Heidi13

OMG!!! not again. Here is the FAQ from the Expeditions Cruises During the day, dress is casual—slacks or jeans and comfortable shoes/boots that are appropriate for excursions/landing or enjoying the ship. Swimsuits, brief shorts, cover-ups and exercise attire should be reserved for the Fitness Center and pool areas. There are no “formal nights” in the evening; evening dress is “elegant casual” for all dining venues, performances and special events. On these occasions, required attire for ladies includes a dress, skirt or slacks with a sweater or blouse; for gentlemen, trousers and a collared shirt. A tie and jacket are optional; jeans are not permitted. The evening dress excludes the World Café, where the dress remains casual, including jeans and boots, after 6:00 PM. The Viking "Rig of the Day" is self-explanatory. If you don't wish to dress appropriately for dinner, you can go to the World Cafe. Otherwise, Carnival & NCL, etc will happily accept your custom.

Since the ship sends the pax manifest to Canada Border Services prior to the ship's arrival, all the Immigration checks are complete prior to the ship's arrival.

One reason is it cost money in fuel to move all the extra victuals, if they purchase way too much for a cruise.

For the 2020 WC, they released the shore-ex really early around late March 2019, or about 9 months before departure. Certainly, this was a special case, as we booked the 2nd half of the 2019/20 Ultimate WC, and the cruise actually started at the end of August. With departure early January, the World Cruisers 2nd half L/A to London) started booking shore-ex from the end of July, with our date in a DV being end of August. The pax on segments could only book shore-ex based on the normal dates in advance of departure for their cabin class. Therefore, the full World Cruisers could review and book shore-ex before any of those pax booked on a segment. Even World Cruisers in a "V" cabin could book before a pax in an "ES" on the first segment. The 22/23 WC is not following the same pattern, as we still don't have any shore-ex published for review and it starts in Ft Lauderdale in 6 months. However, MVJ and the pax statement indicates that in a DV cabin, we should be able to book shore-ex on 17th August.

We were in a DV4 on our last cruise and had no issues getting the shore-ex we wanted.

Viking tendering is vastly superior to Princess, and I should know, having experienced both sides of the Princess process. Tender Set-Up Many cruise lines use pontoons alongside the ship, which are lowered from above, or fold out from the hull. They also have narrower external stairs down to the platform from the Uppermost Continuous Deck. The tenders dock alongside the pontoons, rather than the actual ship. This all takes time to set up. Viking bring the tenders directly alongside the ship, at one of the Shell Doors, so the set-up time is considerably less. Viking has a wide internal staircase from the Uppermost Continuous Deck (Deck "A") to the boarding location. Lots of room on the stairs for crew to assist. Tendering Process Viking do not provide any queue jumping for higher category cabins and since they have no loyalty levels, that isn't available either. If on a Viking Shore-ex, you are normally requested to meet in the Star Theatre, at the time stated on your ticket. When they are ready for your tour or group, you are escorted to the aft stairwell, where you can take the stairs or lifts down to Deck "A". On clearing the security desk, you descend a single flight of athwartships, internal stairs which takes you to a level platform at an external Shell Door. The tender is secured alongside the ship and at the same level as the deck. Therefore, it is an easy step across a narrow gap to the tender. Crew are available to assist and steady you during the transition. If going ashore independently, you are asked to meet in the Living Room Bar. A crew member relays numbers to the tender officer. When they have space on a tender, you are requested to head down the aft stairs. In Bay of Islands, our group of 8 on a private tour waited only 5-10 mins, getting aboard the first pax tender. The entire operation is very safe, and they have lots of crew to assist. What is more important, in the critical transition or the stairs they have lots of room for crew to assist, and also hold on themselves. If the conditions are not safe, the Master will cancel the tender port and if iffy, the Bridge manoeuvres the ship to provide a lee for the tenders while alongside. Another tidbit. Tenders are also lifeboats and as such they must be capable of remaining afloat even when filled to the gunnels (Gunwhale) with water. So, while the Titanic was promoted as being unsinkable, lifeboats really are.

You really are cutting it tight, as you have no guarantees the bus will even return to the ship by the posted time. In August, ferry traffic can cause significant delays all the way into Victoria. Will the bus deviate to drop you in town, probably unlikely, but may let you off downtown. Probably best to check with the cruise line directly.

They use it to aid in verifying vaccine status. If every country had high vaccination rates and provided a Govt issued vaccination status and QR Code that can be scanned like the passport, it could probably be shut down.

How can you consider the OP's question reasonable, as the question only stated "Is there any problem using American Dollars in Canada?" The OP did not specify Vancouver & Victoria, simply stated Canada and is it a problem. A more reasonable question would have been, "Do businesses in ............ accept US dollars and what type of exchange do they normally provide" Since US Dollars are not legal tender in Canada, I can think of a few problems if a vendor accepts them. The vendor runs the risk of currency exchange and must take additional time to exchange them. US bank notes are much easier to counterfeit, since they are not changing over to polymer notes, as are many other countries. From the customer's perspective, the problem is the risk of getting a reasonable exchange rate. Personally, if customers are too lazy to acquire local currency, I would only accept them at par. The exchange rate would be compensation for me accepting the risk and the time required to exchange them.

We have used Luggage Forward, brilliant service. They send the information about a month prior to shipping the cases, including the instructions, restrictions and labels. They suggest a few days that the bags should be picked up to ensure delivery. If memory is correct, once you select the day, they provide a 3 hr window for pick-up. Driver provides a tracking number so you can track the cases 24/7. We next saw them in the cabin, shortly after embarkation.

I generally don't use the 3rd party websites that provide port information. I research the actual ports, as many of them provide cruise ship schedules https://holyheadport.co.uk/images/Holyhead_Cruise_2022.pdf http://booking.dublinport.ie/webx/

My first suggestion is to review a number of the threads comparing the Alaska cruises from Seattle and Vancouver. Seattle ships reach Alaska by sailing up the Pacific Ocean to the west of Vancouver Island. The return to Seattle is via the same routing, so you spend about 1/3 of the cruise in the Pacific Ocean. To comply with US Cabotage laws, you must also visit Victoria, but usually only for a few hours late afternoon/evening. When they experience heavy weather in the Pacific, they arrive late in Victoria, further reducing the time ashore. I worked this coast for 35 yrs and also spent 2 seasons in Alaska until the end of the season. Both years we experienced a 70 kt storm in September. Last September we experienced a significant storm off-shore, which had some ships taking shelter. Alaska is all about scenery and wildlife, if I was flying in from UK, no way I would cruise out of Seattle, wasting time in the Pacific Ocean, and most importantly definitely not in mid/late September. In addition to potential weather issues, you also have less daylight.

Since I used to work for a cruise line, I have completed many flights using cruise line air, although I've never cruised with NCL, I expect they are consistent. The cruise lines purchase bulk fares and they generally aim to find the cheapest flights available in their contract. You could be provided with direct Toronto to Iceland flights and return from LHR, but unfortunately no guarantees. Another potential issue is they often book the cheapest fare class, which often has no upgrade ability, should you wish to upgrade with points, etc. You may also not get to select a preferred airline. For additional information, I suggest checking out the Cruise Air board https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forum/77-cruise-air/

Scenic cruising aka wasting time to attain the ETA.

Reviewing the port cruise schedules, it shows Holyhead - Viking Mars Sept 17th 08:00 - 18:00 Dublin - Viking Mars Sept 18th 07:00 - 18:00

When the Star Theatre got rather chilly on Viking Sun, the crew were stationed at the door handing blankets to everyone that wanted one.

Negative, we will start a new Live 22/23 World Cruise thread.

Departing Dover, bound for Dublin, the ship will steam West through the English Channel. On clearing the Dover breakwater the Master may steer south to clear the coast, but must then alter to Stbd to join the traffic separation scheme at a shallow angle. The Westbound lane is on the UK side. The initial course is SW to a position off Dungeness, then a small alteration to a position off Eastbourne. By the time you are an hour or two out of Dover you really don't see much land. However, as Jim mentioned, you will see lots of ships. Once in the traffic lane, the ship is at least 10 - 15 miles off the coast. Been a while since I did this route, so memory is a little hazy. Past Eastbourne you really don't see much land. With respect to the best place on the ship to view the scenery, I always prefer the deck fwd of Explorers.

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The Hurtigruten coastal ships are most likely their local ferries, rather than cruise ships. While cruise ships have vastly superior manoeuvring capabilities than cargo ships, the average ferry has way more capability than most cruise ships. Cargo ships normally spend long voyages at sea, so it isn't cost effective to pay the capital cost to install the thrusters, horsepower, high lift rudders, etc to make them more manoeuvrable. It is cheaper to pay tugs for docking. Cruise ships are built for worldwide operation and may dock once per day, but on average, probably only 3 to 5 times per week. Ferries are designed to handle local waters and meteorological conditions, and can be required to dock multiple times per day. My last command docked 8 times per day, but some of my earlier smaller commands docked up to 32 times per day. Therefore, the ferries are designed to handle the local conditions and are way more manoeuvreable than most pax ships. From a cost/benefit analysis, it is cheaper to install the required horsepower and manoeuvring equipment in the ferries than it is to use tugs multiple times per day, or cancel sailings. I routinely docked in 40 - 60 knot winds with a local 550', 2,000 pax ferry, but the Viking ships would be limited to probably about 25 kts, with lots of tugs. The other factor to consider is local knowledge. Foreign ships must use local pilots, who know the local waters, but they probably don't know the local ferry terminals as well as the ferry Masters, who have docked many hundreds of times.

It is unlikely you get much, if any, noise from the adjacent lounge. It isn't overly loud, even when live music is provided. You also have a main fire zone insulated bulkhead between the cabin and the lounge.

Although you are a fair distance from Stanley Park, it is very walkable. When we stay in Vancouver, we book a condo close to Burrard and it is only about 6 or 7 miles to walk around the seawall.

In the present post-COVID world, frequent flight changes are the norm. To manage the new norm, Viking are delaying issuing tickets until about 60-days before departure, As the customer, if you wish a special deal, specifically having tickets issued earlier, you must accept the inherent risks. Viking clearly state when they issue tickets. If you don't wish to accept this risk and any additional costs, I suggest booking flights independently using points. Unless Viking provides business flights, we always book our own flights using points. No way we will book Viking Air, hoping the fare class can be upgraded to Business or First.

Been to Egypt, specifically Luxor many times. We made the trip from Alexandria every 2-weeks and had armed guards on each bus. In my experience, it is no worse than any major US city.

The percentage varies with the year. Most really intense storms are over in a day. On our last Trans-Pacific we encountered 3 significant storms between L/A and Sydney, with 2 of them in the 60 kts+ category.