Holland America's Koningsdam

Bahamas Larger Pics!

11.9.16 - 11.10.16 80 °F

Koningsdam is Holland America's newest ship and it arrived in Ft. Lauderdale on November 9th for its Caribbean season after sailing in Europe all summer after it joined the fleet. Since they had a short 4 night cruise that worked out well with a conference that I was attending, a bunch of us decided to sail and see what it was like.

Since this was its first stop in the USA, the ship had to pass a Coast Guard Safety Inspection. This delayed our boarding until 1:00pm and delayed our departure for Nassau until 10:00pm. The boarding was handled well, and they had snacks and water available in the cruise terminal as the boarding time could have been as late as 3:00pm, depending on how the safety drill went.

Our first dinner did not go well. Since we were not sure how folks we would have we showed up at 7:00pm for the open seating dining with a group of 9. We did not have a reservation. Holland integrates their open seating with the regular dining, and the system really does not work that well. We were initially told to expect a 30 minute wait for a table. I went back to check on our status at that time and they said it would be a least another 45 minutes before we were seated. We offered to split up into smaller tables, but they said that would not make any difference. We went to the Lido. Lesson learned: HA passengers are basically a fixed dining group. We are going to try and make a reservation for 6:30 tonight and see what happens. Then on the way to the lido, another lady and I got stuck on the elevator for 20 minutes. What was very disturbing was that neither the emergency bell nor the phone in the elevator worked. Literally no way to communicate. The doors finally opened I called 911 to report this very unsafe condition.

Today I am posting pictures of Deck's nine and ten, which include the buffet area, pool area and the spa.