Holland America sending two ships to Asia

[BermudaBound2014]

This news is a couple days old and most of you may already know, but it just came across my feed so I thought I would share.

 

Three departure cities is nice, and it does seem HAL is committed to longer itineraries. 

 

Holland to deploy two Ships in Asia covering 49 Ports

 

[Roz]

I booked the Coral Triangle,  Volcanoes and The Great Barrier Reef cruise back when I was on the Oosterdam in March.  It had just been released. 

[tscoffey]

Westerdam around Japan sounds good. Have to wait until late 2025 or spring 2026 though. Might even book the same cabin - 8128 - that we had in Alaska.

[mcrcruiser]

Being Cautious With the tensions with China at sea  with US war ships I wouldn't jump too quickly .We have to question even placing  Nordam  there at this time . We can  hope for the best outcome  ;however ,caution is warranted  

[Roz]

If HAL has to cancel my cruise because of tensions with China, I'll just take the deposit and book another cruise.  

[cruisemom42]

43 minutes ago, tscoffey said:

Westerdam around Japan sounds good. Have to wait until late 2025 or spring 2026 though. Might even book the same cabin - 8128 - that we had in Alaska.

 

Did you read Hlitner's "Live from" thread on this year's Westerdam cruise around Japan?  (I also made some contributions.) Lots of detail regarding ports along with thoughts on the ship -- hopefully the latter will have improved.

 

[tscoffey]

2 minutes ago, cruisemom42 said:

 

Did you read Hlitner's "Live from" thread on this year's Westerdam cruise around Japan?  (I also made some contributions.) Lots of detail regarding ports along with thoughts on the ship -- hopefully the latter will have improved.

 

Some of it. I get the impression the man likes to complain, quite frankly. And with a good number of those complaints being about alcohol, which I don't drink, I don't have many concerns about the current state of ms Westerdam.

[Lido deck main]

1 minute ago, tscoffey said:

Some of it. I get the impression the man likes to complain, quite frankly. And with a good number of those complaints being about alcohol, which I don't drink, I don't have many concerns about the current state of ms Westerdam.

We have been on  Westerdam to Japan 28 days and no problems.  Loved the cruise.  Well is was a bit rough crossing for a couple of days but that is the weather, not the cruise line.

[cruisemom42]

People cite HAL's great itineraries often, but by stringing together cruises one can come up with "equivalencies" on other lines.

 

After my Westerdam experience in April I am reluctant to commit to another long cruise on HAL, but I was able to put together a nice itinerary on Celebrity Solstice in early Spring 2025 by booking a BTBTBTB (4 segments): from Hong Kong to Singapore to Sydney to Oahu to Vancouver. (I may drop the last in favor of just spending some time in Hawaii....)

 

 

[cruisemom42]

10 minutes ago, tscoffey said:

Some of it. I get the impression the man likes to complain, quite frankly. And with a good number of those complaints being about alcohol, which I don't drink, I don't have many concerns about the current state of ms Westerdam.

 

There was also very little entertainment or enrichment. That definitely impacted my experience. 

[tscoffey]

4 minutes ago, cruisemom42 said:

 

There was also very little entertainment or enrichment. That definitely impacted my experience. 

Perceptions.

Everyone takes their cruise for different reasons, with different expectations.

 

[cruisemom42]

2 minutes ago, tscoffey said:

Perceptions.

Everyone takes their cruise for different reasons, with different expectations.

 

 

I'm sorry but it is not just a "perception" that there was only one guest lecturer during the entire 28 days I was onboard who was a retired dentist and literally read his (outdated) PowerPoint slides to the audience with an occasional aside.

 

Or that Lincoln Center Stage figuratively AND literally shut its doors after 14 days with no classical music offered.

 

Or that the World Stage was dark for many nights of the cruise. 

 

Now that may or may not matter to you, but that is a different thing from calling it a perception or saying it was subjective....

 

 

[tscoffey]

8 minutes ago, cruisemom42 said:

 

I'm sorry but it is not just a "perception" that there was only one guest lecturer during the entire 28 days I was onboard who was a retired dentist and literally read his (outdated) PowerPoint slides to the audience with an occasional aside.

 

Or that Lincoln Center Stage figuratively AND literally shut its doors after 14 days with no classical music offered.

 

Or that the World Stage was dark for many nights of the cruise. 

 

Now that may or may not matter to you, but that is a different thing from calling it a perception or saying it was subjective....

 

 

 

My usage of the word "perception" here is that it is one's "perception" that this negatively impacts your cruise to some degree. For someone else, their "perception" of a satisfying cruise isn't driven by any of these factors.

 

So from a quantitative sense these offerings may have been reduced (an objective perception). But from a qualitative sense, this wouldn't necessarily affect the value of the cruise (a subjective perception).

 

Understood?

 

From the posts I read, the dancers were unable to perform due to pitching and rolling of the ship. This isn't surprising to me (they also called off one evening during our Alaska cruise - also on ms Westerdam - for the same reason. I don't need dancers risking injury for me to enjoy a cruise). And since this was a transpacific cruise, it is entirely expected that pitching and rolling could increase greatly.

Edited June 8, 2023 by tscoffey

[cruisemom42]

1 minute ago, tscoffey said:

From the posts I read, the dancers were unable to perform due to pitching and rolling of the ship. This isn't surprising to me (they also called off one evening in Alaska on ms Westerdam for the same reason). And since this was a transpacific cruise, it is entirely expected that pitching and rolling could increase greatly.

 

I was not on the TP segment, and there were still nights when the World Stage was dark. One night a headline performer was seasick (it was not that rough) but other nights nothing was scheduled.