CCWineLover

May I say, this is such a welcome discussion and exchange of information - just like the old pre-Covid days! So wonderful not to have those depressing threads on Covid testing, quarantining etc! thanks again Clay! Food is always one of our favorite things on Viking!!

Hi Poulsbo! We were just in Seattle! we did included in Porto and you are Not obligated to go home with the rest. You can stay in town and come back on your own. Many ports Viking has shuttles also for the independent walkers to get a ride back. Check with the ship!

Hi - I get cold easily as well. yes it can get cold in various places on the Viking ocean ships - to me. We always bring a sweater to: Star Theatre (always way over ac), explorers lounge (they keep it cold on 7th floor but 8 is warmer), and the specialty restaurants. World cafe has been good temp for us. I know a lot of people onboard run hot, and with all the eating and drinking, it not a surprise. They will chime in and say Tempe was just fine or even too hot, but don’t listen. Just bring your sweaters or car jackets or whatever and you’ll be fine. Oh - Star theatre so cold Viking even has blankets for people!!! Enjoy your cruise!

Thank you! This is an amazing compilation. Will be pasting and saving it.

3 days and you’re already complaining. My experience is on a 2 week cruise it has been halfway or more. If you reach day 13, I’d worry. here’s an idea, why not ask the Viking restaurant staff when it might be coming? They would likely know more than us cruise critics! enjoy your wonderful cruise!

Real? Not a typo? Wow. Oh - I just looked it up. It is $25 deposit, but cruise is still $7K + for a Veranda pp and $1399 air.

Peregrina - you are so right! COVID must have given me a brain fade - I had forgotten about that since it has been well over 2 years ago! 🙂. I do remember all the invitations going out. So, maybe there would be a way to have people "reconfirm" their planned attendance, perhaps by dropping something back off at Guest Services. I imagine lots of the no shows come from 1) people who forget what day it is or 2) they find something better to do and figure no big deal. Both of which are not good. I guess we've been lucky on our cruises that we've had some good people who are prompt and conscientious and who considered attending this private party an honor and a privilege.

Clay - on each one of our four pre-COVID ocean cruises on Viking, we had the same experience - very well attended! We had them all in the Winter Garden as well and it was overflowing! And the drinks and appetizers were flowing as well. All of them were great parties, ranging from perhaps 40 to 90 people. However, I have heard of reports on other cruises where very few show up and it was embarasing for those who did, as Viking had all this food and drinks and hardly anyone there. My guess is they won't be back until at least 2023 - and perhaps they could set it up so people could sign up for them ahead of time. Even with no-shows, that would at least give them an idea of how many people might attend, and solve any attendance issues.

This thread has way too much life - way more than it deserves. Let's all move on.

We are looking at this for 2024. To us the question is would we rather finish in Istanbul or the disaster that has become Venice? Learning towards finishing in Venice. At least jet lag will be gone.

This is great everyone! We should with everyone s experience be able to come up with a complete historical list! Would be great to hear from the early worl cruisers and also that very first ocean year of 2015 with the Star, if people saved any menus!!

So sorry to hear. Viking would likely cancel only if they couldn’t find tour operators. We’ve had excursions cancelled and then try to find our own but there aren’t any. Wishing you luck! viking seems to be very bad at notifications of financial transactions. Last few cruises I noticed some unusual credits. No notification. Turns out Viking is now “refunding” money by auto applying a travel agents OBC to paid for excursions. Bizarre. They claim their system now does that.

This is certainly not always the case. Sometimes you can't see the menus until you get onboard the first day. If you know someone of the same ship on the exact prior itinerary, you can ask them what their menus were. That will give you a rough idea of what you will see, but not totally. About all you will know is you won't start with the menu they finished with. I spoke with them on our Nov/Dec cruise and they told us they draft a rough menu schedule each calendar month, but it can and does change. For example, for our cruise coming up July 15, we never saw any menus, and even after we booked, they just keep saying sample menus coming soon. That is why it probably is pointless to plan out which menu is on which day. Just get it set up on the app on day 1.

We've done both Barcelona and Rome on our own and thoroughly enjoyed them. Quite easy to do and easy to navigate around. We did the Rome-Barcelona cruise last November - great cruise and wonderful itinerary. We did 4 nights in Rome and 2 in Barcelona (wish we'd done 3 or 4). So much to do and food is such a wonderful part of each of these classic cities! Or you could do Paris, as you had wanted to, and then do the cruise - or vice versa.

Not totally true. Every ship we've been on does rotate - have seen 3 and 4 days of one menu. But they certainly do not rotate between 21 menus - at least not in the last several years. Again, my premise is they have "executed" 21 different menus, and may have many in "storage", but are not actively serving every one of those 21.

Clay - maybe they meant that there have been 21 menus since Ocean Cruising began in 2015. I doubt there are 21 menus in current existence. These above we've all seen, except #10. Can't think of others. We've been on multiple cruises in the past year and haven't seen anything beyond what you've listed.

Sounds like someone is just upset with their decision and all they want to do is VENT! Sounds like someone should just cancel and move on. Speaks with hyperbole about old points and says many substandard practices but lists only 2 - of which they are all debatable. I suggest people scroll past this thread after reading it for what it is. Signed - veteran cruiser

We are on Venus July 15. This means we board in Greenwich July 15. There are some tours that go out that evening. You STAY onboard the ship the first night. We leave Greenwich on July 16. There are tours on the 16th and the schedule shows us leaving Greenwich at 3 PM. Your own schedule should tell you exact time that you leave Greenwich (or planned time). As someone earlier said, the confusion likely is because Viking refers to it as "London" Netting it out, you spend your first afternoon/evening/night onboard, stay onboard the next day and leave in the afternoon of the next day. No hotel involved.

You nailed it. Our thoughts exactly. These were our experiences too, and we are not a troll. Not sure why someone is so vile against your comments (calling you a troll) . . . It really comes down to everyone's personal opinions and experiences. There is no right or wrong - just understand what the various experiences will be like and make your own decisions.

I agree - don't wait to book premium or business class. In addition, the way prices are going up, as soon as you book them, you get the current price. If you wait it will likely be higher. However, I'm confused - my TA told me to contact Viking Air directly to communicate my preferences since it would be much quicker and easier than having an intermediary (were they just not wanting to do it?). So I did and it was simple and quick. Don't think there is a rule that the TA "has" to do it. "Others report that if you booked veranda or higher cabins that V gives special price discount for air upgrades" The lowest cabin on Viking is called "veranda", so this can't be correct. I also have never gotten price discounts based on cabin and we've had Veranda, DV, and PV rooms. So perhaps you mean that if you book the Suites or higher you might get discount. Would be worth verifying.

Yes, determined by the Cruise Line. I would ask them, not Cruise Critic. We were on Viking, and soonest we could board was 11:00 AM once and another time it was 1:00 PM. So it also depends on the specific itinerary among other things.

I had to laugh - on our Ocean cruise (in Norway even!) in April, we saw two people in their bathing suits (and a TShirt) at the World Cafe. They went to get the cold cuts/salad stuff and you could see the water dripping down on the floor. Absolutely bizarre!! Wouldn't want to sit in their seat after they left, that's for sure! Sounds like we definitely are off and running!! oh - and in Norway, can't they turn the sun off a little earlier in the evening?

Sometimes Ocean ships we've been on had 2 evening shows - one at 9:00 or 9:15 and an additional early one at around 6:15 or so. Previewing the next day's activities: we would get the next day's daily in our rooms when we got back from dinner. However one time I was down at the excursion desk at around 6:00 and they had some copies there. Also, the CD tapes a TV show about next day's activities and it was available in the evening - not sure what time though. He would tape it in the afternoon from various places on the ship, which you could recognize. Just curious - at what time do you need to know about next day's activities?

Hi Lorna. I think the nice travel pouches disappeared with COVID. (Cost cutting). Still get luggage tags. In fact, we get 2 each for every cruise, and even 4 for Back to Back. Since we only use one apiece per cruise, we must have about 10 of the luggage tags sitting around 🙂 Still have the old travel pouches though - they are great for carrying certain items.

Thank you for the nice comment! I am sure that you will thoroughly enjoy your cruise! But what a distance to fly! We love traveling too and we are targeting Athens to Istanbul in 2024. You will enjoy the Med coast - we did Rome to Barcelona. Very much enjoyed Nice/Eze/Monte Carlo (we did the all day optional excursion), as well as Montpelier (we did the wine home/castle optional tour - fabulous for wine lovers!), and of course you can't say enough about how great Barcelona is! I seem to remember you Melbourne boys were planning the Southern Crossing (Buenos Aires-Barcelona) at one point. Likely you got cancelled like we did! We rebooked for Nov 2023. Come join! Thoroughly enjoy Melbourne (and Australia). Cousin in Perth so we've been way out there a couple times. Have enjoyed our wine tastings in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Margaret River. We like wine!