And here is part 2 of Malcolm's review, as well as a link to his photos at the bottom :
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At about 5-30pm Paul needed to go onto the rear deck for a smoke. I went with him and we took this opportunity to poke around some of the conference rooms that had been in use during the day. Some of the doors were now locked but we did manage to see some of the restored public rooms that were not open to the general public on the tour. We still didn’t get to see the Theatre unfortunately.
One thing we found about this ship is that it is possible to get almost everywhere. If the direct route is blocked - so many stairs (especially those on the outside of the ship) have red tape across them - approach from a different direction and you will find that there is open access.
At about 6-00 we went for a drink in the Ocean Bar. The bar itself was packed and the drinks very expensive. As it was the time most conferences were finishing the bar was full of delegates. We felt that we were forced out of the room fairly quickly. Paul had a Whisky and water, I had a Gin and Tonic; the cost was €18.00. I think that's expensive - particularly as we were charged for an entire bottle of mineral water. When we left the bar we went back to our cabin to get dressed for dinner.
Part of the package we booked included a complimentary drink in the Ocean Bar. At about 7-15 the bar was quieter than it had been at 6-00. We had no problem getting a table and there was still space available for anyone else who came in. We had another round of drinks. I didn’t object to the bottle of mineral water this time as the SS Rotterdam was picking up the tab!
The package I had booked included dinner in the Lido. At the time of booking I had said that I did not want to eat there and had upgraded to the Club Room for a supplement of €12-50 per person. This was for a three course meal.
The Club Room is certainly not the best restaurant I've eaten in, it's not even in the top ten; it does come into the top 100 however. We certainly had a better meal here than we ever had in the Queens Grill on QE2. We decided that the Club Room probable warranted one AA Rosette. There are some things however that make it very difficult to compare with any other restaurant in the UK.
When we got to the restaurant it was not full. By the end of the evening there were still four tables that had not been occupied. Despite this, for a restaurant to be running almost full on a Thursday night, shows that it is quite popular.
We got a nice table for two where we were both facing into the restaurant. The waiter came and asked us if we would like a drink before our dinner; we accepted but that was it. No menus appeared nor was there any indication given as to what was going to happen. I remembered Isabelle Prondzynski’s comments in her review and I had seen that on their website it was possible to book a Club Room dinner of 3, 4, 5 or 6 courses so I asked about extra courses. It turned out that there is no choice at each course but more than the basic three courses are available. For a Supplement of €**-** we were able to have all the courses on offer. Wine is done in a similar way. They don't have a wine list but, for €**-**, you get four glasses of different wines each to complement a course. [I left these spaces to fill in when I found out how much we had been charged unfortunately I never did find the breakdown of prices. All I can say is that we were charged an extra €87.75 to include our drink before the meal, six courses rather than three and the wine]While we had our drinks we were served a bread roll. I think this was homemade and was accompanied by both a plain whipped butter and a whipped butter containing peanuts. Both were delicious. More bread was brought throughout the meal as we finished each roll (they were only very small rolls).
There are almost no other English people on board so details of the meal were not available in English. I can therefore only give what our waiter said we were eating or what the dish looked to be. We started with scallops on a traditional Dutch salad. This was followed by Sea Bass. For the third course we ate a Crayfish consommé served over a cauliflower puree (this was delightful). Our fourth course was foal (as in a young horse). This was two small collops of the meat accompanied by two sections of a leek that had been filled with a rich mashed potato mix. Our main course was Pork (although nearer what would be called ham in the UK) served with lentils. The meal ended with a pear and apple compote with a small scoop of a vanilla ice cream and some kind of mousse. We finished dinner off with coffee.
We saw the problems with the meal as follows: There was no choice. We eat most things but, had they served up something that we couldn't eat we'd have been stuck; all the savoury courses were quite heavily salted. They were so heavily salted that it was to the detriment of the flavour of the meal; I felt that my Sea Bass was not cooked as well as I would have liked whilst Paul felt his foal was underdone. There was no opportunity for personal taste to be taken into account. When the waiter asked if the foal was good Paul commented that he would have liked it slightly better cooked. The waiter replied that it was Paul's personal taste and that it had been cooked properly (I do not think the waiter was being rude nor was any insult implied – any criticism taken by us came from his lack of English and was not meant by him); the service was not particularly speedy.
The entire meal took about 3 1/2 hours. This did not seem too long for the meal however until it was time for the pudding. We seemed to wait a very long time after the main course for the pudding to arrive; when it did it was only because we'd asked for it. After our coffee we asked for the bill. Our waiter said "certainly" and disappeared. Five minutes later we saw him serving another table, a few minutes later still he was in discussion with other members of the restaurant's staff. In the end we gave up trying to get a bill. As our room number was on our reservation we just left.
After another brief trip to the rear deck we returned to the Ocean Bar for a nightcap. The bar was much quieter now with plenty of space. We both had a Lagavulin each that cost €17-00. Again I think that's expensive. (I did manage to persuade the bar tender that a glass of tap water was all we needed not a bottle of mineral water).
The following morning breakfast was served in the Lido. It was a buffet format with five stations. Two of these were similar offering a selection of fruits, yoghurt, jams and assorted toast toppings. The third had a selection of cold meats and cheeses. Between the third and fourth were half a dozen metal containers. Each of these held a different kind of bread (croissants, sliced, etc). The fourth held a range of hot food – pancakes, waffles, bacon, sausage and hard boiled or fried eggs. The final station was on the bar in the Lido and offered a selection of beverages.
Breakfast was good. The two things that stopped it being very good was that the selection of hot food was almost cold and the difficulty in getting a decent cup of tea from the beverage station.
The previous evening we had noticed some steps leading down from behind the swimming pool on the rear deck. We now took them. They lead to an area under the rear deck that I think would have been used by the crew while she was steaming. From ashore you could see that there was a further deck area below this which had bollards, capstans, etc on it but we could not see any way to gain access to this area.
Finally it was time to check out. This was not the simple affair it should have been. The process ended up taking over 15 minutes while they tried to sort out why I had been charged €187.75 supplement for dinner. In the end they worked out that I had been invoiced for eating in both the Club Room and the Lido and therefore reduced my bill by €75.00.
When we visited the Queen Mary in Long Beach I remembered being told to ask to see an original cabin. I thought that it was also worth asking on the SS Rotterdam. The receptionist told me that while they will have “Historic” cabins on offer soon and that he would be delighted to show me one if it was available all the cabins they have at the moment are newly constructed for the hotel – neither the fixtures not the fittings date back to when she was in service. I think this answers my pondering about the originality of some of the furniture in our room.
Part of the package on the ship was a “Rotterdam Welcome Card”. This included a day’s unlimited travel on the busses, trams and the underground. So, rather than taking a taxi to get back into central Rotterdam we decided to use public transport. This is very easy. There is a bus stop almost adjacent to the ship. From there you catch the 77 bus to Rijnhaven underground station. Centraal Station is then only five stops. Although it is very easy going from The SS Rotterdam into the centre I think that it would be very difficult going to the SS Rotterdam from the station, particularly if you do not know where the bus stops at Rijnhaven.
We were left kicking our heels in Rotterdam for a day before we could catch the coach back to the ferry. There is not much in Rotterdam that interests me but one place that deserves a mention is the Engles café near the station itself. This is a café that was fitted out in the 1950s and is still working today. The tourist information office for the station has been built into one side of the cafe but the rest is original. This café struck me as far more original than any of the public rooms on the SS Rotterdam. This café is well worth visiting. It is not that expensive, the service is good and it provides a more comfortable waiting area that anything offered by the station.
To sum up: Am I glad I went? Yes. Did I enjoy it? Yes. Would I recommend the experience to someone else? Yes, as long as I was sure that they know they were only going to be staying in a hotel and that they understood De Rotterdam’s line about “slip away from everyday life and enjoy the style of the past in the atmosphere of today” gives the wrong impression at the moment. Would I go back? No, I’ve seen the ship. My curiosity has been satisfied. If I were to need a hotel in Rotterdam then I could see me staying there again but I think that is very unlikely. I am very glad that I didn’t opt to pay a lot more and stay onboard for two nights – one night was more than enough time to see and experience everything that was available to the independent traveller on that ship.
My stay on the SS Rotterdam was expensive. The cost for two of us for one night was €301.25 (about £273.00 or USD415.00). This does not include the coffee or lunch aboard (although it does include dinner and most drinks), any other refreshments we had in Rotterdam or the cost of getting from York to the ship and back. The total cost for our three nights away was about £600.00 (about USD 900.00).
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His photos are here :
https://www.flickr.com/photos/mrkpnh/sets/72157623613679110/detail/~~~~~~~~~~~~~
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LinersList/message/121449