We went on our first cruise! We did a 7-Day Viking Saga Cruise to Norway on The Holland America Line Rotterdam. If you are here hoping to read about Norway- sorry, that will be another post. This is just about the cruise experience! So keep reading to hear all about it!

First you might be wondering why I, who am terrified of open water and get motion sick, decided to book a cruise. I almost did not! But Jeremy has always wanted to do a cruise and I knew I would never do a Caribbean cruise. An Alaskan cruise maybe… It would really have to have a draw of being close to land and have incredible scenery for me to be on board. (literally!) So when Samantha Brown (you know, the travel host of half a dozen travel shows and producer of her own travel show Places to Love on PBS) said she was inviting fans on this cruise with her, I was typing in the credit card number before I even had a second thought!

Ok, it wasn’t really like that!

I did think about it for a few months before booking. I do get very motion sick. And even though I have been venturing out on boats more and more frequently over the years (and doing well with them), I was still very nervous to be out in the big blue. The ship is big (very BIG) and the North Sea route we took is less than 20 miles from land, so I tried to be brave and went for it. I do well on ferries. I can barely feel the motion and don’t generally get sick. I was hoping a cruise ship would be similar, and it was, for the most part.

I did a lot, A LOT, of research to try to make this easier on me, and to ease my anxiety of the unknown! Here are some questions I found the answers to, and some general cruise ship tips I wish I had known ahead of time. These tips are all specific to Holland America Cruise line and the Rotterdam ship in particular.

• Picking a Room.
  For motion sickness, I read that middle of the ship both horizontally and vertically is the best, and to have a window so you can watch the horizon. I know for me, I also need fresh air. I need the wind in my face! So I booked a terrace boom as close to midship as I could get. I needed the patio, not just a porthole window that would not open. I did totally fine on this trip. We could barely feel the movement in our room. I slept pretty well. I’m not sure if my room selection made this difference or not. I was in different areas of the ship for meals and other things, and could definitely feel the movement. The dining room was at the back of the ship on level 2 and I had a hard time the two times we ate in there. The casual food court was on level 9 and took up the front half of the ship, and I had no problems in there.
  
  I planned ahead and had many options in case I got sick, but the only thing I used was my motion sickness roll on essential oil. I bought some wrist band bracelets and they were worthless! They were too big for my wrists and not adjustable. It was impossible for them to put pressure on the spots I needed them to. I brought some less drowsy Dramamine too, but did not need it.
• Drink Packages.
  I booked our cruise through USAA Member Travel Privileges. So we got a bit of a discounted rate and the “Have it All” package as part of the military discount. This included the drink package, WiFi, a specialty dining credit, and a shore excursion credit. The price of the Have it All package varies depending on cruise length and various early booking sales they do. I do think it is worth it! Most drinks (beer, wine, cocktails) were around $9-12. If you wanted a cappuccino, tea, soda, bottled water, juice, etc, these also fell under the drink package. Important notes: any drink over $11 was not covered and you had to pay the difference. You are limited to 15 drinks per day.
• Dining.
  The Dining room and Lido Market (casual food court style dining) were included in the fare, along with a few other fast casual places like the café, a pizza and sandwich bistro, and a burger stop by the pool. Room Service is also included. There are other restaurants on the ship that are labeled “Specialty Dining” and are an added cost. We used a mix of all of these. Samantha Brown hosted a dinner at one of the seafood restaurants on board, so we booked that. And then we used our dining credit at a sushi restaurant. The meals at the specialty dining were wonderful! Fresh and full of flavor! The meals at the free places were like eating at a cafeteria. Not bad….not great. Made in mass and under a heat lamp, or from frozen ingredients, and tastes like it.
• Excursions
  We did get an excursion credit to use toward any Holland America excursion. But if you have traveled with me ever, you know I am not a fan of bus tours, and AM a big fan of freedom! Freedom to go where the whim takes me and stay there as long as I wish! There were some interesting looking excursions to lighthouses and waterfalls, but not many of them had good reviews. And the ones that did booked up fast! Also, the cruise excursions are SO EXPENSIVE! So I mostly did what I always do, and researched the port calls for months to see what the attractions were, what I wanted to see, and we did our own thing. I did end up booking an excursion from the ship on our last Port day in Flåm, but then a private company tour I had my eye on open 2 days before and I booked that instead. If you want the ease of not having to research and plan, I would use a service like Get Your Guide or Viator to look for tours or attractions in the port you will be in. If you don’t want to think even that much, then book the cruise excursion.
• Ship Activities
  I downloaded the Holland America App (required for your cruise) weeks in advance and had been trying to look at the day plans and add things I was interested in to my itineraries. It kept glitching and deleting them! Until we got to the ship. When we connected to the ship, the app worked seamlessly! You do not need Wifi to use the app on board either. So I added activities I was interested in, and the app would remind me about 10 minutes before they started. And there are so many activities! And they sometimes over lap, some you have to pay for (like Scotch tasting) but most are free. And many give a free gift just for showing up! It’s fun to feel fancy at a Champagne art auction or look at all the fancy jewelry! Just be smart and do your research. The cruise ships mark up is insane! And “60% off” is nothing when it has been marked up 80% from retail in the first place.
• Getting Water
  I was under the impression drinking water would be easily accessible. Well, it is. But as a glass of water, or a can of water that counts under the drink package. I was really suffering the first day and a half just trying to have some water available in my room when I did not want to go to a bar and order water, or pay an additional cost to have water stocked in the room! I decided to buy a water bottle from the gift shop and asked the bar tenders or waiters to fill it up. This was the game changer for me! So bring a reusable water bottle!
• There is no coffee or tea in the room. You have to go to one of the dining options open for breakfast to get coffee. On our ship, the dining room closed breakfast at 9:30, and Lido market closed at 10:30. So if you slept in, your options were limited. This is where I took advantage of room service! I ordered coffee to the room every morning. I felt bad ordering just coffee, so we would also get fruit or cereal. One day was an early morning for us so we had a full breakfast delivered. But in the first full day at sea I learned you need to know the hours of restaurants and plan your day accordingly if you want to eat! Lunch in the dining room is only an hour long! So the first day was rough, but the rest of the trip we got in a groove.
• Gratuities
  They already add gratuity to everything! I had read in my research that Holland America charges a $16 per person, per day “Crew Appreciation” gratuity to your ship account. What I did not realize is they also automatically add a gratuity to all of the additional service bills. If you go to the Dining room and order a Lobster Roll (which is an additional charge and not on the free menu) they add a gratuity to your bill. I didn’t realize they did this because the bill they bring you to sign also has the spot to add additional tip. So I had been adding small tips to the bills. Then I went to the Spa for a facial and my aesthetician commented on the ‘big tip’ I left her. I was surprised because I thought I was leaving the usual. We looked at the bill later and realized the spa had already added a 18% gratuity to the bill and I added another 18% on top of it. 😐 So next cruise, I am not tipping anyone. Except maybe the housekeeper. Because our neighbor was getting towel animals and we got only one the entire cruise! Maybe if we tipped we would have gotten the towel elephant.
• How Dressy is “Dressy?”
  There were 2 “Dressy” nights on our cruise. I was very unsure how dressy this needed to be, and was getting a lot of conflicting info from other groups. I think with our cruise, the nights were labeled as “Dressy” and not “Formal” so people mostly just dressed nice. Like regular dress and slacks. I brought a more formal dress but wore a cocktail dress for the first night and was so glad I did! I would have felt very overdressed in my formal dress. Even my sequin cocktail dress felt overdressed! We skipped the second “dressy” night by eating at the Lido Market. Only the Dining Room and the onboard Restaurants require the dress code. Also good to know, every day for dinner they do not allow shorts in the dining room.
• Room Rundown
  Our room came equipped with closets, plenty of hangers, an umbrella, plenty of pillows, spa robes, throw blankets, shampoo/conditioner/soap dispensers in the shower (no bath tub), a refrigerator, a safe, a desk, USB charging ports, 120v US plugs AND 220 EU Class C plugs, coat hangers on the wall, a small sofa bed, and mini bar of drinks. Some of this is probably specific to the room class we booked, but I think most rooms will have similar amenities. It was very much like staying in a hotel. They leave a form in the room to request extras: pillows, blankets, turndown service, etc. The one thing they do not have is an iron or ironing board, and you cannot bring your own. The ship offers laundry service. You can fill a bag and it is $35. That is the only laundry option aside from a clothesline in the shower.
  

I’m sure there is more I wanted to say about this whole experience that I forgot about. If there is something you are interested in that I did not touch on, feel free to ask and I will do my best to answer. Jeremy and I were talking that we both know people who go on one cruise and then are hooked and do nothing but cruises after! I don’t think it will be that way for us. I think Jeremy enjoyed it more than I did. As I said, I like freedom, and I felt very restricted on the ship with limitations on options and hours. I am also an introvert and I just need some space, peace and quiet alone to recharge! After a week of constant activities, I was overstimulated and irritable. I was very happy to be getting off the ship!

As I write this, it has been just a few days since we left the ship. I still have the motion sensation in my head (how long does this last) and am still mildly “over it.” So time will tell how I feel about this cruise in retrospect. How about you? Is a cruise on your bucket list? Are you a cruise lover? Have any great tips? Pop them in the comments!