Booking Excursions and Restaurants from V1 Cabin

We are booked in V1 cabins (3 couples) on the Star from Stockholm to Bergen in September 2018. We have cruised with Viking River, but none of us has experience with Ocean cruising, ever. As we are booked in a lower category cabin, will we be at a severe disadvantage in booking included, and optional excursions, as well as dining in Alternative Restaurants? Will we have trouble booking dinner reservations for 6 of us together?

Do you think booking restrictions would impact our overall enjoyment of this cruise?

Thanks for any info.

We are booked in V1 cabins (3 couples) on the Star from Stockholm to Bergen in September 2018. We have cruised with Viking River, but none of us has experience with Ocean cruising, ever. As we are booked in a lower category cabin, will we be at a severe disadvantage in booking included, and optional excursions, as well as dining in Alternative Restaurants? Will we have trouble booking dinner reservations for 6 of us together?

 

Do you think booking restrictions would impact our overall enjoyment of this cruise?

 

Thanks for any info.

A big, huge, resounding NO!!!

As things stand now, you should have no trouble making reservations for the specialty restaurants when you board. Still, it a while until your cruise and things change over time. If you continue to follow these boards, you should be able to keep up with the flow. There are a number of topics that come up over and over again and dinner reservations is one of them.

As for tour reservations, each cabin will have to book separately. You will have plenty of time between the time the final choice of tours is posted on MyVikingJourney and when booking opens for V cabins to discuss your choices and come up with a plan, including your preference for time slots. Once you all book your tours and have gone through them to compare time slots, you can contact Viking to get their help in fixing any problems. By the time you are ready to book, you will have also read plenty of threads on this topic and will know all the secrets.

As a group of six, you might want to look into doing private tours instead of the optionals because sometimes it can be cheaper (depends on the port and depends on what you want to do). Regardless of price, for a number of reasons-- that other can enumerate-- you especially want to book a private two day tour in St. Peterburg. You can read more about private tours in all of the ports of call, especially StP, in the ports of call section, on Trip Advisor and on any of the "Viking Homelands" roll calls past or present.

We were in a V2 cabin on our first Viking Ocean a few months ago. We were not able to book restaurants online (was showing as unavailable). so upon boarding, I headed to the world cafe. There is a spot near the entrance for making reservations in all the specialty restaurants. There was only 1 person ahead of me, and I was able to make all my reservations there with no trouble. I would do this the day you get on - when we checked back later in the cruise, was not able to add another night in Manfredi's. However, the Chef's Table seemed to be more available later in the cruise.

Thanks so much to both of you for the great info. Very helpful and reassuring! We are wishing we were on the September 2017 sailing instead of September 2018!:D

 

I know how you feel. It was 2.5 years from the time we booked until we sailed but it is definitely worth the wait. Ours was a little longer since we had to wait for them to build the ship!

As already mentioned, you will find very detailed info on the CC boards to get all the info you need. We are on the Sept 2017 homelands cruise. We have booked independently (saves $$): St Pete 2 day grand tour with Alla (online site has detailed info - very reputable), Stavinger Pulpit Rock fjord cruise with Rødne (again online res very easy) and in Bergen, 1st day in port, "Norway In A Nutshell" - NIN ( a circuit tour which includes Flam railway, fjord cruise, etc, considered the highlight of Norway for many) reserved through visitbergen.com. This should get you started. Rick Steves has excellent guide book "Northern European Cruise Ports" which contains detailed info - on each port on the Homelands cruise. Enjoy your planning - as many of us do.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Ned, what time did you book your NIN tour and what time does your ship get in? Thanks!

Ned, what time did you book your NIN tour and what time does your ship get in? Thanks!

Jean: see post in forum re Viking Star Homelands 9-9-17