dinner. For all the discussion about dreading formal wear on this board there were plenty of people dressed up and in the MDR. Didn't matter what size table either and we were only a party of 2 (we prefer to be seated with others). So either we had to go to really early or really late. We would see people leave, but they didn't really seat new people. It seemed like they waited to turn a lot of tables at once on formal night. Every other night we were able to get tables right away. It might depend on the staff. This was the first time we actually saw them hand out jackets.

We did miss seeing the same faces each night, but then again we've heard horror stories about some table mates and we had one ourselves one time. So with open seating you don't have to worry about that.

We have done several spring break cruises because while I was in grad school it was the week I could go without missing a class. I don't remember a lot of partiers on board (which is why we booked HAL). Definitely, a lot more families, especially on the newer ships. The one thing that will be noticeable is that when you are in port you will be with Carnival/Royal/NCL so you will see a lot of spring break behavior in port, shore excursions, etc.

We were always happy to return to the ship and happy that we booked HAL to escape that behavior.

We have never had a problem with the front desk. I will definitely be asking for a paper to be delivered to the room. I really enjoy reading the daily paper, but did not enjoy the scavenger hunt to find a copy that we experienced last year; there were rarely copies in the library, lido, or front desk. Or the ones that were in the lido were covered in food (gross!!). So I asked them how to get one, and they delivered for the rest of the cruise. I understand they are trying to save some money/paper, but they send me more pieces of paper with art/jewelry sales.

Probably every cruise we've had a billing error (usually individual charges for laundry when we have the package or mini-bar charges-I can't think of a single time in my life I've bought something from a mini-bar), and they have always been helpful, nice.

On our collector's cruise last year, which was a E/W Carib. we definitely had to get off the ship and go through customs in FLL to zero the ship. It took several hours as there was at least a half a dozen ships in port that day and there were only two agents. There were also something like 40% the ship doing the collector's cruise. So I'm sure it depends on the port, # of people, etc. If we did it over again we probably would have booked an early excursion that day.

We had to do two drills, two under orange, but they also had a special drink reception for us around the pool, free dinner in Canaletto, and sent a snack to the room. We wouldn't expect that in the future, but it was nice.

Still we are doing a collector's cruise this year. B2B Canada/New England (mostly so we don't have to fly), and from our roll call there are several people doing the B2B.

We are definitely considering the Bermuda cruise next year (because we live in MA).

Can anyone clarify what teabags are available on Volendam please. I drink strong hot tea and cannot stand Liptons' for example which I know is standard on some lines. I'm think I saw a mention of PG Tips somewhere but can't be sure. Alternatively something like Assam or Twinings English Breakfast would be good! Any info would be greatly appreciated :)

No idea what the iced tea is, but the HAL branded hot tea is a Darjeeling. I quite enjoy it. They also have a box with green and herbal teas in the dining room. I think they were Bigelow.

In the explorations café they carry Tazo, but those aren't "included"

It seems that there are many different experiences with AYWD based on the ship. I was wondering if anyone had any experience with AYWD on the Zaandam? According to the schedule they only implemented it on this ship in early Feb.

We want to eat early, but will be off the ship at 8am most mornings that we are in port. So not sure we will be able to make reservations. We would like to meet new people, so we are hoping that it will be easier to seat us.

Thanks!