CDNPolar

You have to play a little bit by ear here... We leave Monday for Passage to Eastern Europe. Our itinerary map from the web site shows NO overnight in port. The legend on the Viking itinerary maps show a solid black dot vs. a white dot indicating overnight in port. BUT, often River Cruises do not sail overnight, but in the early morning or later in the afternoon after excursions come back. Often on a River Cruise, the scenery along the river banks is a "not to miss" thing so you sail when it is light. You should be able to get port and sailing times when you board, and this is important, because you may return from an excursion at 2pm and think that you can return to the city on your own to explore, but you may sail at 3pm. This will all be covered in your daily program. Always look for the back on board time each day. We have been tempted to leave the excursion sometimes and just wander on our own, so you must know the back on board time. (Always tell your excursion leader if you are walking away from the group) I would email tellus@vikingcruises.com and give your booking number, and ask ALL your questions. You will likely within 24-48 hours get a phone call from someone that will answer all your questions. If you have asked all questions in advance they will come back with better answers.

Yes - this is possible that the first night they might cruise the harbour at night, BUT, on the first day of embarkation, that would mean that every guest is on board, and often there are stragglers that arrive later than others because of flight delays etc. Where we have seen this kind of thing is when you arrive one or two days early and are in a hotel as part of the cruise package, then when you do embark the ship everyone is there.... mikem1977 - you still want to scour your invoice for the dates but also call Viking to ensure that you have the story right. You may really want to go to the Opera, but missing the night sailing may be something you would want to stay on board for...

You could do that but why would you lose any money if you did not have to? And, if you had any vouchers on the booking you would lose them where revising the booking and keeping the same booking number would allow you to keep those vouchers. This is exactly what happened to us. We booked this trip while onboard an Ocean cruise, and had a larger discount for booking onboard. We also had vouchers - to the tune of almost $2,000.00 combined. If we canceled we would lose all that. Because we revised our booking - which we had to change the dates according to Viking - then we kept all that.

I am only referring to cancellation and interruption insurance. Insurance is a complicated topic. If you have pre-existing conditions and you are insuring medical, there may be reason to insure before penalties, but that depends on the policy language. Most stable periods - most - are 90 days and penalties kick in at 121 days. But if you are not concerned about the medical coverage, and just cancelation then buying before penalty does not make sense. Now, that also means that you can only cancel for a covered reason. If you want cancel for any reason, that has to be purchased at the time of booking or relatively close to the booking. This would allow you to cancel for any reason during the 120 day period.

On Viking you can always take your own bags... the disembarkation gangway may not be smooth depending on what port you are ending in... it could be slight stairs like when you embark and disembark in various ports.

Your itinerary will tell you if you are overnight in Budapest or not. If you cannot find it there call Viking and ask.... If I have the right itinerary, then this indicates that you arrive at the ship on the 17th (day one) and you are overnight as there is a day two in Budapest. This to me would say you can do what you like the night of the 17th. All you have to worry about is what time you are boarding the ship and can you make your opera for 6pm?

Still no one likes to pay that early... but, you don't have to also pay for cancellation insurance until just before 120 days. We buy our cancellation insurance 122 days from sailing.

This is our personal video of this cruise. Our "Brand" is LK Travel Journal

This is our personal video of this cruise. Our "Brand" is LK Travel Journal

This is our personal video of this cruise. Our "Brand" is LK Travel Journal

This is our personal video of this cruise. Our "Brand" is LK Travel Journal

This is our personal video of this cruise. Our "Brand" is LK Travel Journal

This is our personal video from this cruise. Our "Brand" is LK Travel Journal

This is our personal video from this cruise. Our "Brand" is LK Travel Journal

Note however that unless you are worried about losing the deposit, you do NOT need to buy insurance to cover the amount paid until penalties kick in. Penalties in USA and CAD are 120 days from sailing. If you pay in full a year out, but cancel for any reason 121+ days from sailing, you get all your money back but $100 per person. Look at the penalties on the invoice. They just want your money up front as it deters tire kickers, but you get it all back if you cancel 121+ days in advance. Don't pay for insurance before the 121 days out.

Just to be clear for anyone reading, I am Canada, and the same rules should apply to the USA. These rules may NOT apply to UK or Australia.

We have taken advantage of this kind of change of promo before but you will have to change the dates of your cruise by a week or two either earlier or later. Here is what we did: Booked cruise with NO promotion other than $25 deposit. Months later Viking offer the same cruise with Free Air. Call Viking and they tell us that we have to revise our booking and effectively cancel the first booked cruise and book a new cruise. They would give us the free air, and "revise" the booking so we had the same booking number but we had to change the dates. Actually this is the cruise that we are leaving for on Monday. Originally we had an early September date and the only way to get the free air was moving the dates and to get the same cabin type we had to choose the dates we have. Good luck. Oh, and if one reservation agent says it can't be done, hang up and call back until you get someone that says it can be done. If all else fails ask for a supervisor, because they can do this.

We are purchasing our eSIM this weekend for 5 countries in Eastern Europe. We are testing this starting Tuesday. We will report our success as soon as we can. Since we are buying eSIM for two phones, we will change all the settings on both and then test if we can make calls to each other as WiFi calls when off the ship and on eSIM data only. Hopefully Rogers won't block this kind of setting in the future, because we don't want to completely disconnect, but we also don't want to pay Rogers $15 or $30 per day for our one or two phones. I know that the USA is a big market comparably, but our friends from Kentucky have a home in Spain and they spend around the 180 days a year there. They don't have any increase in their monthly bill, they just experience slightly slower data when out and about. When in their home, they have great WiFi so their speed is fine.

Perhaps this is only my experience, but why are wait times that long for renewal? In the 4-5 times I have flown through Pearson in the last year, there are no lines at Nexus/Global Entry at all. In fact in my last flight connecting through LA to Sydney, I was the ONLY person in the Global Entry line with my Nexus card. Actually, there was no line. I just walked straight to the machine and straight to the agent. Who are and where are all these people that are clogging up the renewal process? They are not travelling that I can see... LOL

With our Uniworld Nile cruise, we were at the Four Seasons Hotel in Cairo overnight for one night, and we accepted that as good enough in advance, but in essence it would not have been if we were severely delayed arriving. I believe that our bus left the next morning for the airport to fly to Luxor quite early. We did also have a briefing to attend in one of the conference rooms and that was for every guest, and that started at 9:00am. We would not have wanted to miss that. We tend to go one day early just to mitigate any issues. I would not hesitate to go one day early on your own, depending on what you want to do with that day. First - arrange your hotel with the same hotel as the cruise line - and if The Four Seasons or Ritz Carlton, you are completely safe. Second - arrange your transportation from airport to the hotel through the hotel you are staying at. Most hotels will do this for you, so you are assured that you are getting a trusted company to meet you at the airport. It might be a few dollars more, but worth it in Egypt if you are not 100% comfortable. Finally, I would also ask the hotel to suggest a private tour guide for your advance stay and book something again, that the hotel is suggesting. This unless you just want to hang out in the hotel until your cruise gang arrive and things get going with that. My only suggestion is that you only eat in the hotel and only drink bottled water, unless the hotel is guaranteeing their water for your safety. Don't eat or drink outside of the hotel on the first day that you are in advance of the cruise tour.

We originally booked on Viking but had to cancel because the ship we were booked on was not even launched about 9 months before our scheduled departure. This is when we decided to go on Uniworld. I have only been on the Uniworld ship, but I would do Viking just because their two ships are brand new and from what I saw sailing past, are up to Viking standards which is much higher than many of the other river ships on the Nile. My understanding is that Viking do not own these ships but they were purpose built for Viking to their standard. The Uniworld ship we were on, belonged to someone else before and although okay, we are used to a much higher standard of decor and repair. This Uniworld ship was not a comfortable ship but the beds were fine.

Well, when I say "home number" I am referring to your cell number. If you install an eSIM that is data only, and you leave your cellular network on, then your cell number will still be active and potentially racking up roaming charges.... depends on your phone, and your service.

From what I understand, if you are buying an eSIM and only using WhatsApp - which is a data app - you will be fine. The ways around is about using your home number for WiFi calling when you also have an eSIM. If you are good with your home number just going to voice mail when you are away, buy the eSIM, and ask all your friends and family to call you on WhatApp and you will be good. (Make sure you turn off your cellular data and roaming however...)

Good reminder and good warning to all. As Fouremco says, this is one of the sites that may do the job for you but at a premium cost. This is why I have bookmarked what I call the "GOES" site because that word is in CAPS somewhere in the long URL, and that is the site that I go to... This is also why I spend a lot of time when travelling to a country that requires a Visa for a Canadian to enter, looking for the countries government site that is legit. I start at the Canadian government site and then look for the country specific site. Lots of sites out there, especially for Visas and ETA's that will take your money and do it for you, but at premium cost. Worst case scenario is that it is a fraudulent site that takes your money, and your information and you get to your destination and your Visa is not valid.

We are going to try all your recommendations on our trip leaving next week. Our main goal is to NOT have to pay Rogers $15 per day to stay connected to home. We want to be able to receive phone calls from family and friends at home and not be hidden behind an eSIM that sends any calls to our home numbers to voicemail that we cannot access. We are fine to tell immediate family to reach us via WhatsApp, and have done so, but just still want the connection to the home number. We also want to be able to use our data freely to use maps and internet searches, as we are going on a River Cruise and often you are in port overnight and you want to go back into the city or town after dinner on your own. So, we have checked out your other post, written down all the settings and checked them out and know what to switch on and off and where... We are going to buy from the eSIM provider you suggested because we will be in 5 Eastern European countries and this is the only one that seems to have a package that includes all of the countries we will be in so we don't have to purchase country by country. Thank you for your patience with my questions!