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Poulsbo Cruisers

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Posts posted by Poulsbo Cruisers

  1. 1 hour ago, Krazy4Kruisin' said:

    We were also perturbed that we had to pay so far in advance. Doing that for 900 people on every cruise and every ship, they are making a FORTUNE off our money. I do feel this is totally unfair, but like the OP said, we still chose to book.

    It’s a great way for Viking to help finance all those new ships. They are borrowing from the cruisers interest free. 🤔🤔 Pretty smart since all of us cruising on Viking allow them to do so. 

  2. We did a river cruise with Vantage from Budapest to Amsterdam. It was wonderful. Next month we are doing a Rhine River cruise from Amsterdam to Basel with Avalon. Many love Viking and they may offer a great experience. Be prepared for their payment up front policy. We also found that many of their itineraries included less time on the boat and more time in hotels. (I’m not anti-Viking. After all, we have an ocean cruise booked with them.) As others have said, pick your itinerary then see which lines do that itinerary. It’s important to see which cities/towns they visit and for how long. Also how many daylight hours are spent cruising (important if you want to watch the scenery pass by). River boats all have a maximum length determined by the shortest locks you will pass through and a maximum height determined by the lowest bridges you will travel under. Therefore, passenger capacity will be based on the size of the cabins and how many cabins to common space on the boat. The experience will be quite different from an ocean cruise. You won’t find all day buffets and very little entertainment. You will get free Wifi and excursions with most lines. 

  3. We will be doing our first Viking voyage in September. We stop in Porto from 8am to 6pm. There is an included walking tour that lasts several hours. My question deals with this port as well as others. If we do the included tour are we obligated to stay with the group until it returns to the ship? Or may we leave the group at the end of the walk and make our way back to the ship on our own? It would seem like a waste to spend so little time in the city. 

  4. We are taking our first Viking Ocean cruise in September. We are looking forward to it. No, I don’t like Viking’s early payment policy, but we were well aware of it when we booked. I wouldn’t rate them of lower quality because of it. This early payment policy may keep us from sailing Viking in the future, only time will tell. We did take advantage of the echeck discount and would hope that other cruise lines begin offering this same perk. Regardless of what sales are occurring with other cruise lines, they have to pay a fee when we use a credit card. I’d love it if they would offer a further discount for cash. 

  5. 1 hour ago, karl_nj said:

    Very interesting that Viking Ocean went from one of the most conservative in regard to testing (with daily onboard PCR testing), to not even requiring a test to board the ship (except in in the US/Canada, assuming due to the CDC.)  Are they the first cruise line to not require a test before boarding the ship?

    We are booked on an Avalon cruise from Amsterdam next month. They require proof of vaccination, but not a negative test. 

  6. 16 minutes ago, crimmj said:

    But can we assume if someone actually gets sick with Covid on the cruise - the quarantine process will continue?

    I believe the policy of every cruise line is to quarantine passengers who test positive. I don’t see that changing. 

    • Like 3
  7. Another FB poster just posted this:

    “Just boarded the Mars in Bergen! They asked for our preboard Covid test and then we were told we are no longer spitting and masks are optional. About 95% maskless….it’s nice to not have to spit!”

    • Like 10
  8. We are taking our first Viking Ocean cruise in September. The daily testing has been a well known fact with Viking ever since they resumed sailing. How did you not know this when you booked your cruise? I feel it is unnecessary and an inconvenience, but we knew it upfront and accepted it has part of our cruise. 

  9. On 3/20/2022 at 7:10 PM, Cadodge said:

    I thought what was being described as deplorable is that is that both passengers in a cabin have to purchase the package. I don't drink alcohol but my wife does enjoy wine. Might make sense for her to have the package but certainly does not for me.

    It’s understandable why cruise lines do this. One could easily get a drink at one bar for themself and then go to another bar and get one for their significant other. The only cruise line that I’ve found that doesn’t have this policy is Princess. 

  10. 32 minutes ago, Blackduck59 said:

     

    Here's hoping that by the time you take your cruise the issues that we had with regard to inexperienced crew will be largely sorted, as the crew will have 5 months more experience by then.

    We recently completed a Panama Canal cruise with Princess. We are platinum with Princess so it wasn’t a first impression cruise. But, I can say it was a worst impression cruise. We were very disappointed and will probably not sail with Princess again even though we have never had those issues in the past and it may have been partially due to the pandemic. Whether first impression or not, once one is turned off, it’s difficult to trust a cruise line with your money again. 

    • Like 4
    • Thanks 2
  11. It’s very smart on Viking’s part to have this type of early deposit requirement. As long as so many are willing to do it, Viking gets interest free loans to help them build their new ships. If most Viking customers were to refuse to book early with these deposit requirements, Viking would probably change its policy. 

  12. We will be on our first cruise with Viking in September. We are considering using Viking Air Plus for our flight to Bergen and home from Barcelona. Before booking with Viking, I’d like to know if there are any airlines that Viking just doesn’t use. Or will I be able to request any airline that flies these routes? Should I have my preferred flights chosen prior to booking air with Viking? 

  13. 2 hours ago, jonthomas said:

    I can no longer keep up with all the rules, regulations and changes. Nor do I want a PHd in this field.   Many can now make a career out of creating   rules as fast as they can and get paid good salaries for it. A new field in the job market. Rules development, rules adjustment, rules interpretation, rules enforcing, rules changing. Im sure many  here could apply for these positions. 

     

    Crazy. No way to enjoy travel or the simple life. Ha simple life, what is that?

    Couldn’t agree more. We booked our first Viking cruise a couple years back for a September 2021 cruise, which Viking canceled. We really wanted to try Viking and accepted the 125% voucher. We are now sailing in September 2022. Until I read this post I had absolutely no idea that if something changed and we couldn’t travel for health issues, our Trip Mate insurance would be worthless. This is one of those major issues that should be made very clear at the time when vouchers are offered. At our ages we never book any cruise without buying insurance. Essentially, this is what we have done by accepting the vouchers. I don’t care if every cruise line does this. It still stinks. I would assume that 125% vouchers probably don’t really cost Viking anything. There’s going to be some passengers like the OP who will never be able to use them with no recourse for a refund. There will be many, like us, who have excess money remaining on our voucher that won’t be used up since they can’t be converted to OBC. 
     

    Maybe Viking and other cruise lines don’t care how this looks. But it’s things like this along with Viking wanting all the fares up front that could eventually turn customers off. Don’t get me wrong, I’m looking forward to our first Viking adventure. I just hope we don’t get sick ahead of time. 

    • Like 4
  14. Thank you for this. It was very timely for us. We just returned from a 10-day Panama Canal cruise with Princess. We have never been so disappointed in the food on any cruise we have sailed on. We knew it was time to try new cruise lines. We already had an Avalon river cruise and a Viking Ocean cruise booked for later this year. We just booked an Oceania Caribbean cruise for next January prior to reading this post. It appears we made a wise choice. 

    • Like 2
  15. We just finished our 11th Princess cruise. We have 119 cruise days. We may never achieve Elite status as we will be trying other cruise lines. A few years ago we were on a Princess cruise with a young couple who were Elite. They were telling us how they achieved this by booking one day cruises between Seattle and Vancouver every year until they reached Elite. They had a fraction of the cruise days we had, but they were Elite. Even someone just taking 7 day cruises out of Port Everglades could achieve Elite status after 105 cruise days. Maybe all cruise lines should consider rewarding people for cruise days over number of cruises. With that thought out of the way, our recent cruise on Emerald had very few Elite and Platinum guests. 

    • Like 1
  16. 1 hour ago, skynight said:

    All mini suites have the same interiors. All Dolphin deck minis have a 9ft x 6ft balcony which is not covered. ME cat are forward. MD are aft. MB are mid forward and mid aft. M1 are Club Class minis and are mid ship. There are also 18 cat ME mini suites on deck 8 aft with covered balconies. Two of them have larger balconies. 

    We always try to book the ME mini suites on deck 8. We have been fortunate to get D731 with its bigger balcony on three occasions. We always ask Princess to not upgrade us. We love the covered balconies and don’t like paying more to have a balcony open to anyone who wants to look down on us. 

    • Like 1
  17. My wife and I just completed our first cruise using the medallion and the app. We are both 72, but aren’t afraid of change or technology. We loved the medallion and the app. Our cabin door unlocked as we got near the cabin. We ordered drinks using the app and they were delivered to where we were sitting in a few minutes. We ordered room service with the app and the order arrived quickly and correctly. I imagine those people who still desire a paper boarding pass still use them on airlines also. As others have stated you don’t need a smart phone to use the medallion, but do need it to order drinks and food delivered to where you are sitting. Don’t worry, you can still go old school and personally go to the bars and restaurants and get your own food and drinks and bring them back to where you are sitting. 

    • Like 3
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