BluebonnetTexan

I’m sure someone will reply here, but you might want to go check current and past roll calls for info, too. 

So glad to see that you successfully visited the Faroe Islands. Seems like most posts I see related to this port are misses. Looks like a very interesting stop. Thanks for chronicling your trip. 

@CurlerRob good point. I wasn’t thinking about the need to access sites with 2FA in the at sea scenario, but plenty of sites give you the option to setup both an email and a text option to select at the time for whichever is most efficient for you. And, you should be able to easily turn off 2FA on sites as well. With all the data breaches and password leaks, something has to be done to better secure authentication because too many people reuse passwords and have weak passwords. I’ve used a password manager for years, but too many people don’t. Wish I had a one-size fits all solution to this problem! And, yes, what Viking is doing isn’t actually 2FA if I understand it correctly. Again, I haven’t tried yet to login to MVJ, it sounds like they are just providing an emailed code as an alternative to using your password. 
 

I can’t stand to do email on any device other than my laptop. I finally gave in recently and enabled it on my phone and iPad as an emergency backup though.

I do like 2FA, but want it to send a text instead of email. I haven’t tried to login to MVJ yet after these reports hoping Viking will make a change and we are months away from our next trip. I know of another site with the behavior I’m seeing described where a code is automatically emailed, but then the option to use your password is presented. I think this is very confusing personally. It’s frustrating to hear I may be dealing with the same issue now with Viking. It does clutter the inbox unnecessarily. 
 

I hope Viking is reading these complaints and can implement a different approach soon. My career was also in IT like many others who’ve already commented. I know it can be implemented better! 

I just read about this yesterday on a blog post about a different cruise line’s beverage package. That person specifically mentioned Spain and Italy as charging VAT on cruise ship drinks and packages not pre-purchased before boarding. So, if your friends want to buy the SSBP they should do it in MVJ before leaving for the cruise, instead of waiting until they board to add it. 

I think once you buy a bottle it’s yours to do with as you wish. 

Watching the Scottish Open and just saw a familiar ship shape passing off the coast…checked Cruise Mapper and sure enough it was Viking Neptune! 😁🥂

On 7/12/2024 at 7:58 AM, surmy555 said:

Are there options to do either of these tours independently in case they are fully booked ? Any recommendations?

We did the Viking Iconic Iceland, Greenland, and Canada last year and used independent tours in several ports, including Akureyri. The tour we did there was pretty close to Viking's Northern Treasures. You can find my "almost live" CC posts here: 

I also have more details and pictures on my personal blog - you can find all of that trip's posts here: http://notesbynancy.com/our-trips/2023-viking-ocean-iconic-iceland-greenland-and-canada-trip/

14 hours ago, rmalbers said:

That's to bad. That is fairly protected there so the wind must of been just wrong for it.  Great excuse for a do over.

Except it isn’t protected where the ship has to station itself and the tenders operate in open water. Once the tenders get into the harbor, yes, it’s more protected, but big ships can’t get in. 

@PRH happy to hear you made L’Anse aux Meadows! All the sailings last year missed for various reasons, including ours. But we did make the two scheduled Greenland ports.

@Clay Clayton replying here so it will go back to top of threads for you to post your new promo. 

@photopro2 Thanks for starting this thread. I totally agree with the majority here. The “expectations” options have no clear baseline and indeed clearly change for most people after their first cruise with Viking. Like many here, my expectations on our first cruise were what I’d call “optimistic” for a great experience. Viking actually surpassed my expectations on that trip (Grand European River) and consequently my expectations on future cruises have been extremely high and based on that it is now hard for Viking to exceed my expectations. Thus, I’ve written a comment to this effect on our surveys since. Really wish they’d change the format to allow poor to excellent choices for everything. 

I don’t know for sure, but we got the impression it was a required stop by the Turkish government for cruise ship tours! 

20 minutes ago, OneSixtyToOne said:

Go to the coop demo on the Viking tour in Kuşadası. They put on quite a show and will do the convincing for you. Low pressure, good prices, and it’s delivered to your door. 

I concur with @OneSixtyToOne. We weren’t on Viking, but went to the same coop. The tour of the factory and learning about the process was very interesting. We weren’t planning to buy either until we walked into the showroom demo and I saw all the rolled up rugs and as they were unrolling them I pointed to one further down and told my husband, “I just want to see that one”. When they finally got to it, I wished I hadn’t seen it! It was that amazing blue silk rug in the center of your picture. We were going to walk out and friends we were with told us that this really was one of the best places to get rugs and they were about to be repeat customers. So, we asked the price…as I crunched the numbers in my head and considered which credit card to put it on and how much did I really like it, they kept dropping the price. It got down to a number we couldn’t turn down given that things like this don’t normally get my attention like this rug did. It was delivered in the time frame they specified and looks great in our living room! I get to enjoy it every day and have no buyer’s remorse. 

@May B Glad to hear it! I suspect that when people called in and found out they couldn’t get the 6-month out payment that they could get any other time with a cruise already booked, then they weren’t booking with this promo. Thus, agents were told to start allowing it. We won’t book anymore unless we can get the 6-month final payment or we are booking something sailing in less than 6 months. 

On 4/7/2024 at 10:02 AM, May B said:

When that letter arrives, it emphatically states the final payment date. Perhaps you are correct that a simple request will be met with a positive response.

 

@May B Yes, it does, but we called Viking this week and booked using FV424 and requested the 6 month out final payment for an Oct 25 cruise and got it. It never hurts to ask when you have another cruise already booked. 

7 minutes ago, mwike said:

Unsolicited suggestion - make it to Krakow if going to Prague.

@mwike Good point! Makes planning a separate trip even more likely! 

4 hours ago, Peregrina651 said:

 

I LOVED Passage to Eastern Europe.

 

The Prague extension isn't long enough to soak up the city. It is easy enough to take the train from Prague to Budapest if you extebnd on your own. Or arrive a few days prior to the extension, if you opt for that route.

 

As for Bucharest, to this day I regret not having been able to extend our time there. I know.  I will just have to go again!

@Peregrina651 We plan to do our own pre and post in Bucharest and Prague - pending how many days we can add when it comes time to commit with Bucharest as the priority as we don't expect to be back anywhere near there again. We've also looked at just doing a Prague focused trip maybe combined with Berlin. Right now due to family commitments, we can't plan lengthy trips.      

Budapest is one of my favorites. I first went there on a business trip in 2015, I think, and determined that it was a place I wanted to bring my husband to visit also. We did the Grand European Viking River cruise starting in Budapest with their extension as our retirement trip in 2017. Along with colleagues showing us the town, we also enjoyed the Viking excursions and recommendations they made. We will be there again when we do Passage to Eastern Europe in 2025 and plan to spend extra days in Bucharest, Budapest, and add Prague if we can.

20 hours ago, kctwinmommy said:

I know, we have very few in our roll call for our cruise in 2 months.

You might be surprised to find additional lurkers who would want to participate in the M&M if someone volunteers to organize it and collect the info. For our roll call last year I had a few people contact me to signup via the email I provided with their info who hadn’t been actively participating in the roll call, but were following it. 

I know it was mentioned above that AVS24 was still available, but thought I'd post the current details I got in an email today for select May/June 2024 sailings: 

Offer AVS24: Offer valid on bookings made from Feb 13 to Feb 29, 2024. FREE international airfare, up to $1,000 in shipboard credit per couple & special fares valid on select May & Jun 2024 departures of Viking Homelands; May 25 & 27, 2024 departures of Iceland & Norway's Arctic Explorer; select Jun departures of Iconic Iceland, Greenland & Canada; select May & Jun 2024 departures of Into the Midnight Sun; Apr 5 & May 1, 2024 departures of British Isles Explorer. $500 Shipboard credit per person if booking a PV, PS, ES or OS category stateroom; $200 Shipboard credit per person if booking a V or DV category stateroom. Call for details. Prices are in US dollars and for US residents only. Air does not have to be purchased to get cruise/tour offer. All fares reflect cruise taxes, port taxes and fees. Additional restrictions may apply. Airfares vary on other itineraries, gateways and departures. Air offers not valid on Alaska, Hawaii, San Juan and Mexico City; call for details. Book by Feb 29, 2024. Pay in full by at time of booking. Offer may be withdrawn at any time without prior notice. Offer expires Feb 29, 2024.

13 hours ago, OUBaylor1 said:

 I have been searching Cruise Critic for information on Viking's Iconic Iceland, Greenland & Canada cruise because we are taking this itinerary in August 2024 departing Reykjavik.  This is our first Viking cruise.  We have been Celebrity cruisers for the past 27 years and decided to try a different line.  Thanks so much for your review.  I am still not quite convinced that I did the right thing by choosing Viking over Celebrity who has a similar but not quite as extensive itinerary.  Have you ever cruised Celebrity?  If so, how does Viking compare toBy the way, my husband and I are both Baylor alumni.  My husband did a Ph.d while I finished my undergraduate work at Hankamer School of Business.  Sec 'em Bears!  Ah, yes, I did my graduate degree at OU.  I am always walking a fine line when it comes to sports!

I wondered if you might be a fellow Bear when I responded to your earlier post! It’ll be easier for you to root for both teams once OU is in the SEC! Sic ‘Em! 
To answer your current question, we have not traveled with Celebrity. However, there are quite a few threads, I think, on both the Celebrity and Viking boards comparing the two. For us, we aren’t ardent cruisers. It has been about the itineraries allowing us to get either overviews of places we might like to return for more in depth travel later (river cruises, Mediterranean) or seeing places we couldn’t easily without a cruise ship (Alaska, Greenland, Iceland, Baltic) in a reasonable timeframe. As for Viking, we love the no kids, no casinos, no photographers, and low-key atmosphere. The service has always been fabulous from room stewards to the top officers. 
The IGC itinerary is challenging due to the geography, number of tender ports, and potential for bad weather. We had never been to any of the locations on the itinerary and decided to roll the dice and roll with whatever itinerary changes occurred and enjoy the trip! You won’t know if Viking is the right fit for you until you try it. Hopefully you’ll pick up some useful information from my blog of our trip and from others who have posted here about that route and Viking in general. 

We were on the NYC-Reykjavik direction leaving Aug 30, and were able to do both Greenland ports, then sailed thru PC Sound in the afternoon/evening on the way to Iceland. It was beautiful and somewhat dangerous given all the growlers and icebergs still around in September. I don’t think the earlier summer sailings were able to do this stretch.

We also docked there in September on Saturn.

28 minutes ago, janetcbl said:

“Greenland, Iceland, Norway and Beyond”, May 25, 2024-June 22, 2024. Going from Bergen to NYC. There are a number of strange things about this trip, for example no excursions listed for Reykjavik. It will be interesting to see what happens……

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No Reykjavik excursions because that is the changeover port for the B2B you are actually on. My understanding is that Viking will provide some options for those continuing to NYC during the cruise for Reykjavik. You might check the rolls calls from last year for timing. If I were you, I’d book a third party small tour Golden Circle or South Coast tour depending on time in port and not wait on Viking to book. We did the NYC to Reykjavik leg last year and stayed extra days in Reykjavik after disembarking.