Tourist101

We would like to share our greatest disappointment about cruising with Holland America with Maasdam from New Zealand to San Diego, on the 1st of February, 2018 Our holiday turned out into a disaster due to problems with accommodation on board. We have booked two cabins - a suite and an ocean view cabin. Throughout the whole cruise we had a lot of issues with our suite resulting in our lack of sleep and sickness. As a result our holiday was completely spoiled and the value of money invested absolutely did not match the promised pleasant experience. We had issues with A/C in our suite throughout the whole cruise and the friendly crew after numerous attempts could not solve the problem. Either the A/C did not work and we had to face the heat or it was impossible to turn it down letting the coldest air possible in the suite, so that we had to put on layers of clothes and still got sick. In addition to the numerous sleepless nights, we were exposed to the toxic smell of the paint through A/C during the sea days, which was coming from the frequent repairs on different decks. However, the worst part began when we smelled unexpected toxic carbon monoxide that was penetrating through the A/C for a couple of days. As it turned out a lot of passengers made complaints about that toxic smell, but the problem was again not solved quickly. The staff reacted with the reply that this smell depends on the direction of the wind and it is an ordinary matter. It is crucial to emphasize that carbon monoxide may result in fatal end, especially, when a person is in a deep sleep and breathing it in. In our case, children had been having a headache for three days and the adults for almost four days with the signs of nausea and inability to live a proper life. This experience may lead to health problems in the future. Highly disappointed and with the fear that the toxic smell of carbon monoxide would appear again, we started to discuss the option for disembarkation in Honolulu. Our only request was reimbursement for the rest of the trip. We even did not even ask for compensation for all the sleepless previous nights on cruise. To our greatest surprise, we were declined the refund for the rest of the cruise. The only gesture was an offer of $2000 for our whole company - 6 people! Considering the fact that we have invested in our holiday almost C$50,000 we are completely unsatisfied with the value of money we have spent on this cruise. Yet, the most important part from this cruise experience was the issue with the toxic carbon monoxide. It is absolutely irresponsible from the side of the cruise company that passengers might get exposed to any toxic smells and gases.