South Pacific Here We Come! (Post #1)

Day 1

The longest Holland America cruise since the restart begins today.   We embark ms Zuiderdam here in San Diego for a 35 day round trip to the South Pacific.  Here is the official HAL map.  

You can find a link to the cruise map HERE where each marker will link to the post for that day.  This is a standard google map and you can drill down and move around as you expect with any other google map.  

Our check-in time at first was 3 PM but then modified to 3:20.  How strictly these times are enforced seems to vary from cruise to cruise and even hour to hour.  Inconsistent enforcement of the check-in time seems to be the only thing that is consistent.  

The cruise terminal is only about 16 miles from our residence, and we arrived in about 20 minutes since Sunday afternoon traffic was very light.  

NOTE:  Since we are visiting Hawaii, we need to get an extra series of COVID tests to meet the requirements for an exemption to their quarantine requirements.  This entails getting a COVID test immediately prior to embarkation and then another test after our departure from Avalon.  

Here is how HAL managed the 100% pre-cruise testing and integrated this into the check-in process.  

Our first stop was a table to fill out a slip of paper with our name and date of birth.  The slip has a number from 1-10 which identifies our COVID testing group.  We also had a small pink strip of paper, that also had our group number, 10 in our case, which would be used to direct us to the appropriate holding pen later as we waited for our test results.  

Once we had our small forms, we were directed to an area with 10 testing stations, each separated by curtains, staffed by two people with a table.  They had us swab our nose, insert the swab in vial of testing chemicals and then they laid the completed test on top of the slip of paper with our name.  I was a little concerned that my swab might get bumped or mixed up on the wrong slip for another passenger.  Before I left that station, I made sure that my swab was on my piece of paper – that’s the best I could do and we moved on to standard metal detector screening.  

There wasn’t a station for paying corkage fees on wine as you see on other cruises.  

Next up was a station to check our health paperwork – vaccine records, negative COVID test within 48 hours and proof of registration with Hawaii Safe Travels.  

Our friendly check-in person told us that earlier in the day, one person didn’t have their booster, which was required by Tahiti.  Apparently, she was able to go to a nearby CVS and get a booster shot immediately and then return to the terminal and board.   This is third hand information so take it for what it’s worth.  

After our health paperwork was cleared, we were directed to our holding pen to await results of the test.  There were 10 pens, but by the time we boarded, only one was still in use.  No one can leave the pen until the entire group has all the results – then assuming no one is called aside, our group was dismissed and we proceed to the actual check-in counters/kiosks.  There were no priority lines for any level of status during this process.  

Check-in was a breeze.  Once we approached the kiosk, the agent scanned our passport,  then they scanned our face.  Assuming the passport facial scan matches our actual face and maybe the picture you scanned on the navigator app, a big green check appears, a printer spit out a small piece of paper which was now our boarding pass.  That’s it.  No questions – no verification of anything other than our face.  Very fast.  

Check-in was now complete and we headed to the ship where security scanned our small boarding pass, checked our face (which was from a picture on file from cruises years ago – they didn’t use the current picture I loaded on the Navigator app and they didn’t take a new picture).  Not sure what the rules are for how often or how long they continue to use the same picture.  

The ship photographers were already gone by the time we finished checking in, so we had the security guard take a shot – not bad!  

Our stateroom is a Signature Suite, very nice, on Deck 8, number 8070.   As per the new protocol, our key cards were waiting in the mailbox outside our door.  All our bags were already delivered inside the room.  

I was a little disappointed to learn that we missed a Mariner Reception that was held at 2 PM – with a 3:20 PM check-in we would miss it by design.  On our earlier cruise (post-startup) they didn’t hold these receptions until the first sea day so everyone had a chance to attend.  

We purchased the Have It All Package which included the Surf WiFi package.  We always upgrade to the premium package but it has to be done in person at Guest Services.   There were the typical long lines on the first day, but we got a chance to catch up with Henk Mensink, the Hotel GM, who we have come to know from our previous world cruises.  Most of the issues that brought people to the front desk involved getting connected to the internet.  If you are new to smartphones and connecting to the internet in these environments it can be a little bewildering.  My advice to anyone not confident in doing this would be to stop by your local Starbucks and practice connecting to their internet.   It’s not exactly the same but similar.  

All fixed seating was not available pre-cruise, but we easily switched to late seating fixed and were assigned table 29 (a four top) on Deck 3 at 8pm.  (All the larger tables were not available)  We have 2 empty seats so if anyone onboard wants to join us – give me a call – we’d love to meet you.  

Sunset Sail Aways are hard to beat – Catching up with friends from earlier cruises at the Seaview bar was a special treat.  

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More to come about Dining and Have it All packages – I’ll save that commentary for some slower news days.

The evening entertainment was the HAL Origin story – highly recommended, but not something we need to see twice – maybe in a year or two for a refresher.

Our late arrival onboard made our first day more hectic as we had to try and get the bed clear and things sorta put away before going to bed.

A great start to a great cruise!