Disembark/Embark by tender in Vancouver. How will Viking handle this?

[Paulchili]

What is not discussed here is how this tendering “situation” came to be.

I believe it was due to Viking’s miscalculation of arrival date due to the fact that they ignored that crossing the international date line will repeat a day.

Originally the schedule listed our cruise as 23 days starting on May 5th in Tokyo. When you filled in the dates for each day, the 23rd day came to be May 27th (instead of May 26th). Thus they probably scheduled the docking for the 27th when presumably there would be docking space for them. By the time they figured out that they actually arrive to Vancouver on the 26th there was no room for them.

Incidentally, based on that schedule I - and some others on this cruise - booked their flights home for the 27th (I am flying for miles so I had to book this flight 11 months out).

A foolish mistake on someone’s part at Viking scheduling.

At least, this is my understanding as to how this came to be.

BTW - no explanation or apology of any kind was ever offered.

Edited March 31, 2019 by Paulchili

[Captain_Morgan]

I would like to think that something so simple as crossing the date line would not be the cause of this misstep on the part of Viking's schedulers, but I could be wrong.

I would more likely chalk it up to hubris in thinking that they could show up to the dance and be given a spot at the table on relatively short notice in comparison to the likes of those already scheduled and confirmed for berth space on the day....

 

It will be interesting to hear from those affected as to how it all goes on the day in question, and sadly the lack of information sharing seems to be a frequent trend with Viking...

[Paulchili]

1 hour ago, Captain_Morgan said:

I would more likely chalk it up to hubris in thinking that they could show up to the dance and be given a spot at the table on relatively short notice in comparison to the likes of those already scheduled and confirmed for berth space on the day....

Nobody is given “a spot at the table” last minute. They cannot simply bump other lines that are already scheduled to dock - even Viking is not that naive.

As you probably know, docking schedules are set up a couple of years ahead of the time (if not more). If Viking knew that they were docking on the 26th and asked for a spot, they would have been told who is already scheduled for that day. OTOH, if they thought they were arriving on the 27th then they probably had a spot.

It’s having to change from the 27th to 26th “last minute” that got them into trouble.

Just IMO.

[Captain_Morgan]

well they've got time to sort it, unless of course they want to run a pending disaster of a day....guess time will tell how it all unfolds

[Pushka]

3 hours ago, Captain_Morgan said:

well they've got time to sort it, unless of course they want to run a pending disaster of a day....guess time will tell how it all unfolds

 

They certainly did mess up the dates of the preceding cruise and my cruise. While my cruise always showed as departing on 26 May on Viking and TAs websites, the trip before mine showed as arriving on 27 May on several TA websites as recently as December last year which was when I contacted Viking. And at the same time I asked about the lack of berth for disembark/embark. I didn’t check on Vikings website to see what date they had for the preceding cruise. As long as they are planning for it now and not going to pull the ‘unexpected’ issue of tender on the day and which impacts on our itinerary I’m sure it will be ok just messy. 

[Heidi13]

As it turn out I still know the Harbourmaster at Port Metro Vancouver and have just had a long chat with him regarding Viking Orion's arrival on May 26th.

 

While some minor details are still being finalised, the plan is basically complete and if it changes, he will give me a ring.

 

Arrival - Viking has always planned on an arrival of May 26th, so the speculation they forgot the dateline is completely unfounded.

 

The ship will dock at Canada Place before the other ships to discharge all baggage and depending on time available may also take on stores. The ship will also board some Canada Customs & Immigration Officers. Prior to arrival of the other ships, Orion will vacate the berth and head to an anchorage.

 

All luggage will be taken to a local hotel. Disembarking passengers will clear Canada Customs/Immigration on board the ship, then head ashore by tender. This is similar to cruises ending in Greenwich. They are using the floats I predicted, which are between Canada Place & Seabus Terminal. Viking has a fleet of buses arranged, which will transport passengers to the hotel, where you will collect your baggage.

 

Embarking passengers will be processed normally at Canada Place., boarding the ship when it returns to the berth. Baggage will be loaded at the same time, as will stores, etc.

 

 

 

 

[Pushka]

24 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

As it turn out I still know the Harbourmaster at Port Metro Vancouver and have just had a long chat with him regarding Viking Orion's arrival on May 26th.

 

While some minor details are still being finalised, the plan is basically complete and if it changes, he will give me a ring.

 

Arrival - Viking has always planned on an arrival of May 26th, so the speculation they forgot the dateline is completely unfounded.

 

The ship will dock at Canada Place before the other ships to discharge all baggage and depending on time available may also take on stores. The ship will also board some Canada Customs & Immigration Officers. Prior to arrival of the other ships, Orion will vacate the berth and head to an anchorage.

 

All luggage will be taken to a local hotel. Disembarking passengers will clear Canada Customs/Immigration on board the ship, then head ashore by tender. This is similar to cruises ending in Greenwich. They are using the floats I predicted, which are between Canada Place & Seabus Terminal. Viking has a fleet of buses arranged, which will transport passengers to the hotel, where you will collect your baggage.

 

Embarking passengers will be processed normally at Canada Place., boarding the ship when it returns to the berth. Baggage will be loaded at the same time, as will stores, etc.

 

 

 

 

 

Gosh Thankyou. But I have a query. The Orion will not be heading back to port until 5pm. We are supposed to board from 11am. So what happens for the 6 hours in between? And we were supposed to depart Vancouver at 5pm anyway. Seems like we lose a day onboard. 

Edited April 2, 2019 by Pushka

[Relaxing Rita]

Thank you very much for your information Heidi.... whew.... now to get our heads around  getting our luggage from a hotel and then making it to the BC Ferries Bus Terminal... instead of getting the Bus right at Canada Place.... oh well it is what it is... just wonder when it will be in print from Viking... perhaps not until we board???

[Pushka]

9 hours ago, Relaxing Rita said:

Thank you very much for your information Heidi.... whew.... now to get our heads around  getting our luggage from a hotel and then making it to the BC Ferries Bus Terminal... instead of getting the Bus right at Canada Place.... oh well it is what it is... just wonder when it will be in print from Viking... perhaps not until we board???

 

Good that you are sorted. 😀 However it seems that we most certainly aren’t! 

Edited April 2, 2019 by Pushka

[Relaxing Rita]

Pushka... no you aren't... hope everyone gets some notification sometime soon... we are the lucky ones on CC but there must be 100's of others who have made arrangements that are no longer able to be met ... and $$'s spent too on transport/tours/etc which will not have the correct starting place and time.

I also wonder how many people on May 5th cruise are still thinking that they are embarking at Yokohama, which was stated on our cruise info when we booked....

 

[Pushka]

1 minute ago, Relaxing Rita said:

Pushka... no you aren't... hope everyone gets some notification sometime soon... we are the lucky ones on CC but there must be 100's of others who have made arrangements that are no longer able to be met ... and $$'s spent too on transport/tours/etc which will not have the correct starting place and time.

I also wonder how many people on May 5th cruise are still thinking that they are embarking at Yokohama, which was stated on our cruise info when we booked....

 

 

Its been a bit of a mess with Japan. I suspect we won’t be told until the day before which doesn’t work when people are travelling. And with being in Vancouver for a couple of days prior I don’t really want another tour etc, plus we will have luggage anyway. The only advice in our planner is that flights must arrive by 2pm on 26th. 

[Ienjoycruising]

56 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

As it turn out I still know the Harbourmaster at Port Metro Vancouver and have just had a long chat with him regarding Viking Orion's arrival on May 26th.

 

Thanks Heidi13 for getting this Information for us cruisers who will be embarking in Vancouver.  I ended up doing the pre-excursion in Vancouver as it came close to the same cost if we did it on our own.  I will definitely be worth the upcharge for VO to take care of all the details to get us on the Orion on embarkation day.  And an additional thanks for adding so much good information on the Viking Sky problems.

 

 

[Pushka]

It’s interesting that cruise mapper has Orion arriving into Vancouver on 27th. 

[Paulchili]

1 hour ago, Heidi13 said:

All luggage will be taken to a local hotel. ..... Viking has a fleet of buses arranged, which will transport passengers to the hotel, where you will collect your baggage.

Thank you for that info.

Do we -or Viking for that matter - know what hotel are we talking about?

Surely those arrangements have been made by now and we should be told what hotel the luggage will be stored at as many of us have plans after disembarkation and not everyone is on Viking’s post cruise program.

Edited April 2, 2019 by Paulchili

[Paulchili]

3 minutes ago, Pushka said:

It’s interesting that cruise mapper has Orion arriving into Vancouver on 27th. 

I still don’t believe that they always planned on arriving on the 26th. If so, they surely made the mess of it for both disembarking but especially embarking passsengers.

[Pushka]

5 minutes ago, Paulchili said:

I still don’t believe that they always planned on arriving on the 26th. If so, they surely made the mess of it for both disembarking but especially embarking passsengers.

 

I think they just generally messed up. Our cruise date for departure was always the 26th. I really hope they let us get on the ship by tender at the correct time otherwise 900 boarding at once at 5pm will be a nightmare. And we should all have been advised by Viking by now. 

[Paulchili]

37 minutes ago, Pushka said:

 

I really hope they let us get on the ship by tender at the correct time otherwise 900 boarding at once at 5pm will be a nightmare. And we should all have been advised by Viking by now. 

Exactly. Not to mention having to deal with your luggage till 5 PM for independent travelers. Many might be arriving that morning or even if they arrived a day or two earlier, you’ll have to check out of the hotel by noon. Sure, one can leave the luggage at the hotel but I am sure everyone is anxious to get on the ship ASAP and get settled in.

Edited April 3, 2019 by Paulchili

[stretchcruz]

This has nothing to do with Vancouver, but we disembarked Orion last week in Bali and found out a few days before that we were tendering instead of docking. (It is very possible that this was somewhere in my documents,  but I didn't notice.) I have absolutely no idea how they got our luggage ashore but we had it outside of our stateroom about 10:15 the night before. They gave us all times to meet in the lobby to board the tender. Ours was 9 AM and we left promptly. I had a private guide booked who was going to pick us up at 9 and I emailed him to change the time. We took our carryons to the tender (crew loaded them), we took the tender ride to the shore and our luggage was there sorted by color. It is my understanding that the ship was going to move to the dock later on in the day (I think I heard noon but not sure) for the embarking passengers.

[Pushka]

1 hour ago, Paulchili said:

Exactly. Not to mention having to deal with your luggage till 5 PM for independent travelers. Many might be arriving that morning or even if they arrived a day or two earlier, you’ll have to check out of the hotel by noon. Sure, one can leave the luggage at the hotel but I am sure everyone is anxious to get on the ship ASAP and get settled in.

 

We will still be getting to the port at the time it says we can board which is 11 am. And drop off luggage. I’m not hanging around the hotel as we will be expected to leave and will have seen everything we want to see. 

[Heidi13]

5 hours ago, Pushka said:

 

Gosh Thankyou. But I have a query. The Orion will not be heading back to port until 5pm. We are supposed to board from 11am. So what happens for the 6 hours in between? And we were supposed to depart Vancouver at 5pm anyway. Seems like we lose a day onboard. 

Pushka - Unfortunately I can't help with that one. Hopefully once all arrangements are finalised, Viking will advise and/or change the boarding times.

[Heidi13]

5 hours ago, Relaxing Rita said:

Thank you very much for your information Heidi.... whew.... now to get our heads around  getting our luggage from a hotel and then making it to the BC Ferries Bus Terminal... instead of getting the Bus right at Canada Place.... oh well it is what it is... just wonder when it will be in print from Viking... perhaps not until we board???

Having difficulty figuring out why going from a hotel to the BC Ferries terminal, which on the mainland are at Tsawwassen and Horseshoe Bay . If you mention which hotel you are in maybe I can make some suggestions. If close to Skytrain that might be a better option. 

[Heidi13]

5 hours ago, Pushka said:

It’s interesting that cruise mapper has Orion arriving into Vancouver on 27th. 

Cruise Mapper is not accurate. On our World Cruise they are also a day out. Personally, I only use them as a very last option, when I can't find info on other websites.

[Heidi13]

5 hours ago, Paulchili said:

I still don’t believe that they always planned on arriving on the 26th. If so, they surely made the mess of it for both disembarking but especially embarking passsengers.

If they were wrong with the dates, all ports before Vancouver and the entire season would be incorrect. I also confirmed it with the port, who I would tend to believe before speculation.

[Heidi13]

4 hours ago, Paulchili said:

Exactly. Not to mention having to deal with your luggage till 5 PM for independent travelers. Many might be arriving that morning or even if they arrived a day or two earlier, you’ll have to check out of the hotel by noon. Sure, one can leave the luggage at the hotel but I am sure everyone is anxious to get on the ship ASAP and get settled in.

Vancouver accepts luggage when the Longshoremen are available, normally as early as 10:00, sometimes even by 09:30. You can head down to arrivals, drop bags, then go spend time in Vancouver until you want to check-in.

[Relaxing Rita]

4 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

Having difficulty figuring out why going from a hotel to the BC Ferries terminal, which on the mainland are at Tsawwassen and Horseshoe Bay . If you mention which hotel you are in maybe I can make some suggestions. If close to Skytrain that might be a better option. 

 

Sorry for the confusion .... We will be disembarking Orion on May 26th. So now we will be going from the ship by tender, bus to a hotel (still to be named), collect our luggage with 900 others and then we need to get to the BC Ferries Connector at Pacific Central Station. I assume now it will be a taxi ride for the 4 of us... just happy I hadn't made any reservations. Just need to get to Victoria sometime that day!!