We enjoyed the whole cruise experience on Noordam -HAL, cruise for 15 days over the Christmas New Year period. It was good value for money compared to other cruise line offerings for the same period. We have cruised with HAL many times and are now nearing the achievement of 4 star Mariner status. The ports on this cruise were in some cases a repeat of the 2016-2017 Christmas-new Year cruise. We booked a guarantee balcony cabin and were very happy to be allocated a VA category cabin on deck 5 .

The cabin showed damage on the wall presumably from luggage. There is a life boat underneath the balcony which did not obstruct the ocean view from the balcony apart from looking down to the promenade deck. There was noise associated with the lowering of the boat for tender ports.,usually about 7a.m.

We ate mostly in the main dining room. The food was good to very good judged from the standard of what we paid.. The Lido is very busy most of the time with a variety of food from international to Asian. The ice cream counter is open all day and serves delicious ice cream and other desserts and cookies.. Read more