Day 1, Cruising the North Sea en route Portree

Our first full day of the cruise was a sea day, which is always a nice way to get rested after travel while orienting yourself to the ship.

We always get room service breakfast and were a little concerned about the different look to the breakfast hang tag.  A copy of the breakfast hang tag is HERE.  A copy of the earlier menu is HERE.  A copy of the menu that was on the 2016 Grand World Voyage is HERE.  You can see that there are fewer choices and is consistent with HAL making everything simpler and easier to read.  Also new are some options to pay extra for steak and eggs and a few other items.  Nevertheless we were please to see that HAL still offers a hot room service breakfast at no extra charge.

The menu encourages waste by giving you the impression that your only choice is to check the box and take everything offered for that selection.    As an experiment I edited the menu – crossing off “scrambled eggs” and writing in “over medium”   I also wrote in cream instead of checking the box for either milk for 2% for your coffee.

I put my menu outside my door and turned in, wondering what would be delivered in the AM.

Right on time, the room service waiter knocked on the door and delivered our tray.   All of my modifications were accepted and the food delivered as requested.  I will be trying this throughout the cruise and I am not sure if this is a YMMV situation, a nod toward my Mariner status or something else.   I will enquire with some of my sources to see if I can shed any light on the official policy of what is an acceptable edit to the breakfast hang tag.

Here are some pictures of the breakfast as delivered

Always remember this simple rule when cruising – if you would like something a certain way or something that is different than the official offering – ask very nicely and more often than not your request will be granted.

We spent most to the day working with our knitting group.  Beth Brown-Reinsel presented a class on Fair Isle Tams in the Hudson room that was well received and very popular.

Tonight was our first Gala Night.  There were a handful of men in Tuxedos, another handful in suits with the majority of the rest wearing sport jackets, some with ties some without, and a healthy number of folks meeting the collared shirt minimum.  Women were probably more dressed, but we didn’t see any one in a gown.  I wore my Tux and will continue, and the good news is that you can wear pretty much anything you want and you will fit in.

If you want a traditional formal night – cruise on the QM-2 – we did one last year and it was a lot of fun.

Captain Bart Vaartjes hosted the welcome toast in the Vista Lounge right before the evening show.  This event was streamlined in that there wasn’t any introduction of the ships senior officers.  We would have enjoyed seeing who they were, but we are probably in the minority.  The Captain did make a point to say he was actually toasting with Ginger Ale instead of Champagne.

Immediately following the toast, The Zuiderdam singers and dancers put on a wonderful show called “One World”.  We haven’t seen this show before and it was outstanding.  Their musical arrangements and choreography produced a high energy program.  Using rear screen projections to change locations, the cast, with appropriate costume changes, expressed the joy of the community of the world.  It had sort of a Lion King vibe to it and we enjoyed it very much.  We enjoy all the live entertainment on HAL ships and rarely miss a show.  They are all worth seeing multiple times.

We will be in Portree, Scotland tomorrow and are hoping the forecast for rain turns out to be incorrect.

• Beth Brown Reinsel
• HAL Singers and Dancers
• One World