7 Things to Know About Holland America Line’s Nieuw Statendam

Travel Market Report recently spent seven days exploring Nordic Europe on Holland America Line’s Nieuw Statendam. We were invited to experience the cruise, and were offered behind-the-scenes opportunities to tour the ship’s facilities, chat with crew, and learn more about HAL. 

After a week onboard, here’s what we believe travel advisors need to know about Holland America Line and Nieuw Statendam. 

Service is exceptional
Holland America prides itself on its service. 

The crew is friendly and attentive, and the rooms are kept tidy with twice-daily steward service (plus turndown service). Multiple guests stated that HAL’s service was a major draw, and TMR observed multiple examples of this—including a café barista who had memorized a guest’s “cappuccino double-dry” order. At dinner service, food was brought to the table all at once, even for a party of eight with special dietary requests. At the busiest meals, crew quickly turned over tables, wiping them almost as soon as guests left them. 

Our biggest disappointment in terms of service was that most of the crew we encountered were short on wine knowledge, even in the specialty restaurants.

A music lover’s dream cruise
Like all of Holland America’s newer ships, Nieuw Statendam is inspired by music. The decor’s theme revolves around instruments and pop culture, with fun and unique sculptures and wall art located throughout. The carpets in some hallways feature designs of classical instruments. According to HAL, even the ship’s design “draws inspiration from the elegant curves of musical instruments.”

Live bands play multiple times daily in the three performance venues, B.B. King’s Blues Club, Rolling Stone Lounge, and Billboard Onboard, and there are various music-based shows on the World Stage. The bands were great, and the various venues offered a good spectrum of genres and styles, from ‘90s grunge to disco. 

HAL is in the process of reintroducing classical string performances on Nieuw Statendam—and the rest of the fleet. Other itineraries include region-specific musical performances; for example, European sailings on Nieuw Statendam, Rotterdam, and Zuiderdam will feature the Chordial Chamber Trio and Pantheon, a dynamic group of European tenors, while cruises to Canada and New England feature Breton Thunder, a new show based on Nova Scotian musical traditions. 

Chill vibes, but guests can party if they want to
Our cruise was generally a laid-back, chill atmosphere. There are loungers all over the ship for lying down with a good book. The restaurants were surprisingly tolerable volume-wise, even with how massive some were (the dining room is huge). Even the children seemed to pick up on this: whenever we encountered young children (outside of the pool at least) they were calmly hanging out with their parents, laughing, playing cards, or reading.  

A future cruise planner suggested to TMR that HAL’s seven-day cruises attract more families with kids, but otherwise, “retired widow” is, at least anecdotally, the cruise line’s target demo. There’s pickleball, there’s bingo, and there’s a whole lot of playing the oldies. 
 
It appears that HAL is trying to address that reputation head-on by offering more activities for younger adults. This includes a bar crawl that was very popular with the 20 to 30 range (although a 76-year-old did participate!), DJ sets, and after-hour live music that played more recent hits until about midnight. 

Having said that, the ship operates predominantly on the assumption that guests are getting up early and having breakfast before 9:00 a.m. (technically a limited breakfast is available until 11:30 a.m.) and the ship was a ghost town after midnight. 

Edutainment
There’s a spirit of discovery sailing with Holland America that resonates with young and old. Guests are given the opportunity to learn more about each destination the evening before arrival, and these informational sessions are live-streamed throughout the ship. HAL periodically invites guest speakers to give presentations on the World Stage. For example, Icelandic geologist Jon Vidar Sigurdsson will be joining Nieuw Statendam later this month for its 21-day Iceland, Greenland, & Scottish Mysteries cruise.

Guests can learn more about Holland America and Nieuw Statendam while on the cruise. There’s the Origins show on the World Stage, which goes over HAL’s history (which was a full house during TMR’s sailing; we really enjoyed it). There’s a City on the Sea presentation that provides a “behind-the-scenes” look at cruise ship operations.    

Nieuw Statendam’s onboard entertainment included educational activities as well. According to Adams, the art classes are consistently one of the most popular offerings, and HAL has developed a raincheck system to meet demand. The “Tech for Travelers” series, which replaced the previous Microsoft classes, is a technology-based education program that teaches guests skills useful when traveling, like using smartphone apps or backing up data. 

Nieuw Statendam is one of HAL’s biggest ships
Nieuw Statendam is a Pinnacle-class ship, meaning it’s one of Holland America’s biggest, holding 2,666 guests. Only three of the cruise line’s 11 ships hold more than 2,600 passengers, and some guests told TMR that the ship felt “busier” than other HAL ships. (TMR is unable to confirm if this is accurate.)

Despite technically being mid-sized, the ship can feel crowded at times, especially during sea days. We found a few strategies to avoid the crowds. Lido Market is unbearable at peak meal times, but Grand Dutch, Dive-In, and NY Pizza aren’t as bad. Room service is included, and it’s easy to order breakfast the night before. 

Outside of meals, the Crow’s Nest (deck 12) and Ocean Bar have lots of seating and tend to be quiet during the day. 

On the positive side, the ship offers comfortable staterooms, as well as many dining and entertainment options. There’s lots to do, and many opportunities to find a quiet corner to curl up with a book. 

Prepare to spend on premium dining
While the aforementioned Dive-In, NY Pizza, and Grand Dutch do offer decent food at no extra costs, most of your clients probably don’t want to eat burgers and cheese sandwiches for a week.

Sadly, we found the Lido Market and dining room to be inconsistent. For a guaranteed delicious meal, the premium dining options are more than worth the extra cost. Seafood is king in this category: Canaletto offers fresh pasta and an assortment of fresh fish options, Rudi’s Sel de Mer is a brasserie specializing in seafood, and Pinnacle Grill serves surf and turf (the candied bacon appetizer is a must-try).   

Tamarind and the Morimoto at Sea pop-up (located within Tamarind on a select date) are both phenomenal. Tamarind is a pan-Asian restaurant serving dishes like shrimp tempura and crispy duck. Morimoto at Sea has a similar menu but with an inventive twist. It is the first restaurant at sea by Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto, and the food lives up to the name. Currently, only Nieuw Amsterdam has a stand-alone version of this specialty restaurant, but Nieuw Statendam guests can experience the menu at the pop-up, which is guaranteed to occur at least once per cruise.        

Family-friendly, but there’s a catch
Several extended families were onboard the Nieuw Statendam during TMR’s visit. Some of the happiest were multi-generational groups with teenage and young adult grandchildren. These are families for which Nieuw Statendam can be a great option. There were some young children on the cruise as well, but the ship did not have a lot to keep them engaged.  

Nieuw Statendam is best suited for quiet, mature kids who enjoy the laid-back pace and calm atmosphere of the ship. Children who enjoy reading, playing board games, doing art, and hanging out in the pool will have plenty to do. More rambunctious children will struggle with the lack of physical activities.

Nieuw Statendam is family-friendly in the sense that children are welcome, but the right itinerary is important. Ours was not designed with kids in mind. For example, the Lido pool area was the only pool open to guests 17 years old or younger, and there was no lifeguard on duty. (Disney, Royal Caribbean, and Norwegian Cruise Line all have some sort of pool monitor on staff). At several points in the seven-day cruise, this area was taken over in the evening for a clearly adult activity, like showing an R-rated movie or a sporting event. 

The excursions are equally adult-centric. The port in Heimay did have a decent playground, but tendering with small children would have been a nightmare. Unless a child is interested in history, art, and nature, there wasn’t a lot for them to enjoy at the destinations we visited.    

Parents will not get the break from childcare that they’d enjoy on some other cruise lines either. TMR encountered many parents entertaining their kids with card games or pool time. There is a supervised Kids Club for kids ages 3 to 6 and tweens ages 7 to 11,  but these max out at 25 kids each, and it’s first-come first-serve. Parents also need to pick up their kids for lunch breaks as the clubs operate in the mornings and afternoons only. (Teens use the arcade High Score exclusively during the day).