chipmunkbob

We're just back from a cruise on Viking Sky and were very happy with it.  We learned that one has to plan almost two years in advance for future Viking Ocean cruises and that just isn't going to work in our lives.  Has anyone given this subject any thought?  We'd probably like a Mediterranean trip next fall; but committing to a date before spring would be really risky for a cancellation.  Are there secrets to manage this?  I'm seen some spotty comparisons of other lines in these forums; but nothing systematic. Some fellow cruisers this month said to look at Oceania.  My TA suggests Regent. Are there others to think about?  We're happy with Viking given availability.  Just not expecting availability 6 months prior to the cruise date.

What's important to us is reasonably priced transfers, reasonably priced shore excursions;  good food; included or reasonably priced ordinary wines and a good itinerary. What I don't want is casinos, formal dress nights; pushy photographers and lots of small children.  I don't need an expensive drink package for 2 glasses of wine at dinner.

Thanks chipmunkbob

We are also planning to do our own walking tour. Where was the spot where you had to meet the Viking bus? Gendarmenmarket?

Yes, that's correct; but they trained us to think of it as across the street from the only Hilton in Berlin.

One more thought while I'm on this forum. If you are doing Viking Homelands originating in Bergen, be very conscious of your flight arrangements. We were booked on British Airways from New York with a two hour connection in London Heathrow. It was booked by Viking because they offered "free" airfare at the time we booked. If that works, it's almost perfect; but the weather in NY on the day we left was horrible. We left NY three hours late and missed the only connection to Bergen from Heathrow that day. I had called Viking from JFK airport when it became obvious that we were not going to make our connection and asked what to do. They instructed me to go the BA transfers desk and they were obligated to make things good on any airline available. We did that and the British Air agent started to book us on the same flight the next day. It seems that BA and SAS have no business relationship and you can't use a BA ticket on SAS. I protested enough that the BA agent agreed to call Viking in the US (at 9:30 AM London time, 12:30 AM US West Coast) and got through. It seems that Viking had actually caught on that we and a bunch of others didn't make the London to Bergen connection and had begun the process of rebooking us on an SAS flight through Oslo leaving at 3:00PM. Not optimal, but weather happens and we got to the ship 10 hours late. We had to claim our baggage in London, explain our situation to a UK immigration officer in some detail, claim our ticket at SAS and recheck our luggage at SAS paying a 60GBP luggage fee because the new ticket didn't include luggage. I'm expecting trip insurance to reimburse that fee; but we paid it once SAS made clear that we could pay it or not get on the flight. They would not call Viking.

SAS delivered an on-time pair of flights. Viking met us at the airport. There were about 20 of us who had missed the London connection and wound up on this path to Bergen.

Lessons from this:

Weather happens. It happens more in summer when thunderstorms are frequent. Give yourself some extra time on that connection to Bergen

Bergen is far from the center of the airline universe. If you miss your connection, there's not a lot of backup. Airline working relationships seem to be less strong. British Airways was trying to be helpful, but didn't have much to work with given their partnerships. They didn't seem to accept the idea from Viking that I was their problem using any available airline

Viking was very helpful here but had no real way of contacting me. My cell phone doesn't work in England. Without BA calling Viking, I might have had a path to Bergen and not known it. Try and get a Viking phone number for the country that you're connecting in. Maybe, there is an email path here; but you never know if email is actually read.

Your travel agent might be able to help if you booked air through them; but they're likely to be sleeping when this happens. If you booked on the internet, you're stuck with what the airline will give you.

I'd consider starting in Stockholm because there are more options for a missed connection or going a day early to Oslo and getting to Bergen by bus or train if I were doing it again.

We had a good trip. We lost Saturday afternoon in Bergen for this adventure.

Thanks chipmunkbob

What did you do in Berlin?

We did the included tour which was a train ride to Berlin, a one hour overview of the city on buses and about 3.5 hours of free time. Viking chartered the train which made reasonable time going to Berlin. It was scheduled to leave at 6:30AM. Getting 600 people off a ship and onto the correct car on the train took an extra 20 minutes. They dropped some people with tours external to the city somewhere along the way; but we were at the Ostbahnhof by 9:15. You can skip the bus tour, but it was an interesting reminder of the recent history of Berlin from a competent guide ending about 10:45. Optional programs which were in the city also picked up their buses here. We followed a preplanned walking tour and had a wurst in a park beer garden. We were to meet the bus to the train station at 2:30 with a desired train departure of 3:15. Berlin is under a lot of construction and the last Viking optional tour was almost an hour late to the train station. The train was after 6:00 at the ship and it took a while to board 600 people through German security. They do wait for you if you're on a formal tour. They don't if you're on your own and don't make it to the bus pickup point on time.

From our experience on Viking Homelands in May 2017. The choice of excursions is of course personal, but here's a couple of thoughts.

The Eidfjord port is tiny and there's pretty much nothing to do there. The included tour and the simpler optional tours spend much of their time at a small nature center which isn't worth much and can't handle the crowds. I'd either take one of the more involved tours or think of it as a day at sea allowing for some pretty photography.

You have to either get a Russian visa or spend the time in St Petersburg with a tour (Viking or private). The included tour is a bus ride with a couple of photo stops. We took the canal tour plus museum tours. These do fill, so book early. I believe that you can exchange them if you see something better on board subject to availability.

There were shuttle buses at each port where the walk to town was not trivial. No tour was an option that we selected a couple of times.

We did Viking homelands starting in Bergen on May 6. The currency issue is mostly solved through the use of credit cards. I charged a bottle of water in Norway which translated back to about $3 without issue. Currency is needed for tips, restrooms and postage. Postage can be avoided by having the ship mail anything home and charging your room account. It took a couple of days to realize that this was the correct answer. Guides were happy to take US dollar bills or Euro coins. Less happy to take left over bills from the prior country. Spending Norwegian krona as a tip in Denmark got me a strange look even through it was a bigger than average tip. You may get away with using dollars in restrooms which are attended; but don't count on it. It's easier to buy a coffee in MacDonalds and get the restroom code in the case of a real need. Most venues with an entry fee provide a free, but often crowded restroom.

I bought Norwegian krona which was a mistake and Euros. The ATM in Bergen had a 200 krona minimum which was far too much and came as 2 100 krona notes. We did the rest on Euros and plastic.

All the tours in Russia came with a bag of coins for restroom entries.

Allow me to hijack your thread just a bit. We're booked on this cruise in May. One thing that I note is that we have 6 currencies in 15 days. How did you manage that? I'd hope to mostly use credit cards, but there's always the tips for shore excursions and small amounts for lunch. Did you hit ATMs for small amounts everywhere or try to use the currency for the last port or try and use dollars or euros everywhere?

Let me add one more question to the pile. We're on Homelands in May. Is it worth getting a Russian Visa and going through that process or should we simply rely on Viking provided tours as the entire experience? The travel agent advises sticking with Viking, but warns that we're tethered somewhat to the tour and can't explore on our own. The VISA cost and turnaround may be an issue also.