Thread: ms Zaandam - history

ms Zaandam (2000-present) Built in 2000 as ms Zaandam by Fincantieri - Cantieri Navali Italiani S.p.A., Marghera (Venice), Italy for Holland America Line. Her keel was laid on 26 June 1998 and she was floated out of her building dock on 30 April 1999.



After running successful technical trials in the Adriatic, Zaandam was delivered to Holland America Line on 6 April 2000. She then crossed the Atlantic via the Adriatic and Mediterranean under the command of Captain Jean “Jack” van Coevorden. Uniquely, Zaandam was originally intended to serve as Holland America's bid to attract younger passengers. Consequently, upon her arrival in Ft. Lauderdale, FL she was christened by her then 13-year old godmothers, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, known to television viewers of the late 80's and early 90's from the sitcom "Full House", in a ceremony on 4 May 2000. She departed that afternoon on her maiden voyage, a 7-day voyage to the eastern Caribbean with port calls at San Juan, Puerto Rico, Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas/Cruz Bay, St. John, USVI, Nassau, as well as HAL’s private island Half Moon Cay, both in the Bahamas. She would alternate this itinerary with a series of cruises to the western Caribbean stopping at Playa del Carmen/Cozumel, Mexico, Ocho Rios, Jamaica, Georgetown, Grand Cayman and Half Moon Cay.



Zaandam was named after the city of Zaandam located in the Dutch province of Noord Holland (North Holland), the main city in the municipality of Zaanstad. Zaandam, the city, was once a small settlement built on the river Zaan near a dam. ms Zaandam is the third ship in HAL history to bear the name Zaandam and also the third ship of the four vessel “R” class, Rotterdam (1997), Volendam (1999), and Amsterdam (2000) are her sisters. The “R” class really should be divided into two separate classes due to internal and external differences; Rotterdam & Amsterdam as one class and Zaandam & Volendam as the other. Holland America Line, however, considers the four ships as one class.

The first Zaandam, built by the Nederlandsche Stoomboot Maatschappij/Netherlands Steamboat Company, at Rotterdam, the Netherlands, was launched on 20 July 1882 as a 3,063 ton combination steam and twin-masted sail ship. Zaandam I, HAL’s first ship built in the Netherlands, would sail between Rotterdam and New York through 1897 and also opened HAL’s new route to Buenos Aires, Argentina. In June 1897, she was purchased by the Austro-Americana Steamship Company and renamed Styria. In 1902 she was sold to the New York-based Luckenbach Steamship Company, renamed Julia Luckenbach, and converted into a petroleum carrier. In January 1913 while in Chesapeake Bay, she collided with another steamer and subsequently sank.

The second Zaandam was laid down on 22 December 1937 at Wilton-Feijenoord at Schiedam, the Netherlands. She was a 10,909 ton combo cargo-passenger vessel which departed Rotterdam for New York on her maiden voyage on 7 January 1939. When the Netherlands were invaded and occupied by Germany in May 1940, Zaandam was repainted in camouflage colors. In 1942 she was requisitioned by the British Ministry of War Transport and then assigned to the United States War Shipping Administration. In November 1942, Zaandam was torpedoed by a German U-boat, some 300 miles off the coast of Brazil and sank, tragically with 130 of her occupants killed or missing at sea. There were 169 survivors.



Essentially a stretched-out and slightly larger version of HAL’s “S” class, Zaandam has three design changes that distinguish her from that earlier class: Her aft swimming pool was moved from Navigation Deck up one level to Lido Deck, an alternate restaurant, at the time of her delivery called the Marco Polo, later changed into the Pinnacle Grill, was incorporated, and a mid-ship elevator bank and stairwell was added. Zaandam is similar to the lead ship of the “R” class, Rotterdam, but is slower (she basically has the same speed as the four “S” class ships). Zaandam also has a single funnel, however the stack is of a different design than the “S” class funnels. Rotterdam and Amsterdam have a twin-funnel, side-by-side arrangement. Unlike Rotterdam, one of HAL’s two flagships designed for longer, world-wide cruises, Zaandam was designed for yeoman duty in the Caribbean and Alaska but has also found her way to Hawaii, the South Pacific, Australia and Asia. Her home ports so far have been Ft. Lauderdale and Port Canaveral, Fl, San Diego, CA and Vancouver, BC.

The basic layout of Zaandam’s public rooms are the same as that of ms Volendam, including her two-tier Rotterdam dining room, Lido buffet-style restaurant, an alternate 88-seat Marco Polo (Pinnacle Grill) restaurant, as well as a Club HAL children’s room on her Sports Deck that can also be used as a meeting or reception room. Her main two-story show lounge is named after Dutch abstract painter Pieter Cornelis “Piet” Mondriaan. The lounge glitters with bright white, gray, and silver decor with somewhat darker furniture providing contrast (the tables feature lamps with miniature musical instruments). Zaandam’s trade mark Ocean Bar attracts the pre- and post-dinner cocktail crowd and her 205-seat Wajang theater, the place for movies, meetings and presentations. The Crows Nest observation lounge has a 320-degree view for taking in port departures and arrivals. She has an Ocean Spa fitness center with a gymnasium and separate massage, sauna and steam rooms. Zaandam also came out with an Explorers Lounge, Java Café coffee bar, Piano Bar, a 24-seat Erasmus Library, an Internet center, shops stocked with duty-free goods, and a Casino with Casino Bar which doubles as the ship’s sports bar.

Zaandam’s alternative 88-seat restaurant, Marco Polo, sported the contemporary pan-European warmth of light beech wood. Architect Frans Dingemans strove to create an artists’ bistro with works by Rubens, Rembrandt, Henry Moore, Picasso, Matisse plus a host of unknown talents, each framed in the style of its period. The result was a fine artists’ bistro that looks as if it evolved over the centuries. Open for lunch and dinner by reservation at no additional charge, the Marco Polo featured “California-style” Italian cuisine such as Pollo ala Aglio e Rosmarino, Costoletta di Vitello al Carbone, Petto de Pollo Rustico and Osso Buco ala Milanese.

Like older sisters Rotterdam and Volendam, Zaandam featured a 24-hour Internet center/café managed by Digital Seas and called "The Web Site." It allowed passengers to go on-line on a real-time basis, check their own e-mail accounts and stock quotes as well as surf the World Wide Web. The Internet center, equipped with eight computer terminals and a printer, was located on Upper Promenade Deck between the Erasmus Library and the Hudson/Half Moon meeting rooms in a space, initially known as the Puzzle Corner.



Zaandam’s theme is loosely tied to the world of music with related memorabilia scattered throughout the ship in fabrics, posters and real instruments. Zaandam’s center piece is a giant 22-foot high Baroque-style Dutch pipe/street organ with mechanical figures “playing” violins, drums and horns that can be found in her three-deck high atrium. The organ incorporates wooden pipes and drums, and when it is played it breathes life into the menagerie of puppets connected to its mechanism. The organ is also playable by a computerized "player-piano" system from Yamaha and “performs” on sea days at 11:00 am and at 12 Noon and at 2:00 and 4:00 pm. Throughout the ship, one will find sheet music created by famous composers and authentic instruments from the 19th century that are pieces of art in themselves such as the Rothphone and bass Sarruso-phone, two double-reeded instruments resembling bassoons made of brass.

Zaandam sports a collection of rock 'n' roll memorabilia that would do credit to a Hard Rock Cafe: a Fender Squire Telecaster guitar, signed by the Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Charlie Watts, Ronnie Wood and Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stones, is located in a glass display case on the Deck 4 staircase. An Ariana acoustic guitar signed by David Bowie and Iggy Pop, a Fender Stratocaster guitar signed in silver ink by the members of Queen and a Bently Les Paul-style guitar signed by various artists, including Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton, BB King, Robert Cray, Keith Richards and Les Paul can also be found in the hallway near the lower entrance to the Rotterdam dining room. The rear wall of the Explorers lounge has a Conn saxophone with a mouthpiece signed by former U.S. President Bill Clinton. There are two somewhat unusual piano art pieces on board that have been painted by modern Dutch artists; one by Henk van Vessem painted in a colorful abstract design located in the ship’s Lido Restaurant, the other, made to look like “shipwreck wood” is located in the Seaview Lounge (outside the Piano Bar).

The artwork and artifacts onboard Zaandam are valued at more than U.S. $2 million, including antiques, paintings, prints and photography centered around a theme of Dutch and Holland America Line seafaring exploration and cruise travel. There are a series of black & white photos of the line’s early cruise ships in some of the passenger corridors. Zaandam also exhibits works created specifically for the vessel by world-class artists and has a collection of Egyptian artwork (including a wooden model of the third coffin of King Tutankhamen) permanently displayed in the Art Gallery. Usually an “eye catcher” is the large reproduction of the New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art’s “Yellow Jasper”, actually a fragment of an Egyptian queen’s face (commonly referred to as “the yellow lips”) located on the outside of the Explorers Lounge. Like all other HAL ships, great paintings of the line’s ships by Captain Stephen Card can be found in the forward stairwell, and some public rooms are decorated in Dutch colonial motif. A bronze sculpture of a group of five leaping white-sided Pacific dolphins by British artist Susanna Holt is located at Zaandam’s mid-ships magrodomed Lido pool. A pair of boldly colored life-size ceramic cows by Dutch artist Jackie Bouw lie contently by the ship’s rear/Sea view swimming pool.

In November 2003, Holland America Cruise Line announced a U.S. $225 million program of up-scaling their cruise ships, cruise line image and passenger cruise experience called the 'Signature of Excellence program'. This enhancement program included stateroom amenities: Sealy Posturepedic Premium Plush Euro-Top mattresses, 100% white cotton woven bed linens, waffle-weave and terry cloth bathrobes and extra-fluffy Egyptian cotton towels to all cabin categories; new massage-type showerheads and professional-grade quiet hair dryers in all bathrooms; new flat-screen LCD televisions, 5x magnifying make-up mirrors with halo lightning, fresh flowers, complimentary fruit baskets and stainless-steel ice buckets with serving trays in all cabins; plus comfortable bed duvets, fully-stocked mini-bars, personalized stationary, DVD players and access to a well-stocked DVD library in all suite-category staterooms.

Also new would be a Culinary Arts Center (inside the Wajang Theater) presented by Food & Wine magazine with a state-of-the-art show kitchen equipped with plasma video screens and on-stage counters for gourmet cooking demonstrations, tasting events and interactive classes; a Wine Tasting Bar and Gourmet Shop where guests can purchase culinary items including china and silverware from the Pinnacle Grill as well as HAL Master Chef’s Rudi Sodamin’s cook books, (in place of her Java Café); the introduction of the Pinnacle Grill alternative restaurant and private Neptune concierge lounge on all ships (Zaandam lost eight inside staterooms in order to build the lounge), two additional dining times in the main dining room, a casual dinner option with table-side waiter service inside the Lido Restaurant; an Explorations Café “powered by the New York Times”, which offers guests an opportunity to sip coffee, browse through one of the most extensive libraries at sea, enjoy a wide selection of music at one of several listening stations or surf the Internet (taking in the Erasmus Library and original internet center and adding a coffee bar), basically a combination internet café, coffee shop and library; a refurbished Crow’s Nest; an expanded Greenhouse Spa and Salon with new treatment rooms offering a thermal suite with hydrotherapy and thalassotherapy hot tub/Jacuzzi as well as heated ceramic lounges plus the extension and expansion of the fitness facility/gymnasium, out and above the ship’s bridge.

In addition, changes were made for non-adults, including newly expanded youth facilities within the "Club HAL" program and the creation of the interior “Loft” and exterior “Oasis” for teens. The younger cruisers (ages 3-7) can enjoy supervised, age-specific activities in a more comprehensive Youth Program (arts and crafts, face painting, candy bar bingo, a pajama party, story-telling, board games, drawing contests, ice-cream sundae parties, etc.) in Club HAL. Their room has art theme with paint can stools, palette tables, and vibrant colors. Tweens (ages 8-12) have their own arcade area with their own stage, a jukebox, air hockey, foosball, Karaoke, Sony Playstations, a Digital Dance Revolution machine (DDR), vending machines, miniature golf, ping pong, dance parties, sports events, scavenger hunts, etc. The Loft is a teens-only (ages 13-18) lounge designed to resemble a New York artist's loft and comes complete with dance floor, state-of-the-art sound and laser light system, big screen TV, music videos, DVDs, Sony Playstations, a DDR, comfortable couches, and Internet access. A spiral staircase leads up to the Oasis, a secluded, teens-only sun deck with covered snack areas where teens can soak up rays in hammocks and then cool off in a one-of-a-kind cave and wade pool complete with nine-foot high tropical waterfall.

Shipboard program changes under SOE #1 included an expanded Exploration Speaker series, unique Medallion and Collection shore excursions, iPod art tours of all ships, new wine packages, an early embarkation program (as early as 11:30 am) for guests, flexible As You Wish dining, an expanded Pinnacle Grill menu, exclusive flatware, china and stemware in all restaurants, and a broad expansion of the Greenhouse Spa and Salon facilities and treatments.

For Zaandam, this refit meant the disappearance of her Java Café, Erasmus Library, Web Site internet Cafe, Card Room, Marco Polo restaurant and Kristal Terrace. Zaandam had her SOE part 1 enhancements installed while in dry-dock at the Grand Bahama Shipyard in Freeport, the Bahamas, from 8 through 29 January 2005. Upon emerging from the yard, she sailed to her winter home port of Port Canaveral, Fl. from where she offered a series of 7-day Eastern and Western Caribbean cruises.


During the first week of February 2005, Zaandam, her sister Volendam, HAL's Vista class Zuiderdam, Carnival Miracle and Radisson's Seven Seas Navigator were chartered by the Jacksonville, Fl. Super Bowl Host Committee as accomodations/hotel ships. Jacksonville, the smallest market ever to host a Super Bowl, rented the five ships for U.S. $11.5 million and "parked" them along the St. Johns River for five days to assist with hotel room space for National Football League affiliates and sponsors for Super Bowl XXXIX. The three HAL ships were berthed at the city's newly upgraded Talleyrand Marine Terminal. Rooms aboard the five ships cost $200 to $550 a night.



On 21 January 2009, Zaandam gained a Digital Workshop program by Microsoft which is comprised of complimentary classes led by a Microsoft-trained “techspert”. As part of the program, located in the Queen’s Room, her passengers can learn to use computers to enhance photos, produce and publish videos onto a DVD and create personal web pages or blogs. In addition, one-on-one coaching, called “Techspert Time” is available for more than 20 hours each week.

On 18 November 2009, on the east-bound portion of her Circle Hawaii cruise, Zaandam also gained a second alternate restaurant, "Canaletto", serving Italian cuisine. Canaletto, named for the famous 18th century Venetian artist, which debuted on the ms Eurodam in 2008, will come to life for dinner nightly between 5:30 and 9:30 pm when a section of the ships' Lido restaurant is transformed into the Italian restaurant. Canaletto's menu begins with an antipasti plate that changes nightly, followed by soup choices, salad, four pasta dishes and entrees like veal Milanese, chicken Marsala