Clay Clayton

Glad I could help with the gin. 😂 Have you asked your room steward for a mattress topper? Other folks who like soft beds have reported that makes the bed more comfortable. For me, the mattresses are already softer than what we have at home 😊 Enjoy your cruise!

FWIW, on our Iceland cruise last year, we were unable to get DMIL’s vaccine card loaded into Verifly. When we boarded in Reykjavik, DH and I just had to show our passports and get our temp taken. She had to present her card and have it photocopied. A short and minor annoyance but finding it again after thinking she was finished it with at Icelandic immigration, added unnecessary stress prior to getting aboard.

Also you can do a search for bar menus under my name. I posted them from all venues during our Iceland cruise last July. Aquavit probably has the most complete offerings.

For those of us in the US, the referral for sure and the early booking discount if it was being offered online or via an email promotion.

If you haven’t already, this thread provides lots of information: https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2416372-tips-for-new-viking-ocean-cruisers/page/62/#comment-62141739

There was a TV documentary about the building of one of Viking’s ships that we watched before sailing on any of them. The “drama” was whether the propellers would be cast perfectly so as to keep vibration to a minimum. I’ve searched Google to see what it was titled and where to watch but haven’t been successful😢 It’s not “Mighty Ships”. Maybe someone else will remember.

Booking it!

I would be looking for a new agent for your next Viking cruise.

You should know when you ask the agent. Our agent’s credit typically shows up on our onboard account the second day we are aboard. Viking maximum allowable amounts are $150 pp for cruises up to 7 nights, $300 pp for 8-14 nights, and $500 pp for cruises over 15 nights. If your agent is providing less then you might want to consider finding a new one unless like some the advice and work they do on your behalf is worth more than the shipboard credit or other compensation.

To be announced tomorrow- A year at sea, prices starting at $9,995 😂

Almost all cruise lines do…so perhaps just tradition? The PS on Deck 8 do have great access to Explorers and the forward viewing deck.

Apparently Viking would rather pay a commission than pay for more company agents. It is my understanding from our Travel Agent (US based and who provides the Maximum kickback that Viking will allow-not all travel agents do) that you have 30 days to transfer a direct booking to an agent (others have reported 60 days). When we booked our first cruise directly I asked the phone agent if moving the booking would affect his compensation and he told me it would not. Welcome to Viking!

Well it would only be $30k compared to a DV 😂. But I know you book those to be center ship. Luckily we don’t have seasickness issues so unless someone expresses deep regret (or we win the lottery -doubtful since we don’t play) we will likely be in a V2. We were in a far forward one for our first Viking Cruise and enjoyed being so close to the water and always hearing the low wake….but the anchor thingamiggy not so much so will likely try for one of them towards the stern. Have you heard any scuttlebutt about when 2024/25 WC will be announced?

So as y’all are nearing the end, would like input from those of you who are in V and DV staterooms. Do you regret the decision to not book a PV? Mike and I hope to book the WC in 2024 or 2025 and while we know we would enjoy the extra space, storage, and pressing of the PV we can’t quite rationalize the additional $40,000 (presuming pricing stays the same which we know it won’t😢)

Comparing the cost per day is one thing I forgot to mention. For our last TA (which turned into a half TA thanks to Covid) we had almost decided to book Oasis (or one of her RC ships) to see what a HUGE ship was like. But Viking came out with a promo that made their TA only $10 more per person per day when we tried to analyze it apples to apples as well as we could: RC Cruise $2007 Tips $348 Drinks $200 Specialty Dining $300 Total $2855 per day $238 Viking $3598 per day ($257 OBC from Travel Agent covers grats + sufficient drinks.) Difference 19 per day or $10 per day per person Included Benefits:wifi, spa, alternative dining, smaller ship, nicer bathroom

We cruised Millennium from Vancouver to Tokyo in September 2019 after cruising Viking from San Juan to Barcelona the previous March so I think we got a pretty good apples to apples comparison. We were pleasantly surprised at how much we enjoyed Celebrity after becoming such big fans of Viking. We were in a DV on Viking and a regular Balcony on Millie. The rooms were similar though it’s hard to get a better standard bathroom than on Viking-a shower big enough for even me! Other than the nicer bathroom, the biggest difference to us in the stateroom is the closet. We much prefer the location on Celebrity by the door. In Vs and DVs on Viking it is beside the bed which makes it a little difficult to use. #FirstWorldProblems. We took advantage of a promo on a dining package on X so got to try some of the specialty restaurants at a good price. We found the steak house on Millennium comparable to Manfredi’s on V. We were offered a deal for Le Petit Chef on X and did not care for it. Perhaps if we had children? We greatly prefer the size of the Viking ships as you feel like you get to know more people, but we had a great rollcall on the Transpacific and had a number of sea day activities-bridge, LRC, slot pull, etc. Roll calls on Viking tend to be smaller although in the before times Viking provided quite a nice meet and greet. Biggest difference is the entertainment. Viking leans towards much smaller production shows and live music at multiple venues as opposed to the big shows. However, there was no enrichment offered on our X cruise which I really missed. Having a lecture about a historic site you’re going to visit is much different than a port talk about what one can purchase while there. 🤪 We have found that in most cases, the included excursions meet our needs. We have only occasionally purchased an optional excursion-typically when it’s one to someplace we have learned through our precruise research that we “have” to see. Typically the “panorama” tours are on large buses but we have never seen them full. These typically give an overview of the highlights of a port with two or three stops and last 2-3 hours leaving time in the port for independent exploration or to take an optional tour. Sometimes, the included tour is much more extensive-for example in China, one of the included tours in Tianjin (for Bejing) was to the Great Wall. It was scheduled for 7 hours most of which was on the Highway back and forth. We elected to “do” the wall independently prior to the cruise but if one didn’t have the time or resources, having it included was a good value. While I didn’t do a comparative analysis of Celebrity and Viking (guess I should have) I did do one for our 2018 Eastbound Viking TA and our westbound Norwegian TA. It might give you some insight to Viking’s differences also. https://cruisinwithclay.wordpress.com/2019/02/12/transatlantic-battle/ Welcome to Viking, if you haven’t discovered it yet, the newbie thread has lots of good information and hints. Of course there are a lot of us here that are happy to answer any questions also. https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2416372-tips-for-new-viking-ocean-cruisers/page/62/#comment-62141739

I’m so hoping you’re right! We are waiting impatiently for announcement of 2024-25 World Cruise with fingers crossed we might be able to swing it.

Just an FYI and I hope things have changed as the world comes back from Covid, but last July in Iceland, there were few independent guides available. I looked in two of our ports and was only able to find one guide in each.

Hard to believe it’s ending…at least for some. I hope that those continuing on to Norway will keep posting…some of us are enjoying living vicariously! For those disembarking, thanks for letting me tag along…safe travels home. And don’t forget once you’re home you have to pay when you leave a restaurant!😂

Unlike Andy, we haven’t bothered to get currency before arrival in each country. We have our money at Charles Schwab and they don’t charge a conversion fee and reimburse us for ATM fees. So we don’t have to hunt for a particular system. We used it exclusively for our two years of living nomadically and since the pandammic we have used it once it twice when we were away from our credit union’s (where we also have an account) ATMs and then in Iceland last July. . Our experience on minimums is that you can get something approximate to $10-20 of local currency. One other thought, verify that dollar bills aren’t the preferred currency. When we did Buenos Aires to Valparaiso in 2010 (not on Viking), most of our independent guides and lots of markets preferred crisp US currency rather than their local. I seem to being nervous until we got to the ship (and the inroom safe) as we had $1,500 or so in cash on our person for the various excursions.

Like Insanity, we did a 1/2 day tour to Monserrat with Barcelona Day Tours. We had a group of 10 or so I out together on our rollcall. They picked us up upon disembarkation from our Transatlantic and we headed to Montserrat. We arrived in time for the choir performance which was very enjoyable. After some free time we headed back to Barcelona and we were dropped off at our various hotels. I was pleased with the ease of communication and our guide. He even said goodbye and jumped off the van and ran several blocks back to the last hotel stop to return a fellow guest’s phone that we discovered had been left after they got out at their hotel. The driver the. took the last of us on to our hotels. Talk about service!

My experience is similar to Stretch’s. I only use a Travel Agent as a booking agent so making sure I get the maximum cash value is what’s important to me. I have one agent I use for Viking Cruises and another for Norwegian because if the different onboard/shipboard credit each offers. Welcome to Viking! if you haven’t already discovered this thread, it’s worth a read: https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2416372-tips-for-new-viking-ocean-cruisers/page/62/#comment-62141739

Can’t believe you didn’t buy a cagner for your nativity set. Ours graces our set each Christmas since we learned about him during our 2018 Barcelona visit. 😂

My Daddy always said you get what you pay for so I’m a little concerned about the low fares on Pullmantur. We are looking at Monarch’s eastbound Spring 2020 transatlantic and the price for a Jr Suite (balcony) all in including drinks package and gratuities is slightly over $1000 per person. That’s about what we paid on Norwegian Star last fall for a westbound TA in an inside at a group rate! From reading the few reviews and info available here on CC and on YouTube it appears Pullmantur is comparable to other mainstream lines but just on older ships. Most reviewers seem to think it’s a good value. Was my Daddy wrong?