Mich3554

Puerto Madryn was the one time I was incredibly happy we were on a Viking tour. We had gone to the penguin colony in Punta Tombo and were nearly 2 hours late getting back. Then on the way back to the port, a semi took off the bus’s side mirror when we got caught in a horrible traffic backup. The bus pulled up to the ship, we boarded and we were away from the dock before we got to our cabin.

We took 2 cruises on the Jupiter, about 3 months apart. The crew that was still there recognized us from 3 months earlier. With thousands of people passing through, how do they do that? We sat down in the Aquavit terrace, not realizing it was lobster night at the grill. One of the managers eating back there heard me grouse and went to the pool grill and brought back both DH and I a lobster to have with the rest of our meal. DH’s shoes fell apart in Colonia. The shoe disconnected from the sole, and other than sandals these were his only shoes. While we went shopping the next day for new shoes in Montevideo, our cabin steward brought his old shoes to their machine shop. Delivered his old shoes back that evening, looking like new shoes. We were leaving for dinner and a stain on my sweater that I thought it had washed out but was still there (DH helpfully pointed it out just as we were leaving our cabin). Cabin steward heard him laugh at my inability to hit my mouth with food. I went back to the cabin to put on another shirt, and threw the chocolate stained sweater onto the bed to deal with later. Cabin steward took my stained sweater to the laundry and got the stain removed and returned it the next morning.

Yep. We went to Giverny when our cruise stopped in Le Havre. It just didn’t seem to make sense to try to go to Paris as you spent too little time there for such a long bus ride. I love Rouen too, would gladly go back here too. We haven’t done Honfleur, so I’m filing that away for the future.

Neither do I. I have flown Turkish Air and find it is almost on par with Emirates.

My first suggestion would be check with the store first. I made a large purchase in a store in Italy, and the store was very used to sending purchases home for cruise passengers. Best thing, it was free (I’m sure the price for shipping was built into the price I paid). The store shipped it such that I would be home when it arrived.

We recently did our first river cruise this past spring. We had a balcony suite (courtesy of the 125% voucher) but we never used the balcony. The big perk for us was the free laundry. There are other seating areas other than the lounge. However, a few afternoons I took my kindle to the lounge and watched the world go by….just like on ocean cruises. It wasn’t noisy or packed, other than for port talks before dinner. The Aquavit terrace has 2 seated tables for meals. DH and I also ate at the end of a long table. There was no need to communicate with others if we did not want to. We did go with 3 other people, so most times we ate with dinner them. Our cruise was April/May, the Grand European. It happened before testing and masks were dropped.

The only time I have seen perks or discounts linked to the length of the cruise was when we booked on board. We booked a 30 day cruise and a 50 day cruise when we were on our South American cruise. Both were linked with additional discounts and OBC for the cruise length. For instance the 30 day cruise had an additional on board discount of $400, the 50 day $800. We also received OBC for each, but as it wasn’t on the invoice, I don’t remember how much but know how much was related to the cruise length. When Viking canceled Viking Homelands part of the 30 day cruise, they also canceled the British Isles part. My Viking agent had to do battle with his manager to get our discounts back as we still kept the BI part. We got the $$ back in OBC.

When we went on the South American leg of our cruise last year, the only pair of shoes (his other footwear was Tevas) that DH brought with him deconstructed. The sole totally disconnected from the shoe. We wound up doing a frantic shopping trip in Montevideo to try to find him new walking shoes. We also bought glue to try to fix his old shoes. When DH went to try to repair them, his shoes were missing. We tore our cabin apart looking for them. No shoes. Later that evening, our cabin steward brought them back fixed better than new. They also cleaned them up.

I renewed mine in Jan and it took 3 weeks with expedited service. My friend did not expedite and it took her 6 MONTHS to get her passport renewed.

Nope. I have an agent I deal with at Viking, and he takes pretty good care of me. At this point, we have booked 11 cruises, including a WC with him. Only one of the 11 we booked while on a cruise, not through him.

The weather was fabulous in both Uruguay and Argentina in early Dec, warm and sunny.

Going to jump on this in that we also received updates from Viking as to what we needed to do to get into certain countries. Last Oct-Dec things were changing much faster than they are today, but on our trip in that time period, 5 countries (including the US) changed their rules while we were in transit. Best thing you can do is check both Viking’s requirements in MVJ and your entry country’s requirements to make sure nothing has changed.

We were near here…..5049. I’d have no problem staying in 5065.

ArriveCAN is required any time you cross the border. We go up to Vancouver regularly to see my ILs and have to fill it out every single time.

Gorgeous scenery on the way there. We had a good guide who talked about life in Norway.

There are several styles on the ship in a decent range of sizes, but if you are in Bergen, many shops carry Dale sweaters in many more styles and colors. I did take the Dale factory tour in Bergen, and walked out with 3 sweaters and 2 scarfs. They were a bit less $$ than in the stores and on the ship (prices are very similar). I did get my VAT back too.

We have mostly booked our own flights and always gotten to/from the airport on our own. Viking charges per person, so it never works out in our favor. The only time we have ever used Viking for transit was getting from Valparaiso to Santiago. It is a 2+ hour trip, and we had Viking schedule us a private car as we had non refundable OBC to chew up. I think that was over $300, but we’d have lost the money otherwise as we had paid and purchased everything else we wanted onboard. I think there was $12 in non refundable OBC when we left.

My winner was at a cafe in Vienna called Sluka. Not too sweet and apples not cooked to mush. DH suggested sharing, but I wanted my own piece (largely because if we shared, he’d eat 3/4 of it and I’d get the crumbs). Sooooo good.

I can’t tell you what the status of the Star is, but what I can tell you is that Viking takes very good care of it’s ships. For instance, we got on the Jupiter when it was new. 3 months later, the wooden floor in the Explorer’s lounge was damaged due to a water leak. It wasn’t a tripping hazard, just did not look good. This was right before Covid shut things down. When we got on the Jupiter 2 years later, the floor had been totally replaced.

I realize that I’m an n= 1, but this past spring we used Viking Air plus to book flights. The initial flights we were booked on were impossible. Also being a Delta Skymiles member, I called back with several replacement Delta flights that had better connections. There were absolutely NO problems in rebooking one of those. However, our trip was in April/May and we were booking in December. We missed the flight cancellations mess that occurred afterwards. We were also booking business class seats, not sure if this matters. Other than a few minor glitches from the airlines (there were several flight time changes, but largely inconsequential), everything went very smoothly. Summer is not our travel season, so we have avoided the combination of increased passengers, fewer flights and other problems that are happening now. I suspect in the fall, things will be better (or I hope so, our next trip is in Sept!).

I lost nearly 40 lbs before leaving on our 54 day B2B last winter. I was positive that I was going to regain a decent sized chunk of it. I regained…..2 lbs. I was ok with that. Unlike Andy, I found I was able to portion control better in WC than The Restaurant. There were times where I only wanted a few bites of something, not a whole serving. I realized it when WC went from self serve to passengers being served during a brief outbreak of Norovirus. It was hard to explain that I just wanted to try a few bites, about 1/4 of what I was served. Sea days, I was also in the gym. I did a bit more damage on our recent river cruise. I was drinking much more wine and most meals were plated. Also, I imagine checking out ALL the apple strudels at each stop didn’t help much.

Yep! I’ve been on 2 of these and both were wonderful and unique. I can’t wait to see what the Neptune does this year.

I think one Christmas Eve dinner we had at Manfredi’s. New Year’s Day, there was a huge brunch given. You find out menus the day of, usually. We will also be on this cruise, but going the rest of the way to London. We are just planning on playing the holiday dinners by ear. Viking will do a great job, regardless of where you decide to eat. Excursions for this cruise do not open up until Oct. 6 for us.

It was after we received our luggage tags, so within a month of the trip. The only reason why I remember this was I scratched off the old cabin number and hand wrote the new, upgraded one on it while at home. If you do get an offer, make sure you check to see it really is a good offer. First time we got offered an upgrade, the additional cost was equivalent to what it would have cost for that cabin when I booked it. The second time, it was $200 pp.

Just be aware that upgrades are a double edged sword. We were quire happy in our DV until we received a very lucrative offer for an upgrade to a PV. Now we book PVs. Viking wins, we win, our bank account, not so much! I was telling DH that we are really going to be in trouble if we ever get an offer on an Explorer’s Suite. It’s like flying business class….you can never go back to coach!