{"id":60820,"date":"2021-03-23T11:27:00","date_gmt":"2021-03-23T15:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/mariner-voices\/sea-of-glamour-guest-spotlight-on-kandes-bregman\/"},"modified":"2022-11-11T15:49:43","modified_gmt":"2022-11-11T21:49:43","slug":"holland-america-cruises-featured-on-the-joy-of-cruising-by-paul-thornton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/whats-new\/holland-america-cruises-featured-on-the-joy-of-cruising-by-paul-thornton\/","title":{"rendered":"Sea of Glamour: Guest Spotlight on Kandes Bregman"},"content":{"rendered":"

Paul Thornton<\/a>, author of \u201cThe Joy of Cruising\u201d, has a new book out called \u201cCruising Interrupted\u201d, and in it he features Holland America Line guest Kandes Bregman. Paul and Kandes have granted us permission to share an excerpt of Kandes’ chapter to give a glimpse into her passion for cruising and Holland America Line. Enjoy the segment, and then be sure to check out Paul’s books. <\/em><\/p>\n

When you go to the Holland America Line (HAL) homepage, there should be a photo of Kandes Bregman. I am not implying Kandes is HAL\u2019s most prolific cruiser, or biggest fan, but she would be a good personification of the joy of cruising on Holland America Line. First, from a sheer quantitative perspective: Kandes has cruised virtually all of her 90 cruises on HAL, visiting 76 countries in six continents and spending the equivalent of three years of her life at sea with HAL. (All the more remarkable given that Kandes has been cruising with HAL for less than 20 years.) And, while perhaps there are those out there who exist, it is hard to imagine someone who is more of an ambassador for HAL. Over 100 referrals of cruisers booked and sailed on HAL, several of whom are now four and five star Mariners\u2014HAL\u2019s customer loyalty program. And, Kandes has created and cultivated a website and blog, Sea of Glamour, dedicated to all things HAL.<\/p>\n

After researching Kandes and reviewing Sea of Glamour<\/a>, I opened up my interview with Kandes by stating facetiously, \u201cYou should be in a Holland America Line advertisement!\u201d Kandes responded, \u201cWell, I was….\u201d <\/p>\n

Kandes was born in Seattle, Washington, lived in Saratoga, California, and spent a portion of her life in Cary, North Carolina before settling in Scottsdale, Arizona where she lives with her husband of 40 years, Cor, who is originally from the Netherlands. Kandes and Cor have three children, one of whom recently got married on, surprise, a HAL cruise.<\/p>\n

As a marketing communications executive for technology companies for over 25 years, Kandes traveled for business throughout the United States, visiting most of the states, as well as parts of Europe. \u201cDuring that time I traveled extensively for work and traveling monthly became part of who I am.\u201d Cor was a corporate executive when Kandes met him and later a real estate brokerage and investment entrepreneur, and also traveled quite a bit professionally. <\/p>\n

Cor was born in the Netherlands; thus Kandes and Cor\u2019s affinity for HAL. However, HAL wasn\u2019t their introduction to cruising. Kandes\u2019 introduction to cruising was in December 1998 on Royal Caribbean Grandeur of the Seas. \u201cIt was our first cruise; it was a President\u2019s Club event for the company I worked for. I was Vice President-Marketing, and I hosted the trip. The President\u2019s Club was a sales incentive for the company\u2019s sales force where the top sales people were awarded a weeklong cruise with senior management for reaching certain objectives for the year. For me, because I did corporate events and meetings, it was a work week.\u201d <\/p>\n

So unlike many first time cruisers, Kandes didn\u2019t take to cruising right away. \u201cIt was fun, but I didn\u2019t think I would ever go on a cruise again.\u201d If only she knew\u2026.<\/p>\n

Kandes second cruise, in January 2002, was her introduction to Holland American Line, and she never looked back. Their Dutch travel agents invited Kandes and Cor to join them along with their children and grandchildren for their 40th anniversary celebration cruise to the Caribbean aboard HAL Veendam. Cor had first come to the United States as a foreign exchange student, and the travel agents operated the agency that Cor used to arrange travel between the States and home. \u201cBecause my husband is from the Netherlands, they wanted us to experience the ship heritage, culture, artwork, food and customs.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"Kandes<\/a><\/p>\n

Unlike her first cruise, The Veendam resonated with Kandes. \u201cOur friends who invited us owned a chain of travel agencies, and when they took us on a cruise it was more fun because they are travel agents, it was vacation as opposed to work, and I had my family with me. So it was different. And it was a Dutch cruise line which was my husband\u2019s heritage. So, they made a special arrangement where they had a big table every night for the group, they arranged excursions, we went to the shows; our hosts made sure that we got the full value out of that cruise.\u201d <\/p>\n

Now Kandes was hooked! I said, \u201cIt sounds like that second cruise left an impression on you.\u201d Kandes responded, \u201cYes! We said we are going to do this again. Soon!\u201d And they did, later in that same year. That began a series of cruises \u2014 some just Kandes and Cor, and many with their children \u2014 all on HAL. After that first Royal Caribbean cruise, Kandes never cruised on a cruise line other than HAL… <\/p>\n

…\u201cThe turning-point of my life was when we had the opportunity to take a 50-day cruise in November\/December 2005 on HAL Statendam from San Diego to Sydney, Australia. It was a dream cruise, a once in a life-time event. We met other professional couples that shared our same interest. There were a lot of sea days and we had dinners, parties and lived the life.\u201d<\/p>\n

I asked Kandes what the circumstances were surrounding the 50-day Statendam cruise; I was curious about her referring to it as \u201can opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were working; both had careers and were working all the time, and we had kids in school. So, the only time we could cruise was Christmas, New Years, and Spring Break. The corporation I was working for … we were selling the company. We had done all the work and now were in what the corporate world refers to as the quiet period. [Technically, the period as regulated by securities laws that prohibits corporations from divulging certain information to the public.] There\u2019s nothing I could do \u2014 can\u2019t do an advertising campaign, no marketing, no press releases, nothing. I\u2019m a Vice President of Marketing and I couldn\u2019t carry out marketing. So, there was nothing for me to do. I\u2019m the person that works all the time. I love my work; I am always working; I never took time off. So I asked if I could take my unused vacation. I had all this vacation accrued because I never took off, I took it to go on this 50-day cruise.\u201d… <\/p>\n

…A few weeks after the cruise, Kandes left the corporate world. <\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

Kandes\u2019 children are adults now. They are committed HAL cruisers \u2014 they are all HAL Mariners, each having attained 100 sea days before they were out of high school. For one, Kara, Kandes\u2019 middle child, HAL will forever be a part of her life and not just because of the indelible memories of spring break cruises and Christmas and New Years cruises and \u201cgrowing up HAL.\u201d <\/p>\n

In October 2018, Kara was married on a Mexican Riviera cruise on the bow of HAL Eurodam. That wasn\u2019t quite the original plan though. Kandes had planned for over a year a storybook destination wedding for Kara with the ceremony for 40 guests at a stop at Puerto Vallarta. However, Hurricane Willa, which peaked as a Category 5 hurricane with winds of 160 mph caused Eurodam to be diverted and bypass Puerto Vallarta.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were on the Eurodam with our whole family; we had this big group with us. We had a near tragedy of the whole itinerary being changed and the wedding ceremony in Puerto Vallarta being cancelled, and Holland America was unbelievable in what they did to correct the problem or handle the situation. I had a binder with every detail of what we had planned to do on land, and HAL reproduced the whole ceremony down to the programs on each seat, flowers and music, on the ship. And it was beautiful.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"wedding<\/a><\/p>\n

As a result of an amazing effort by the Eurodam officers and crew, Kandes, Cor and the newlyweds, Mr. and Mrs. Guerry, and guests experienced a fairytale wedding. A post about the wedding is on the HAL blog at Hollandamerica.com\/blog<\/a>.<\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

A year ago Kandes created Sea of Glamour. The name of her blog combines Kandes\u2019 love of the sea with hints of her past life as a beauty pageant winner. She is the former Mrs. Southwest for the Mrs. Globe organization. Kandes likes glamour and feels it fits in well with cruising and traveling \u2014 thus the name, Sea of Glamour. She notes that more importantly through her past life in pageants she worked with some important causes and is the spokesperson for a charitable organization called Women In Need. I asked Kandes about her motivation for starting Sea of Glamour. She told me, \u201cPeople who were first-time cruisers were asking me: \u2018Where do you like to go? What were your best trips?\u2019 They know that I cruise all the time so it was natural they would ask me those kinds of questions. Then they booked their cruise and they want to know what each of the ports is like: \u2018What do you wear? What do you do? How does it all work?\u2019 So, I started a blog. And then I added Instagram<\/a> because I wanted to post fabulous pictures from great places.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kandes is happy with the blog and Instagram and is pleasantly surprised at how many followers she has garnered already. She laments that with the cruise lockdown she has little to post right now. <\/p>\n

Thank you to Paul for allowing us to run a portion of the chapter. Be sure to check out his book and read more about Kandes on her blog. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Paul Thornton, author of \u201cThe Joy of Cruising\u201d, has a new book out called \u201cCruising Interrupted\u201d, and in it he features Holland America Line guest Kandes Bregman. Paul and Kandes have granted us permission to share an excerpt of Kandes’ chapter to give a glimpse into her passion for cruising and Holland America Line. Enjoy the segment, and then be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1876,"featured_media":60821,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,40],"tags":[4191,4196],"class_list":["post-60820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life-on-board","category-whats-new","tag-cruise-ship","tag-experiences"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1876"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60820"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60820\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67996,"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60820\/revisions\/67996"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60821"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hollandamerica.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}