CCWineLover

Yes! The “snap” was unique! Long line of locals and non-tourists is a good indication. 690 krona or $4.80 or so US. Great value. Also we all had a bit of the rye bread ice cream at Cafe Loki near the church. Unusual and very different!! Good!! loved Teykjavik. Back in 6 days.

None on our Viking Saturn. I will ask and see if it’s been retired from the whole fleet

We made it to Reykjavik this morning, docking at 10:00 AM. Wonderful sail in - docking at the far east harbor. We have 2 other ships next to us in port - huge NCL and Fred Olson (which is smaller). We dock about an hour walk from the town. But there are shuttle buses that serve all three ships. We had several buses for people to do Golden Circle trip and a very large number to go see the Whale Museum. We did the latter, which was much better than expected. We had a wonderful bus guide and a good guide in the Whale Museum. After that we went out on our own with a couple we met on Cruise Critic, while most went back to the ship. We had a great time walking around compact Reykjavik, and saw many of the sights we wanted. We stopped and had the infamous Iceland Hot Dog at the place behind the Hilton Curio. It was REALLY good, I hate to say!! I almost went and had another. 690 krone or about $4.82. Not bad. Really nice town to wander through, see some shops, and then head up the rainbow road to the church and Leif Erickson statue. Then saw a wonderful little sculpture garden - reminded me of a combination of the Rodin garden in Paris and the Oslo Vigeland gardens. Got the shuttle back to the ship and now putting the feet up to a nice Norwegian IPA!

I remember that, Joe. Fortunately: -We had come in several days early and did Barcelona on our own - great city -In Tarragona we found a wonderful port city that was not crowded and full of things to walk around, explore, and see! I wouldn't mind going back - except perhaps the trial of getting there from Barcelona Airport. We'll be heading there in February, so we'll have to see how it goes. Hard to believe Viking will still only charge $49 for a transfer.

You are absolutely correct. I do think latitude still has a lot to do with it. Just now did a speed test and got all time low of 0.61 mpbs download speed at 9:00 pm tonight, heading into Reykjavik tomorrow. Worst I've ever seen on a Viking Ship. It HAS to be that we are so far north - but then, we were on Venus last summer to North Cape, Norway and didn't have this problem. So maybe it is also the number of people who ignore Viking's request, and do streaming and face time calls, and videos. I've seen a lot of that being done (or attempted). It is what it is! Hope this posts sometime tonight!

Spoke with Jordan Smith, cruise consultant on our current Saturn cruise. he confirmed: Star Class - 10 ships Star+3 triplets each triplet roughly same features Star unique Sea-Sun-Sky Jupiter-Orion-Venus (dropped the planetarium) Mars-Neptune-Saturn Vela class - 10 ships all the same design 1st one Nov 2024 is Vela restaurants expanded 2 extra rows in MDR, Manfredis and CT, and WC planned to keep below 1000 passengers (998) several on our cruise are booking the Vela now!!

Patti - so glad you having a great cruise! What future cruise are you looking at?

Michelle - not true for us. Our past 4 cruises (2 weeks each) we could see all Chefs table meals and the dates on the date we boarded. I.e. that’s how we know all 5 menus for our current Iceland cruise.

That’s correct. Viking only plans the actual days a month in advance and that can change. on our current Saturn NYC-REY trip we have these menus in order every 3 days: Asian Panorama Scandanavian Route des Indies California Lotus

And as usual, Resly Really bad the half hour before the 6:00 dinner rush as now everyone can FaceTime with their kids. This take 20 mi utes to 6 before dinner.

Yes I know, but it’s been bad since leaving New York and I don’t think of it being that far north. In fairness it is extremely affected by number of users, as about 6:30 am it goes from good to bad and then by 7 am bad to worse as people get up and turn on their devices. Then a brief really bad spike 9-10:30 pm and then good again.

WiFi remains really bad. At times simple texts go “undelivered”. Irony: can’t even bring up Vikings own web site unless early in morning. Just did a check and it proves how dismal it is. and it is STARLINK.

Dee - he did look familiar! I’ll have to ask him. He’s quite good and much appreciated here!

Wonderful report!

Patti - hoping you enjoy the absolutely stunning sailaway from Stockholm through the archipelago!! Enjoy!!

We didn’t book with Jordan, but he’s a great guy! wonderful guitar player in Explorers this trip! Lawrence is his name and has some good eclectic songs rather than the old tried and true. good Italian Primativo on wine list. Sunny skies, another energetic fabulous lecture from Russell Lee. He’s so popular now the Star Theatre filled up at 4:09 for the 4:30 lecture! Rock Star!!! heading to Iceland.

Go for it Joe! just wish we could join you! But booked up. I’m sure you’ll do a wonderful “Live from…” !

I spoke again with Jordan Smith, our Cruise Consultant. There will be no future cruise presentations- they are phasing them out. So I asked again about the new Vela Class. Learned more. -10 Vela class to be built -1st one named Vela to be launched November 2024 and will do Norway, Scandanavia, and Northern Europe. -68 more passengers capability (34 added cabins). To make sure the 998 falls below the magic 1000 number -this means roughly 8-9 cabins per deck or roughly 4 new balconies. -important: ALL restaurants to be expanded to accommodate the additional passengers.

Thank you Andy! Great info, as always.

Another wonderful sea day! So relaxing! So much to do and so many choices so just going to the beach. Roof and windows closed, sun out, and seas easy so it’s really like a resort at the beach! Mai tais!!

Andy ( @Heidi13 ) had posted recently a great explanation of the different ship ratings. Hope he sees this since I can’t remember where I saw his post!

Just attended a wonderful genealogy workshop by Gail Nigh Lee in Torshaven Lounge. It was a huge success! More people than could fit so CD Verity Brown said it would be done again tomorrow. Fantastic job by Gail to our absolutely packed house!

Monday at sea - lots of activities scheduled today by Viking staff! todays Viking Daily.

It was indeed pretty crowded - they had the balconies of deck 2 and 3 packed as well. It reminded me, Maria, of the Christmas caroling party you, Mike, and we were at for the Star last Christmas! Nice to see and quite well done. See my answers regarding the Vela class. No mention of restaurant expansion as well. I do agree - I very much dislike the 737 seating for parties of 2 at the MDR. We won't go there unless we are with other people - and even then, it is still very slow service for us (on this trip too). It's OK if you plan for a dinner of 2 1/2 hours.

So I spoke with the Cruise Consultant, Jordan, this evening and got a lot of information. Yes, the next 10 ships will be part of the "Vela" class and will all be the same, with the new propulsion systems. Vela will be the first, out fall 2024. There will be 998 max passengers. The ships will be exactly the same but a bit longer. As he said, think of the "stretch" airplanes in the past. Makes it easier for design. The Star class, finishing with Saturn, is complete. There will be no more. They built them in triplets after the unique "Star". Each triplet had similar designs in the small aspects. Sea-Sun-Sky then Jupiter-Orion-Venus (which originally was to have planetarium but it was dropped); then Mars-Neptune-Saturn. Jordan said you can book the Vela cruises now. It will be taking the place of Venus in the Norway and Mediterranean itineraries and Venus will join the Jupiter and Orion as the Southern Hemisphere ships. Hope this is of interest to folks!