My dad and his buddy, who I called Uncle Ed, built a 16-foot cabin cruiser in Ed’s garage one winter.  In the spring they took “Laural” out on a trailer, with me tagging along, slid it into the water and motored it to their slip, where their 16-foot cabin cruiser was dwarfed by the other boats in the marina.  I remember Uncle Ed saying, “It’s a peanut!”

That is how I felt as we drove up to Volendam, which was berthed next to Oasis of the Seas.  Volendam has a lower berth capacity of around 1,400, Oasis more than 6,000.  Oasis towered over Volendam. “It’ a peanut!”

Volendam is carrying just over half its capacity, the lady at check in said 747 souls.  Onboard it seems spookily empty.  We were able to get two seats together 5 minutes before showtime last night and it’s been easy to find seating at the lectures.  Normally I need to get to the theater 15 to 20 minutes in advance to get a preferred seat, so I carry a book. No need so far on this trip.  The dining room seems quiet as well, easy for me to hear conversations, and getting breakfast at the Lido Market there are fewer lines, and it is not difficult to find a windowside table.

Tonight, we arrived at the Captain’s Toast four minutes before “showtime” and had great seats.

While the ship is half empty some people could not get reservations for the whole cruise, because we are picking people up in Buenos Aires and in Europe for those who don’t want the full 133 days, and we are told it will be full house on our last leg.  I spoke with one per son in the pool who booked late and must change rooms twice in order to do the whole 133 days.  But now we are a small compliment. Tonight, a number of us got notices that tours we had booked in a couple of the ports were cancelled because not enough people signed up.

Volendam, along with its fraternal twin Zaandam, are the smallest ships in the Holland fleet. She was built at the end of the last century.  Ten years ago, when we started sailing on Holland there were two classes of ship in the fleet smaller than Volendam.  We were on Prinsendam, which had an 800-passenger capacity, and we called her “Littledam.”  The next class up, S class ships, we called “Smallerdam.”  The ship we are on now was “Middledam.”  The class above that, named after the four cardinal compass points “Compassdam,” or “Biggerdam.”   The class above that, which were the biggest ships in the fleet at the time, we called “Biggestdam.”  The ship that was coming out in the next year (2016), holding 2,600 we called “Monsterdam.”

Ships just keep on getting bigger. The hotel manager on Prinsendam in 2015 told us that when Statendam, one of the “Smallerdams” was new and was leaving Ft. Lauderdale the Harbor Master controlling traffic said, “Let the big ship out first.”   Seven years later, the same harbor master said, of the same ship, “Let the little one out last.”     

To put it into perspective when we first moved to Alaska in 1980 one of the ships calling at Sitka was Canadian Pacific’s Princess Patricia, her capacity was 320.  Holland America’s original Prinsendam, which sank in 1980, had a passenger capacity of 390.  The big ships to call were the Vistafjord and the Love Boat (Pacific Princess) at just under 700, just slightly fewer people than on Volendam, sailing at half capacity, today.  The biggest ship we saw was the repurposed trans-Atlantic Ocean liner Rotterdam V at just over 1,100 passengers.

We are still getting used to this ship although we sailed on its fraternal twin, Amsterdam, (which is no longer in the fleet) twice. While both are R class ships the décor is different, so landmarks, a statue here or a painting there don’t give us our bearings.  Amsterdam has cooler colors, Volendam warmer. I think I prefer the warmer. 

Every other time we’ve been on this ship class we were on three deck slightly forward of the aft elevator.  We were booked into a similar room on Volendam, but we kept getting sweeter and sweeter offers to upgrade, probably because there are relatively few people on board.  So now we are in a balcony room on six deck, slightly aft of the forward elevator.  I go out of the room and take the wrong direction and then I punch the wrong button on the elevator.

On our last few Holland cruises were on larger ships (yes, we sailed on Monsterdam and liked it). But I think the smaller size creates a more intimate community atmosphere.  The rooms on the smaller ships are bigger with more storage, better suited for a long cruise. This ship has recently come out of drydock with new carpets and more electric outlets in the rooms.  A few years ago, Volendam was assigned to house refugees from Ukraine.

On our second sea day I am slipping into the routine. I’m back swimming.  This time I have paddles that cause resistance in the water to help me build strength and range of motion in the arm where I have a split bicep.  I love the aft pool but with the cross wind today my paddles blew away sending me running after them. I caught them both, without falling, (don’t run on deck) before they could blow into the drink to become future microplastic pollution.  I used a chair leg to keep them in place while I swam laps.

The Laurel, Uncle Ed’s and Pop’s boat did not fare as well as my paddles in a big wind.  During an Atlantic storm “Peanut” ended up crashing through a picture window of a marina view home. Ed found it sitting in someone’s living room.