Improvements make the cruise
“I guarantee you, we have the best live music at sea.”
A possible exaggeration from Rubin Kooiman, the genial hotel director of Holland America’s 2,100-passenger cruise ship, Eurodam. But with 11 days ahead of us, we were looking forward to seeing if his boast was valid.
In recent years, Holland America has evolved its live music program on several older ships plus its newest vessels, Koningsdam and Nieuw Statendam. The Music Walk is a series of Deck Two venues added to Eurodam in 2015 that run the gamut from hard rock to blues, from Top 40 to classical.
As on all large cruise ships, Eurodam, launched in 2008, has a main theatre where a team of talented dancers present several different Broadway-style productions each cruise with dazzling special effects from the background light curtains. On our cruise from Vancouver to San Diego, with three stops in Mexico, we also had main stage solo acts, usually from singers and pianists, accompanied by a live band.
But the Music Walk is what sets Holland America apart. Every evening there were several choices for live music, always with a large, appreciative audience. The loudest was the BB King’s Blues Club with a full band and soloists belting standards from the blues repertoire. Next door was Billboard Onboard, twin pianos played by a pair of singers who know the Billboard charts through the decades and can handle almost any request. On the two newest, slightly bigger HAL ships there’s an additional venue for the high volume Rolling Stone Rock Room.
Our favourite Music Walk venue on Eurodam was the Lincoln Center Stage with two or more concerts each day featuring a pianist and an exquisite string quartet — cello, viola and two violinists. Each player, a recent graduate of top music schools, was obviously a skilled professional with a wide repertoire ranging from the classical standards — Bach, Schuman, Beethoven — to Leonard Bernstein, the Beatles and Freddie Mercury. Judging by the enthusiastic overflow crowds for each Lincoln Center performance, the smallish room used by the quintet needs to be expanded in the future.
No expansion is needed in the Eurodam’s generous dining areas. The ship may be American-owned and registered in the
Netherlands but the Asian food, in particular, has to be among the tastiest and most creative of any cruise line. The Lido Buffet, on Deck 9, always has a good selection of Thai, Indian or Japanese food but the best venue is Tamarind on Deck 11. This extra cost ($25 per person) restaurant has charming Indonesian servers and a menu filled with visual and tasty delights — shrimp tempura, Shanghai ribs, a spicy satay sampler, and among the mains, lime glazed sea bass and wasabi and soy-crusted beef tenderloin.
Tamarind was also the location of a special Asian dinner, prepared by Japanese sushi master chef Andy Matsuda from Holland America’s Culinary Council. It was a five-course feast, including imaginative sushi but also a delectable sashimi-style tuna trio and grilled scallops dengaku. Each course was accompanied by a high-end wine.
The two other extra cost dining rooms are Pinnacle Grill, the ship’s top-quality steakhouse, and Canaletto, an Italian specialty restaurant.
Even the cost-included main dining room was impressive. The tables for two, four, six or eight guests have well-trained, friendly waiters who presented menus with selections like surf and turf (tender and delicious lobster and beef), barbecue ribs, veal cutlet or chicken parmigiana. The fish, especially the fresh wahoo, was particularly good. Of course, vegetarian options were always available. Our only disappointment in the main dining room was with the Mexican food, offered for a couple of evenings while we were cruising along the Mexican Riviera. Very bland compared with the real thing.
Another area where Eurodam’s cuisine shines is America’s Test Kitchen where chefs prepare special dishes before an appreciative audience and answer questions about their techniques. Master chef Andy Matsuda showed off his sushi skills with a whimsical Panda Face roll.
As we sailed north towards San Diego and disembarkation, we were glad we splurged for a signature suite, the lowest of three suite categories. We had a large room with plenty of storage space, a generous balcony and a huge 50-inch flat screen TV. Best of all, we had a large bathroom with twin sinks, a Jacuzzi tub and a separate shower.
At the start of the cruise, the Eurodam hotel director told us he’d guarantee the best live music at sea.
He was right. But with all the improvements since launching, we’d say his prideful boast could be accurate about several other areas of this sophisticated vessel.