sharkster77

Even if your cabin isn't ready yet you will have access to both the dining room for lunch and the lounge to hang out. When your room is ready someone will find you. It's that simple. When we checked in for our cruise in 2019, someone just asked for our names. Nobody even looked at our passports to verify we were who we said we were. I believe we were free to come and go as long as we were back for a 4:30 safety drill.

We found it interesting that in the Basel train station, males paid less for the rest room if they "stood rather than sat", if you get my drift. Wife thought that was unfair--we had a good laugh over he feigned indignation.

Agree 1000%, we do this for land tours as well. Just makes things more relaxing, having a day to chll out. Also agree re: cruises, we are not arriving early for our tulip cruise next month, because the ship does not sail until the late day 2 or the early day 3 (day 1: arrive, day 2: tour Amsterdam, day 3: sail)

The new itinerary bypasses Ghent, which is a slight disappointment. I believe the ships used to dock in Ghent, and passengers were bussed to Bruges for either a half day or full day. We had hoped to spend a half day in Bruges and see Ghent for the other half. Having recently discovered my Belgian heritage, I hoped to see as much of Belgium as I could. Oh well....

OK, I just didn't get the 'landscaper' reference---have never paid much attention to what they wear, not many of them in the rural area where I live--I know that when I do yard work I don't wear my Sunday best! I would say that the 'preppy' look of chinos, oxford shirts, maybe a sweater, mabye with a sports jacket, has stayed somewhat in style and is accepted pretty much universally for casual office wear, in-classroom wear, etc. I have seen that style in the 70s and still see it today. I find that look for men totally appropriate for dining on a Viking river or ocean cruise. I 'think' you do as well, but it's tough to judge one's tone in a message post.

Also, the choice of included excursion is either a walking tour of Nijmegen or a visit to Arnhem, which includes the Airborne museum and Operation Market Garden. The is a more in-depth tour dealing with Operation MG, in the afternoon (optional, at additional cost).

At a work-related conference, sitting down to lunch, we all introduced ourselves--one man added to his intro, "I have to let you all know (the US president at the time, will not name him here) is a communist!!!!" OOOOOOOOOOOOKKKKKKKKKKKKKK, I then stayed as far away from this guy as possible for the rest of the conference.

Agree totally with you. Big jump though, from "you can't make me wear a suit" to wearing a robe w/o pants in public! I'm often amazed at what folks wear to church, TBH.

Aquarium class may be 150 sf, but some of that is the bump-out under the windows, which creates horizontal storage space but no floor space (unless you are able to walk across the top of the bump-out!). I think in a French balcony, the floor space just in front of the balcony window replaces the bump-out. If the floor plans of the two rooms are drawn to scale, the actual floor space (interior) in both rooms appears to be about the same.

Are the men's pants that you're referring to chinos/khakis? I find that chinos with an oxford shirt, and maybe a sweater totally appropriate. I don't find that to be egregious at all. If not, what kind of "landscaper's garb" are you talking about? Just looking to understand. When I want to be dressier than just wearing jeans, I get a pair of chinos out--I wore them for teaching for 40 years.

I tend to identify very very quickly those who believe their politics are the ONLY correct politics and cannot wait to "straighten me out", and I will avoid them like bubonic plague for the rest of the cruise or tour. Often, someone will ask what state we come from, and if they instantly make assumptions about us based on that, that person joins the avoid-list.

We have an interesting situation. After we booked our flights with Viking, our travel agent went ahead and selected our seats (aisle and window). We then got a notice a few months later from Viking that our booking had changed and we were now in the middle section of the plane. MVJ displays this--middle seats. FYI, the equipment did not change, still same make and model of plane. The travel agent, when we mentioned this to her, went to the airline website and looked up our booking. The airline still, even to this day (we fly in 5 weeks) shows us booked in to the aisle/window seats. I guess we will find out the truth when we check in and receive our boarding passes!

We did our own post-excursion in Lucerne DIY, and Viking arranged for a cab to take us from the ship to the train station in Basel (of course we had to pay for it, but they handled the arrangements).

I forgot to add that the night we had the German musicians board the ship while some were on the pub crawl, after dropping off the musicians and picking up the crawlers, the captain invited us to the top deck to see Cologne all lit up as we departed the city. Our latest night---we probably stayed up well past 10PM that night (wow)! A photo I took of the illuminated Dom is still the wallpaper on my phone, 5 years later.

The flip side of your friend's displeasure with ship swaps is that many complain if their river cruise becomes a bus trip if they are removed from a ship and never put back on one, being shuttled from hotel to hotel. Six of one, half dozen of the other, as my MIL used to say.

On our Rhine cruise almost 5 years ago, we averaged 17,000 steps per day, and I actually came home 4 pounds lighter, despite eating whatever I wanted whenever I wanted!! Yes, you are tired at the end of the day! An active, early-to-bed/early to rise vacation, which suits us just fine. We never stayed in the lounge for the keyboard player, but on the Cologne day we were leaving port late (-ish) so they picked up a trio who sang and played a history of German music program. We sailed as they sang, and dropped them off when we picked up the folks who did the Cologne kolsch pub crawl.

If you pay for Air Plus you can do your homework before talking to either Viking or your travel agent and suggest flight itineraries that you'd be happy with.

With Viking the Maginot Line structures were pointed out as the bus headed out to an excursion (can't remember which), but as far as I know Viking does not offer excursions to the Maginot Line.

After visiting the Tower of London we took the boat in the other direction, getting off at Parliament/Westminster, Easy peasy----going to/from Greenwich I would imagine is just as easy.

I envision daughter Karine Hagen, who is the face of the company in ads (along with her father), attempting to continue her father's successes after he is gone. She must own a chunk of the company, I would think.

I believe the deposits may be nonrefundable, but ARE transferable to another booking, as explained by @CDNPolar

@notamermaid, do you have any knowledge of what water issues are possible in the Netherlands? They seem to know what they're doing regarding water control, land reclamation, etc., so we wonder if they have flooding under control as well. We sail on a tulip cruise in about 6 weeks and wonder if I need to be following water conditions in the Netherlands. Thanks for all you do for these boards.

@geco, may we answer questions or provide some assistance?????????????

We were flying BOS--ZUR--AMS and were probably 3 hours late. We were held at Zurich at least 1. 5 hours (we were told that if we took off on time there would be no gates at Schipol available to accommodate us). After landing at Schipol we just sat on the runway for close to an hour, then FINALLY spent 30 minutes taxiing to a gate. Viking reps were waiting with at least 2 other couples who seemed irked that they had to wait so long for us (too bad!) We were doing a pre-cruise in Amsterdam, so instead of getting to the hotel around lunchtime, we got there around 4:30, essentially losing that first day in Amsterdam. In April we are flying BOS--AMS direct, so we hope to avoid the foolishness of 2019.

Lucky you---we must have walked 20 minutes through a shopping mall-like gauntlet of shops before finding the Viking folks. Photos we had seen showed a larger banner, but there was none, so luckily they spotted us before we spotted them. Our plane had been late, and they were just about to give up on us!! Based on prior experience, we plan on wearing the sticker in April.