Boarding HAL Noordam for our Cruise

Duman from Romeinlimo took us to Civitavecchia. He stopped to buy us gelati before we boarded. Upon embarkation, they mysteriously confiscated our passports. Only later did I find that, because I was the travel coordinator for two CruiseCritic Meet and Greets onboard, they must hold my passport. Although I got it back that evening, I never did get a satisfactory explanation to this.

As to Noordam, the rooms were ready when we boarded shortly after 2 pm. I prefer the stateroom layout where HAL puts the sitting area next to the balcony, whereas RCI puts the sitting area closer to the main door and bathroom. I liked that the balcony partitions opened so we could traverse the two balconies of our connecting staterooms but, because our balconies were shallower than a standard balcony due to the lifeboats below, the open partition door made it nearly impossible for me to open and move through our balcony door. In addition, these Cat VE balconies only have a small coffee table instead of a full balcony table. This didn’t allow us to eat any of our room service breakfasts outside. It would have been nice to have a Cat VD or VC stateroom.

As far as the rest of the ship was concerned, the décor was muted and classy. It had a very warm feel to it. The ship lacked the bright, airiness of RCI’s Radiance and Voyager-class ships--specifically I missed the big soaring atriums. However the ship was notably quieter as the lack of big public spaces kept the noise down and you could easily find private spaces. The Explorations Café is an especially large and inviting area with many comfortable chairs and recliners, and filled books to borrow or read there, DVDs to rent, and computers to use. I liked that HAL gives free internet access to the NY Times web site so you can keep up with what’s going on in the world without paying exorbitant internet access fees.

I found some of the walking flow around the ship to be strange. For example, walking on Deck 3 starboard nearly dead-ends at the Pinnacle Grill and forces you to merge over to the port corridor. On Deck 4, there are similar ways for you to get lost depending on what side of the ship you are on.


The kids, of course, only cared about the pool and the table tennis...