Departure on Jan. 2nd (our 20th anniversary!)
We picked up our rental car early in the morning
and drove back to our house. We did our last minute house preparations
such as locking up the garage, locking the inside door to the
house garage, and more. Dean has a long list and we checked it
twice. Finally we were on the road south to Dori's house and arrived
at around 3:30pm. It was Monday and the celebrated holiday for
New Year's Day, so the traffic wasn't too bad until we arrived
in South Florida.
 
One of the first things we did at Dori's house was to administer
our Covid tests and take a photo of our negative test results
with our passports and a phone showing the time and date, which
would be needed in order to board the ship the next day. After
dinner, Dori surprised us with a very cute 6" cake for our
anniversary. There were no leftovers.
We drove down to Ft. Lauderdale early the next morning and spent
a couple of hours online in a hotel lobby, then turned in our
car and were ready for early boarding. Here the ship's photographers
were getting the backdrop ready for passengers as they entered
the walkway to the ship. The Zuiderdam is a new ship for us. The
Amsterdam, the ship we did the other world cruises on was smaller
and was one of the four ships Holland America sold during the
pandemic. There were about 1400 passengers for this cruise, so
this ship was not at capacity of about 2,000 and this number was
only a little higher than the capacity of the Amsterdam, so that
was good.
Shipboard Life
 
On Jan. 1, our room was upgraded from one on the first deck to
a verandah room on deck 7.
A verandah room has a glass wall with a door to a private outside
deck with chairs and a table.
How luxurious! We've never had a verandah on any previous cruise.
 
After boarding and finding our room, we headed to the poolside
Dive-In (a burger and fries place) and ordered Beyond Meat burgers
for lunch. FYI, Weber: They were very well prepared.
Port Everglades as seen from the ship...
...looking toward the exit at the end of the barrier island and
state park.
Looking back toward the other ships docked in the port, including
the Volendam, our sister ship leaving on the grand South American
voyage. The
Volendam was the last ship we were on in 2020.
 
The Lido pool area is where we spend most of our time onboard,
so that we're in the real air.
 
As usual, the floral arrangements around the ship were beautiful
and elegant.
The atrium features a slow-spinning seahorse. This view is from
deck 3 and seen below here on deck 2 is the fancy Pinnacle Grill
Restaurant. Below that is the main office on Deck 1.
A large oil painting of Venice, Italy was placed on an inside
wall across from the Explorers' Lounge.
It's an impressive 20 feet long.
Another large mural was this purple and yellow tulip painting
at one end of the Lido dinning room.
A stairway between decks 2 & 3 displayed a collection of plaques
commemorating initial visits of the Zuiderdam
at ports around the world.
Beautiful sunset clouds from the back deck, which
was also decorated with flags for the sail away party.
 
As 5-Star Mariners on Holland America, we have several benefits
like free laundry service and two free dinners in the Pinnacle
Grill. We had reserved a spot on our first night on the ship to
celebrate our anniversary. We used our other one toward the end
of the cruise to celebrate Dean's 83rd birthday, which was a few
days after the cruise in May.
 
After passing through the Panama Canal, the Polynesian ambassadors
boarded to provide enrichment such as ukulele lessons, sarong
tying, and more including a few informal performances like this
one on the Lido pool deck. They played a series of traditional
songs: some included hula dancing. The main singer used two types
of ukuleles and the guy played a bass ukulele: we'd never seen
or heard one of those before.
Elliot Finkle, a noted pianist from New York and who we've seen
a couple of times on HAL ships has an amazingly wide repertoire
of pieces he plays--all from his head. He uses no music. For the
days he was aboard, we'd hear him practicing on the Main Stage
during our 5am 50-minute walks on deck two, which includes a loop
into that auditorium. He had two evening shows on the Main Stage,
which included show tunes, movie themes, and other popular genres
with musicians from the ship. He also held two more informal sessions
by himself on the Steinway piano in the Explorers Lounge (one
in the evening and one in the afternoon) where he played mostly
classical music. This photo is from one of his informal sessions.
Overall, there were fewer shows on the Main Stage
on this cruise and fewer guest presenters. Many people complained
about this, but this was the first world cruise since the Pandemic
and the main company, Carnival has a lot of debt. We were just
happy to be on a Grand World Voyage and didn't complain too much.
We enjoyed the many rainbows we saw along the way.
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