MS Prinsendam Holy Lands Cruise October 1, 2012

---

On boarding the Prinsendam, there is something so different about her, you can overlook some of the blemishes (she was headed to dry-dock in FLL soon after our trip). You don't have the long, confusing corridors of some of the larger ships, and I have tried most major cruise lines big ships. This is not the ship to choose if you hang in the Casino all night (it's very small), or you want to dance the night away (there is no nightclub). This is a ship with itineraries that are different from the usual, with full day shore excursions, leaving you too beat to even catch the early show most nights. Only 650 passengers makes it easy to meet people, and they had many solo lunches on sea days where I met a plethora of other singles traveling to have meals with and do some shore excursions. With the smaller sized ship, there were no long lines for disembarkation, shore excursions met in the showroom and even the tender produced only one boat waits, ever. The ports this ship can get into that most ships cannot meant tendering was only required in one of the 13 ports we saw in 16 nights. In Marmaris, Turkey, we were the first "large" ship they had seen all season. It was one of my favorite places on the itinerary for that very reason. The days at sea had all the usual activities, including the Culinary Arts Center, which I found interesting each and every time I went there.

The food on the ship was as good as I've seen on any other Holland American cruise. The meats were plentiful, seafood delicious, salads available, soups a little blah, but I'm not into soups in a hot climate. Each night there was a spicy entree, Indonesian or Thai, and a delicious looking vegetarian entree. Desserts in the dining room were great! I ate in the Lido every day for lunch and had many wonderful salads and entrees. No sandwich bar like the bigger ships, but plenty of choices. One night we had dinner there, and they were serving lobster tail, IN THE LIDO! I loved the Lido outdoor dining, which I'm told is being enclosed during the drydock. Too bad, I thought it was one of the best parts of this lovely ship.

No one spent much time at the pool. Chairs were always available on sea days, and there were not "chair hogs" like on the big ships.



The weather was spectacular this time of year. We had no rain, a few popcorn clouds here and there, but mostly 80s and dry. Parts of Egypt without shade were unbelievably hot. Bring a hat and wear sunscreen. Israel is very wooded and mostly shaded, all those trees planted in the 1960s with donations from around the world for the new Jewish state. Turkey was perfect sightseeing weather, and Greece and Croatia lovely but a little more windy.

---