Empires of the Mediterranean 20-29 March 2018

Booked this cruise with the Ultimate Italy: Tuscany and Classic Greece pre/post add ons. Would like to know if some out there has a PDF of the Viking Star Daily of this itinerary and feedback on the pre/post trip extensions. Thanks!

I have quite a few of these for our "Empires" cruise in Sept. 2015. Take a look at the end of this photo gallery and you'll see them: (ignore the stuff at very end on Norway): http://www.pbase.com/roothy123/viking_star_&page=all

If you want to look at my photos, just try to then get yourself back to the page which lists each "gallery." I believe I made a gallery for each city we visited (Venice, Kotor, Dubrovnik, etc.)

We mostly took Viking's included tours, with one non-included tour in Athens, plus did our own thing in a few ports. I thought Viking's included tours were pretty good considering that they had to be provided for up to 900 people in one day! The optional tour we took (Temple of Poseidon) was worthwhile. I felt the included tour in Athens was a little "light" but there's only so much you can do for up to 900 people in a big, complex city like Athens. The included tour in Santorini sounded a little light, too, but I can imagine that keeping a large group of people together for a walking tour in the town of Fira (Thira?) would be difficult, and getting a bus into many places on the island a bit difficult too. Therefore, I suspect options for a nice included tour for 900 were a bit limited there. The included tours in the Turkish ports were great, but I don't know if Viking goes there any more. Most cruise lines have stopped going there, which is really a shame.

Anyway, hope the Daily papers are useful. They're a little old by now, but at least you can get an idea of what the cruise was like in the fall of 2015.

We did this cruise in Aug 16.

We also did the paid Temple of Poseidon in Athens, along with the Santorini tour that included Oia.

We chose 3 tours from outside companies ....

Kotor- 10 hr day .. up to Mt Lovcen NP with a walk to the mausoleum (brilliant) as were the views down to Kotor Bay, back to our Lady of the Rocks, Perast & then a walk around Kotor.

Zadar- Zrka NP by car & then boat into the park. Really beautiful place

Koper- visited Postnoja Cave & Predjama Castle. Excellent as well.

We chose these 3 as private tours as we had more time to explore without having wait for a bus load of passengers. Viking did have a derivative of these tours but were more expensive (not that this was a factor). All were around €90 p/p and included all NP fees, boat charges & 1 lunch.

The remainder of the tours we did the included Viking Tours.

Great stuff! Really helps and gives us some idea about the ship. I really appreciate the info. The Viking Office said they could not provide it.

Great stuff! Really helps and gives us some idea about the ship. I really appreciate the info. The Viking Office said they could not provide it.

Just remember that Viking is always changing things. So what you see on roothy's dailies is already two seasons out of date and may not be part of your 2018 schedule.

Fitzall, would you share the tour companies names of your optional tours? These look good to me.

This will be our first Viking cruise and are used to booking our own small group tours.

Thanks, Margee and Bill

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Fitzall, would you share the tour companies names of your optional tours? These look good to me.

 

This will be our first Viking cruise and are used to booking our own small group tours.

 

Thanks, Margee and Bill

 

 

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Greeting from Australia, Margee & Bill

After doing our research, we chose 1 company from each port. Looked at what they offered & emailed them with our preferred requirements (including how long we had it port) & they came back with what they could provide. i.e we didn't have to do exactly what their tours said.

As there's a number of 'town' tours included on the cruise, we wanted to get out in to the countryside in some ports.

All 3 were waiting for us when we docked & had us back at the pier with time to spare.

Koper - we did Prejama Castle & Postojna Caves (tours of both) via Ishranka d.o.o travel agency. Part of the Caves guided tour is done by underground train. For the Castle tour, we did self guiding. Cost of this tour included entrance fees for the Caves; I think we paid a minimal fee for the Castle .... but both were well worth it.

Zadar - would have liked to do Plitvice Lakes NP but it was a bit too far to really enjoy it. Settled on Krka NP

which we were told was equally as good. Couldn't agree more! Magnificent. Here we used Zadar Guided Tours ... only a small company but very welcoming (& knowledgable). All entrance fees, boat etc included.

You drive to Skradin & catch a boat into/out of the park. The guide takes you through and then supplies a lunch pack before heading back to Zadar. We reduced the time for lunch & free time so they could give us a quick tour of Zadar before boarding the ship. I think we had to pay a 10% deposit on this one.

The Viking equivalent has you bussing into the park ... the boat trip was a nice touch, and I suspect the walking tour was longer than Viking as there were a few ups & downs.

Kotor - (make sure you're on deck for the sail in - fantastic). Here we used Adventure Montenegro. (Don't get put off by the name ... we're in our 60s) As we had many hours at this port, we decided to firstly go up to Mt Louvcen NP (27 switchbacks) .... great road! plenty of photo ops. At the top, you then climbed up numerous stairs to the mausoleum, and stunning views.

Then returned down the mountain to Perast & caught a boat to Our Lady Of The Rocks for a guided tour... really good as well. Back to Perast for free time (lunch), then to Kotor for a quick tour. All entrance fees etc included.

As previously mentioned, the price was around €90 p/p on each tour, and all were well worth it.

If you google the sights listed, you'll get a an idea of what to expect. Hope this is of some help.

Michael

If Adventure Montenegro is booked, you could try Tours by Milo. 4 of us arranged a 4 hour tour with him in 2015 and thought he did a great job.