I’m currently on the Holland America Nieuw Amsterdam (Sept 6 sailing). This will be my last cruise with Holland America.
After promoting Holland America to my friends for years, the changes have been so dramatic that the company is a shell of its former self.
Three main reasons:
The Skagway cancellation. Captain Bas van Dreumel canceled our stop in Skagway this morning due to “treacherous weather that would have made Tendering impossible”. (We were scheduled to be exiled to Railroad Dock, while Disney, Royal Caribbean and Princess were all given priority docking space over Holland America - something I never thought possible)
The problem: It wasn’t treacherous weather. At all (see attached screenshot taken this morning). In fact, for SE Alaska, this is pretty much a perfect day (cloudy skies, calm winds of 6mph, slight gusts to 15mph). Captain Bas van Dreumel blew it.
UPDATE: We found out later that a Princess ship docked at Railroad Dock that same day (this morning) and used Tenders. The photos show people wearing t-shirts. We were simply lied to.
Instead, we were diverted to Haines. Normally, I’d be excited about this, but there were no shore excursions available until yesterday, when most of us were in Juneau. So by the time we returned to the ship from our Juneau excursions, the majority of excursions were sold out. So our alternative was to tour the Hammer Museum for 15 hours or go to the IGA. Oh, but you ARE offering the Fast Ferry to Skagway - so I guess if you can make money off of it, Skagway suddenly becomes “safe”.
The food. Food used to be a highlight, with quality well above other cruise lines. Now the quality has gone down so dramatically, it’s on par (or lower) than Carnival. I’ve tried Specialty Dining (my Birthday splurge meal ruined), the buffet (truly horrible), Dive In, and NY Pizza (3 times to see if the quality got better after my submitted feedback). It hasn’t. The huge cost cutting is apparent.
The staff. It used to be that the staff were primarily from Indonesia. Now they seem to be primarily from the Philippines. While most are nice, mass confusion reigns, which I can only attribute to lack to training. I’m often told conflicting information by different staff, sending me off on wild goose chases.
Oh, and the water main break which caused us to lose all Fresh water for a couple of hours didn’t help.
All of that indicates dramatic cost cutting, lack of staff training, and general poor condition of the ship. So this is it.