To Hawaii on the Koningsdam – 5½ days at sea
Imagine living in a small community – 3,600 or so residents – which has great music venues, bars, and restaurants, a spa and many other facilities. Now imagine that in that community, you’re one of the 2,600 people that are retired, and the other 1,000 residents do all the work, from making your bed and cleaning your bathroom to cooking and serving your food. Now put that community on a ship that wanders around the world so you get new views constantly and regularly get to experience a different community for a few hours. Welcome to the world of cruising.
One of the reasons we chose the cruise from Vancouver to Hawaii and back was the lengthy time at sea – two 5½ day crossings, from Astoria to Kauai and from Honolulu back to Vancouver. Port days can be overwhelming, and we needed a gentle entry back into travel. Now that we’re home I can tell you that this idea worked well – better than we had expected, actually.
These long sea crossings won’t work for everyone, but this post will give you an idea of how we spent our time on the Astoria to Kauai crossing. We sailed from Astoria the evening of October 8th and got to Nawiliwili Harbor, Kauai, the morning of October 14th.
It was Holland America’s Pinnacle-Class ship Koningsdam we were on. The first of what are now 3 Pinnacle-Class ships, she went into service in March 2016. She’s 975 feet long, 115 feet wide, 12 decks high, 100,000 gross tons. This particular cruise was a transition cruise after her Alaska season – she’ll now be sailing from San Diego to Hawaii and back all winter.
We booked a “verandah stateroom” on Deck 6 aft, right behind the elevators for easy access (Stateroom VC6179). There is an amazing amount of storage for clothing and all the other stuff people bring. While neither the room nor the completely private verandah could be considered large, they’re comfortable.
The weather wasn’t particularly good for our crossing, with clouds the norm and average seas. The highest waves I heard reported were about 4 meters (13 feet). I enjoy rough seas, and the promenade around Deck 3 is the best place to watch the waves, whatever their height. Both the next photos were shot on October 9th.
When seas get too rough the promenade is closed, but this turned out to be just the doors on one side that were closed on October 12th because of a strong cross-wind from the north.
We had booked a couple of extra packages, the “Have It All” which includes virtually unlimited drinks of any kind, plus some dining and excursions extras, plus the “Thermal Suite” access in the spa, for the hot therapy pool, steam room, and ceramic loungers.
As we don’t drink a lot, the “Have It All” package didn’t save us any money but was very convenient, but the “Thermal Suite” quickly became our favourite place on the ship, and we visited every morning and a couple of evenings.
The next photo shows the men’s dressing room.
The ceramic loungers, shot very early the morning so the floor-to-ceiling sea views don’t show.
And the hot therapy pool (about 104°F). On average there were 4 people in the pool – 6 was the most, and Cathy and I sometimes had it to ourselves.
Going back to our cabin. These are the elevators a few feet from it.
We usually took the stairs, and I credit that with the fact that I only gained 5 pounds during these 17 days of indulgence.
The hallway to our cabin. Deck 6 is the Mozart Deck for some reason – each deck has different carpeting to match the name.
Where to eat?! There are plenty of choices, from the main 750-seat dining room, the lower floor of which is seen in the next photo (on Deck 2), to the huge buffet, specialty cafes and restaurants, and tiny burger, pizza, and gelato outlets. While there is an extra charge for some of the specialty restaurants, everything else is covered in your fare.
We had initially decided to avoid the dining room as it can get very noisy and chaotic, but a few days into the cruise I went pretty much deaf (water in my ears?) and then the dining room became a really nice place for breakfast in particular.
The buffet (the Lido Market) on Deck 9 was our most common place to eat, though we sometimes chose our meals then went to a quieter outside table to eat. The next 2 photos of small sections of the Lido were shot on an early-morning exploration, while it was closed.
While we’re talking about food, let’s go to health. The next photo shows an enhanced hand-wash pod and hand-sanitation stand in the Lido. There are many dozens of the hand-sanitation stand all over the ship, but that was was one of only two hand-wash pods I saw, at each main entry to the Lido.
In the FAQ section of the Holland America website they state “Masks on board are recommended but not required indoors or outdoors. We highly recommend guests wear a mask in the World Stage and other entertainment areas, casino, spa treatment rooms, Club HAL and during other congregate events. Masks are required to be worn during the entire embarkation and debarkation process and on transportation during any Holland America Line organized shore excursions, on tenders to and from ports, and in the onboard Medical Center.” That, however, is NOT even encouraged, much less enforced. Mask use was practiced by far less than 1% of passengers, though that increased towards the end of the cruise as more and more people were obviously sick.
The reality is that as much as crew and staff keep the ship immaculate, you need to have your own well-defined safety plan that includes N95 masks.
Okay, we’ll go back to food in a bit (just like on the ship!) but let’s go to some of the active places now. The Lido Pool (and hot tubs) in the middle of Deck 9 is the central gathering point for many activities (as well as more food and drinks). The retractable roof gets opened on warm days – a little bit or completely depending on the weather.
The pool in the photo above was closed by netting due to fairly rough seas. Here’s a video of what that looked and sounded like – I found the waves to be quite soothing 🙂
At the forward part of the Lido Pool area is a large open area used for a variety of activities including dance and fitness classes. The next photo was shot very early in the morning.
On Deck 10 overlooking the pool area are a variety of seating and lounging options.
Deck 10 is also the home of New York Deli and Pizza, which we visited a few times. Haha – I didn’t stay away from food for long, did I? For the first few days of the cruise they still had Alaska beers, then switched to something else.
Also on Deck 10 is Club HAL for kids. It may have gotten no use on this cruise – there were less than half a a dozen kids on the ship.
We went up to the aft section of Deck 10 twice to dine at Tamarind. They offer nami (Vietnamese) and sushi, and we did both, one each night. Food, service, and ambiance are all 10/10. The sushi deserves particular mention – we have sushi restaurants in Whitehorse, but even in Vancouver I’ve never had sushi created by an artist. The sushi was our final meal aboard, and it was a perfect ending to the cruise.
Continuing up to Deck 11, there’s a short jogging track (the smallest I’ve seen on a cruise ship), and the sports court seen in the next photo – it was being used for pickleball every time I saw anyone there.
Heading back down, there are 3 areas that are much smaller than on any other ship we’ve been one. First and probably most surprising is the casino on Deck 3.
Next is the library, tucked into a hard-to-find corner.
And finally, the shops, though they still take up a fair bit of real estate, are smaller than we’ve usually seen. I’ve always thought that cruise ships and cruise ports were very poor choices as places to buy things like expensive jewelry and watches, but different strokes.
So, what has replaced the area that was taken up by casinos, libraries, and shops? Music venues, lounges, and places to eat. I’ll tell you more about those in a later post, as well as showing you a few more places on the ship as we explored further.
Next, our incredible bucket-list day on Kauai!
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Comment looks amazing, but I’ll either fly or take the train. My stomach started turning when I saw the waves . Glad you had a wonderful time, did Cathy pick the next journey?