Fafnar

Thanks for this nice review. We leave Sunday and now I'm really excited.

Now we'll see what the different cruise lines learned in 2013. Some treated their passengers very well; others not well at all. Did they learn their lesson?

Thanks for this question. I was one of the passengers stuck in this mess. We were on the Viking Gefjon, a new ship only on it's second cruise. We sat docked at Kehl/Strasbourg for 5 nights. We were then bused for an hour and a half boat tour of the Rhein, where we saw several Viking cruises going past, like we were supposed to have done. Then bused to Mainz, spent the night, bused to Trier for quick tour and then bused to Paris for the end of the trip. Needless to say, we were extremely disappointed in the trip. A bus tour of Freiberg does not make up for a cruise down the Rhein. A bus tour of Baden Baden is not at all like a tour of the Moselle valley. This was supposed to be a dream cruise vacation for a significant wedding anniversary. Instead, it turned out to be a Viking nightmare.

Can we expect any sort of refund/credit from Viking or are we just out of luck? ( to put it politely)

I just got back from Paris. The Viking tour is on a bus that drives past most major sites. You have an hour stop at Notre Dame, and then drive to the Eiffel tower, where you have 10 minutes to take photos. The bus then returns to your hotel. If you chose, you can leave the tour at either point and continue on your own. Please just tell the tour guide if you decide to leave ,so that the rest of the bus doesn't wait for you to return.

The Gefjon passengers are now in Mainz. Announcements of plans changed several times the last day on the ship. We were finally bused to Oberwesel, had a hour and a half tour of the middle Rhein with a rushed lunch , and then bused to Mainz. We were going to tour Luxembourg, but now are touring Trier. At least the Paris weather is looking up.

Look, I can be as flexible as the next person and I am definitely not blaming the staff for any of this. But I paid a lot of money to cruise through Europe, not live on a houseboat. And it especially hurt watching 2 longboats cruise down the middle Rhein as we were supposed to have done. Seeing Freiberg or Baden Baden was not what I wanted to do on this trip celebrating our 40 th wedding anniversary.

So, does Viking offer any refunds or credits for trips that went this wrong?

It's now 11 pm. We haven't moved. Again, told one thing, but another has happened. I am upset with Viking. They don't follow through with anything they say. Maybe we will stay on the ship maybe we won't. Maybe we will go downstream, maybe we won't . My business doesn't work this way, why does theirs? I can be flexible, but this is ridiculous. I've heard from other passangers that this " non- committal language" is typical of the company. And here we sit . What a terrible vacation this has been.

The Viking Gefjon, stuck in Strasbourg for the past 5 nights and they are giving up. As of 1 pm today (and things change hourly) we are disembarking in the morning, busing to somewhere, taking a day cruise up the middle Rhine and then getting a hotel. Very disappointed in the way this was handled. No one seemed willing to look more than a day out. It should have been obvious soon that drastic changes would be necessary. Instead of cruising, we've been on a houseboat. No sure if we will get any sort of refund on this bust of a vacation.

It was just announced that we won't leave Strasbourg until noon. They are going to bus us to speyer , and hopefully the boat will meet us there . They are watching a "wave" of water as it makes its way downstream . They promised to at least put us on a day trip up the middle Rhine to see the castles. But I think the time on the Moselle and trier will be forfeit. I'm disappointed to say the least.

The Viking Idi made it out of Basel , so they are happier.

Thank you for your very nice reply. We saw one barge go by about an hour ago! However nothing since. Other passengers talked about the possibility of changing ships, but not the staff.

You can tell the staff is new. They are all trying very hard to do everything right but often miss basics. The captain is very young, 28, and not used to talking to a room full of passengers. However, we love the ship and are making the best of our vacation .

The staff said that 25% of the river was closed, mainly from Basel to Strasbourg. The only things passing us are sticks. They are running out of places to take us. Today we are going to Freiberg. Yesterday we were bused to Heidelberg, but there were problems getting enough buses. The river looks like it went up again last night. I hope we are allowed to move tonight.

I am sitting on a Viking longboat at Strasbourg right now for the second day in a row as the Rhine river is too high to for the ship to move. They will let us know if the ship can move tomorrow night and continue our trip. I'm worried that we will miss the Rhine castles in daylight as they try to make up time. The staff is nice, but as this is only the second trip for the Gefjon, no one is too confident. We are "going with the flow" but I want to warn anyone planning a river cruise that this could happen to you too .

I've been on hold with RCI for over 2 hours today (1 hour this afternoon and an hour now as I type this ) just trying to pay my bill and also the bill of the family members that I'm traveling with. This has been a horrible customer service experience. I'm a tax accountant and I get better service from the IRS.

How hard is it to hire a few more people to answer the phone? I will go find a travel agent as someone suggested and I will start looking at other cruise lines (we're Diamond on RCI) If this lady tells me one more time that she appreciates my patience , I may scream.

We just got back. We took the shuttle from the end of the pier - $16 per person round trip - to Christiansted, where there is more to do than around the pier. The Fort and other historic sites were interesting, the town nice. It was low season and a Sunday, so much was closed. However, well worth the visit.