Viking Mars ... Is she ready to sail?

[PBodek]

We're scheduled to sail on the Mars' second sailing out of Bergen to London on 6/11.  In MVJ, there is nothing to book, no restaurants or shore excursions and we are exactly 6 weeks from sailing.  Yesterday there were many cabins available.  Today the cruise is "Sold Out".  I'm getting the sinking feeling (pun intended) that this cruise will be canceled, possibly Mars isn't ready?  Do they cancel for too few passengers?

[johneb2]

A number of us are scheduled to sail on the Chairman’s cruise right before your cruise.  We have received all our info. The excursions were a little late in getting posted .  Note: our cruise is not listed anywhere as it is a repositioning cruise that was opened up to the passengers who were involved on the Viking Sky incident 3 years ago.  This will be the Mars first sailing.  We will let you know how it goes 

[Heidi13]

Although I haven't seen any media release that the build is complete and ship has been handed over to the owners, the AIS is showing she is under the Norwegian Flag. This tends to indicate she has already been handed over to the owners from the shipyard.

[JDincalif]

7 hours ago, johneb2 said:

A number of us are scheduled to sail on the Chairman’s cruise right before your cruise.  We have received all our info

Just checking: Have you received final documents/instructions/luggage tags yet? We're awaiting this voyage more eagerly than usual!

[johneb2]

40 minutes ago, JDincalif said:

Just checking: Have you received final documents/instructions/luggage tags yet? We're awaiting this voyage more eagerly than usual!

Not yet.  Everything we have received is through MVJ

[PBodek]

1 hour ago, JDincalif said:

Just checking: Have you received final documents/instructions/luggage tags yet? We're awaiting this voyage more eagerly than usual!

We have received nothing!  I did notice that our flights have been ticketed.

[TomMMD]

We are on that cruise as well & we have made some dinner reservations via.  MVJ.

 

Have not seen excursions yer.

 

[johneb2]

Also I might add for all the Viking trips we have taken we didn’t receive the documents until about 20 days before departure.  Since this is a special cruise it might be handled differently 

[SailorPaulH]

On 4/23/2022 at 7:51 PM, PBodek said:

We have received nothing!  I did notice that our flights have been ticketed.

Question: is there a way of determining on MVJ if your flights have been ticketed?

 

When I go MVJ -> Air -> Air Booking: I see information for our flight schedule with an Airline Booking #, but I don't think that means it has been ticketed yet, am I right?

[Virgo61]

There is a Facebook group for the May 28th sailing. Someone on there posted a picture of their received luggage tags and documents. We are also on that sailing and haven't received ours but we did book with a TA so that could take longer.

[philw1776]

Just hope your Mars excursion sails before Elon Musk buys Mars & takes it private!

[Azulann]

20 hours ago, SailorPaulH said:

Question: is there a way of determining on MVJ if your flights have been ticketed?

 

When I go MVJ -> Air -> Air Booking: I see information for our flight schedule with an Airline Booking #, but I don't think that means it has been ticketed yet, am I right?

The ticket number will be a 16 digit number. The other one is the confirmation # which is all letters. 

Be sure to scroll down  to bottom of page. My ticket number was way down at end of page, I got it from my TA .

when is your sailing? 

[SailorPaulH]

31 minutes ago, Azulann said:

The ticket number will be a 16 digit number. The other one is the confirmation # which is all letters. 

Be sure to scroll down  to bottom of page. My ticket number was way down at end of page, I got it from my TA .

when is your sailing? 

I don't have the 16 digit number as yet. Sailing is on July 6th (but outbound flight is June 30th because of pre-cruise extensions).

[MW4AU]

On 4/25/2022 at 1:52 PM, SailorPaulH said:

Question: is there a way of determining on MVJ if your flights have been ticketed?

 

When I go MVJ -> Air -> Air Booking: I see information for our flight schedule with an Airline Booking #, but I don't think that means it has been ticketed yet, am I right?

A sure fire way to know if you are ticketed, is to sign in to your airline account... ie.Delta. If you are ticketed,  you will be able to change your seats and upgrade seats if available. We are on the June 11th cruise and just got ticketed 5 days ago. Still no excursions. TA checked and said they are having issues with new tour operators???

[SailorPaulH]

5 minutes ago, MW4AU said:

A sure fire way to know if you are ticketed, is to sign in to your airline account... ie.Delta. If you are ticketed,  you will be able to change your seats and upgrade seats if available. We are on the June 11th cruise and just got ticketed 5 days ago. Still no excursions. TA checked and said they are having issues with new tour operators???

I checked the airline - Icelandair in this case, and conclude I am not ticketed yet. Should I push VA Plus on this, or just be patient. I do recall being ticketed earlier than this in the past by VA Plus for some VRC bookings.

[MW4AU]

22 minutes ago, SailorPaulH said:

I checked the airline - Icelandair in this case, and conclude I am not ticketed yet. Should I push VA Plus on this, or just be patient. I do recall being ticketed earlier than this in the past by VA Plus for some VRC bookings.

We just returned from a cruise, and had the same issues with getting ticketed. I was anxious to upgrade our seats. After much delay, they did finally ticket us about 60 days out. Never was able to upgrade our seats.

[biggerbearmom]

Typically they ticket approximately 70 days out from the flight. 
I found this out from calling the Viking air department last month.

I had been  waiting for my June 10th flight to be ticketed, and sure enough on day 68 I checked I was able to go in to UA and see that it had been ticketed.

Edited April 28, 2022 by biggerbearmom

[BigBee51]

We are 58 days out from our international flight and have not been ticketed yet but our reservations are in the Delta reservation system so I am not going to fret just yet. 

[SailorPaulH]

20 hours ago, MW4AU said:

We just returned from a cruise, and had the same issues with getting ticketed. I was anxious to upgrade our seats. After much delay, they did finally ticket us about 60 days out. Never was able to upgrade our seats.

Thanks all for your input and help - I decided to call VA Plus. I asked for flights to be ticketed and they did it - they even apologized for things running a little late on ticketing. Set ourselves up with seating, so I think they did a good job overall. Again, just a little pre-emptive transparency would save Viking a lot of customer service calls. 

[MW4AU]

2 hours ago, SailorPaulH said:

Thanks all for your input and help - I decided to call VA Plus. I asked for flights to be ticketed and they did it - they even apologized for things running a little late on ticketing. Set ourselves up with seating, so I think they did a good job overall. Again, just a little pre-emptive transparency would save Viking a lot of customer service calls. 

Happy to hear that! We book with a TA, and have him call Viking to ticket us. In 2019 they ticketed us 90 days out.  This time they were delaying as long as they could, perhaps because of Omicron sweeping through Europe. It took 3 calls over 2 months. 🙂 Have fun on your trip! 

[Heidi13]

Viking Mars was delivered to owners today and she has a couple of tugs standing-by. AIS shows she will arrive in Dubrovnik tomorrow, so looks like she is preparing to sail from the shipyard.

[Squawkman]

Good to hear - we’ll be on the Mars in August for Iceland’s Majestic Landscapes.

[Heidi13]

Viking Mars has now departed the builder's yard

[Haworth]

On board Saturday week, 21st May, can’t wait

[Twitchly]

1 hour ago, Haworth said:

On board Saturday week, 21st May, can’t wait

So will your group be the first? If so, you’ll have great bragging rights — the first people ever to cruise on Mars! 🪐