CDNPolar

The search function is quite good on CC. Try putting the name of the excursion that you are considering into the search. Note that you can search "Everywhere", "This Forum", or "This Topic". I generally always stick to these three depending on where I am starting the search. If you are in roll calls, then restrict your search to "This Forum" but if you are on the main page of CC then you might search "Everywhere". Also, if the name of the excursion is quite long, and you don't get the results, just truncate the name a bit and see if you find results. Using search almost always gets me the information that I want.

You should email tellus@vikingcruises.com before and let them know you are gluten free. They will do their best to have a selection of goods for you on board. You should however be doing this 30+ days in advance. I just wrote tellus looking for Kefir over yogurt and they called me the next day saying they have already contacted the ship and if available in the countries we are sailing through they will do their best to have this on board. Possibly too late to request, but would do it anyway. The next step is to meet with the dining manager as soon as you board. Once you are on the "special menu" list they will do their best to take care of you.

It would be nice but unfortunately not much cabin inventory is available at 6 months out and what is available is generally expensive.

Ask in my work? or ask when travelling? In my work, I don't hide anything. I work as my authentic self in every country that I interact with. In that I mean that if the "relationship" with a colleague evolves to one where we are sharing anything that is personal, I will talk about my husband, or say things like "when my husband and I travelled here..." I am in learning and development and often my relationships grow over time and it is not unusual for this information to come out. From a work perspective I am also very active on LinkedIn and I support and repost 2SLGBTQIA+ material and since I am also connected to all my international colleagues, they would see this active support. I never hide anything work wise. During travel, if we are on the cruise ship and someone asks, we are honest as well. If we were on shore and someone local was asking, I would size up the situation and react accordingly. It would all depend on why I thought that they were asking. Each situation would have it's own response after assessing.

You are doing exactly the right thing and I am certain that you will not have any problems. I work directly with the Philippines, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Japan, and all these countries have rising gay cultures, but still we don't want to be "out and proud" as visitors. As you say - go with the flow. We have done private tours in China - a driver and a guide - just my husband and I. This also was not a problem for us to do because we are not PDA people anyway and although we are two men travelling together, because we are a mixed race couple I think we confuse people as to who and what we are anyway. We are also "mixed age" too and it is not uncommon for us to be referred to as father and son. Haha.

This is a very good point about airlines... we tend to book our air on our own, or probably a 60/40 split. We will take Viking's air when it is free, or reduced, or a deal over booking ourselves. Because we tend to fly Premium or Business, we are paying more and we also tend to book air at least 270 days out. Most flight schedules are out 310 days in advance and we wait for them to settle then book. We often can have 10K or more in airfare paid as much as 9 months in advance.

But does it? If you have the cash to pay as much as 12-18 months in advance, then you can book, pay, but there are no penalties - other than the $100 pp cancellation - up to 121 days in advance. If you cancel more than 120 days in advance they have to refund everything. However, probably more people that are paying that amount in advance are more serious about travelling. Our challenge is that we have friends that want to travel with us on Viking but they cannot fathom the 12+ months in advance payment, and it scares them off. We have several couples that if they could have 6 month terms on payment they would book, but because it is so far out they walk away. At least Viking could consider a referral to have the same booking payment terms as the referee? We have booked for 2025 already but because we have multiple bookings, we get 6 months payment terms.

Sorry, let me try to explain. Just on and about the ship, we don't go looking for opportunities to start a conversation with someone. Neither of us is the "outgoing" type that talks to everyone, but we are more than happy to respond and carry a conversation if someone else starts it. This is again on or about the ship. If we go to the lounge just the two of us, we sit by ourselves and chat and do our thing. The couple that we met on our first cruise together we have been friends with since and we have traveled together many times now. They approached us the first day at the bar, and it just went from there. One half of this couple is the one that talks to everyone and knows many many people at the end of a cruise. We are just very quiet. On our recent Egypt cruise, we were broken into three groups of 20'ish and this 20 was on the same bus and together with the same guide every day. It just started with good mornings being said most days because you saw the same faces everyday and as sometimes happens, everyone sits in the same seat on the bus. Conversations just seem to start to happen out of the familiarity of being together every day in a smaller group.

Actually, we are very much to each their own. We don't make "the first move" 99.9% of the time. If someone approaches us we are happy to talk and interact, and if not, then we just stay to ourselves. But, as I mentioned, when you are on excursion and you are spending 3 hours, 5 hours, or longer on a bus and in and out of sites, sometimes the conversation just starts because of the time and closeness of the situation. We will take a table for 4 in the buffet but rarely does someone approach to share. This has only happened a couple of times when the seating was extremely full. For dinner, if we are travelling alone, we ask for a table for 2. On an upcoming River cruise, we understand that all tables are share of at least 4 so we will be forced to interact. Let's see what happens! (Don't mistake the "forced" to interact comment, we are happy to)

For us, what we have found to be the best time to "make friends" is either sit by someone at the bar, or on an excursion together. When you are walking and wandering during an excursion, it seems to be the best time and place. The other thing that sometimes happens on a Viking Cruise is they have an LGBTQ+ get together one night, and I would assume that anyone that attends that would be open to meeting and chatting. We have never attended, and Viking does not always host one automatically. I think you have to ask for one to be scheduled.

Here is the deal... We have often seen other gay male couples and female couples on the ships that we have been on. We all know what Gaydar is and with some of these couples the gaydar is screaming off the charts! Haha. But we have found them "pretentious" to the point where when we have (or I have) started to make a recognition move, they will divert their eyes and move the opposite direction! To me it was obvious that they were not interested at all in talking or even making contact of any kind. You could watch them moving in and out of breakfast and lunch in the buffet area and to me it looked like they were intentionally avoiding any kind of eye contact. Fair enough... you don't want to talk, I don't need to talk to you. On our Antarctica cruise last year, we met a lesbian couple together for 30+ years and had some nice conversations with them. We chatted with a lesbian couple a few times on our recent Egypt Nile cruise, but we were in a separate excursion group with them so only came across them at the port talk or evening event sometimes.... We have made contact with many straight couples on almost every cruise that we have been on and some of these relationships have continued past the cruise, but so far no gay couples. I don't know what it is, but maybe they feel they will be more "obvious" if they are associated with other gay guys? Heck, they were screaming all by themselves.... And, I don't think that we are hidden in plain sight, but we are not obvious because of our difference in age and cultural background and we are pretty "quietly gay". Haha

We have cruised almost exclusively on Viking - both River and Ocean. We find the crew and guests very open and welcoming. We are not the party couple by any means, and although I understand those that want to travel and interact with other LGBTQ+, we don't care if we are the only ones on the ship. We have made some good and lasting friendships from Viking cruises. We generally see other gay couples on our Viking cruises as well. I will look at BrandG as I am curious now. I have never heard of this company. Last time however that I brought up with my husband travelling with an LGBTQ+ tour, his question was "What advantage would that bring us?" However, know that he is the furthest from a gay culture guy that you could possibly meet. For him, travelling with a gay based group - even if it was just a segment of the total population of the ship - would have to have an advantage to what we were going to see, experience, eat, etc., which it probably wouldn't, therefore he would probably poopoo the idea. Again - don't get me wrong, as I understand the desire to travel with a group of like minded individuals. I personally have never been on a chartered gay cruise, but have had many friends that have and from what I know of them, I don't think I would go on one even if you gifted me the full trip and it was in the Butler Suite section of the ship. Just not my thing. I am far too old now in my body clock and am generally in bed by 9:30pm as the days are so busy and full and packed with wonder of the sights and food during the day that I am exhausted by nightfall! Hahah.

You are quite sensitive. I am just stating an opinion and if you think that was a lecture, then you were mistaken.

That is what you say, but then as I said, we as seasoned travellers AVOID street food. Stick to restaurants and recommended restaurants. With out land based tour next January, we will have a local guide that will recommend restaurants that are not tourist but where our health is safe.

Street food is never recommended unless you really know what you are getting yourself in for. Often you will end up with some kind of "revenge". It might look good, but even as seasoned travellers, we avoid street food and go to a reputable restaurant.

we won’t be eating in places the cater to tourists. We have travelled all over China and Japan, and only eaten in restaurants off of back alleys and not in the middle of tourist town.

We opted for a land based tour next January through Cambodia and Vietnam. We were going to do the Mekong River Cruise, but we really wanted to experience the real and true local food in these countries. NO, it won't be as luxurious as travelling on Viking but, we will get the real food. We love that you can unpack on Viking once and just enjoy, but too wish that there could be a higher level of destination inspired food.

All I can tell you is that if your entrance to the canal is at 5:30am or 6:00am, get up at least one hour earlier and get yourself a spot on the open deck of the Explorers Lounge. You want to be front and centre for the approach with the lights before dawn and you want to experience the whole thing. The approach is slow but the view is beautiful.

Thanks for your comments! My husband produces all these on our return home. He (We) do it only for our own enjoyment and memories of the trip. We have never intended these to be "commercial" but we do now share them to a wider audience as our travel vlog. One short movie is so easy to sit and watch especially when we return home - between the two of us - with in excess of 5000 still and videos combined. I know that sounds like a lot and it is, but consider when you are taking a shot, we often take two or three to ensure we have the best to choose from. Part of it is slimming down the selection and removing duplicates and triplicates first. In the Douro one, there was in fact a Drone, but there are so many legal complications to travelling with an using a Drone that this was our first and only use of it. We had to get permission from the Portuguese government and then know and follow the rules in every area of the city and in every square... it was difficult. We had to have permission from the ship's captain too. Just about to embark on a River Cruise through Eastern Europe so the video generally takes about 60 days from our return before it is done... so end'ish of October? Oh, and other than the one with the Drone, these are ONLY iPhone stills and video. We don't use anything else. https://www.youtube.com/@lktraveljournal4554

This comment I find interesting, but perhaps because we have only sailed Viking. We are very happy with the food on Viking and we pride ourselves on our knowledge of food. We have obviously had an occasional less than adequate food item on Viking, but in general we find the food quite enjoyable and of high standards. (Especially The Chef's Table)

Not knowing for sure where the OP is from but because you mentioned Medicare, assuming you are from the USA...? I am from Canada, and we do take as little as possible in our wallets, but we have to take our Provincial Health Care cards with us as our out of country medical coverage always (in Ontario anyways) requires us to have a valid government health care number. This would need to be verified and this is always suggested that we carry the actual card and not a picture of the card. My question would be, does your out of country medical coverage require you to carry your Blue Cross or Medicare card?

Why would you assume that I am not concerned about my own hands? You are incorrect, as I am concerned with washing my hands. Washing in your cabin does not mean that you don't touch other things on the way to the dining room. I know that others don't care which is why I protect myself by washing my hands. Breakfast especially where buffet is normal, the tongs and serving utensils are the area of concern that you are touching those and then going back to your table. I want to MYSELF wash my hands after this. Think me crazy or paranoid - whatever you wish - but we wash our hands at every restaurant we go to after ordering and touching the menus and before the food arrives. We wash our hands still the minute we arrive home from anywhere out of the house. Thank you to those that see this as something serious and sharing the location of the restrooms near the restaurant.

Did I say anywhere that you were not?

Here is our channel - growing slowly. https://www.youtube.com/@lktraveljournal4554

It could be that the seats were booked through United and they don't show on the Lufthansa site. Similar situation recently when I booked for Australia, I booked the flights on the United site, but there was an Air Canada segment. (Air Canada and United are Star Alliance as are United and Lufthansa). United showed the seats for all segments but Air Canada did not show any seats. If you can actually see the bookings on both airline sites, then I would call each airline. What ended up happening for me is that I was careful to only book seats on each site for that airlines flight and not the other. This worked for me. HOWEVER, there is a poster here that is saying that Lufthansa requires payment for seats. You should take this up with Viking Air. We have found that sometimes the Viking Air reservationist is not knowledgeable and thinks they have booked your seats when they have not.