jkerr

Klfrodo, we have decided rebooked the same trip for next year and transfer our insurance to that trip. We will pay the rebooking fee with the credit that Viking gave us.

FYI we received notification from Travel Insured that the coronvirus would an exemption for reimbursement for flight expenses. 
My point is to let people know that your travel insurance does not cover all that you think it does. Buyer beware. 

First, I understand who the insurance company is and that they not part  Viking.

 I purchased the travel insurance through my travel agent with Travel Insured International.

Viking has cancelled their cruise. I paid $7800 for flights.  I purchased separately and included the cost in my insurance policy. 
I have not filed my claim as of yet because my travel agent is being told that the insurance company will not pay. 
I am trying to inform others that you might think that the cruise line cancelling would trigger flight reimbursement ( don’t miss the point that my insurance fee was raised to include  the cost of my flights). That’s all! 
 

I bought this policy in June 2019 when I booked my trip through Travel Insured International. The front page says  up to 100% refund if trip is cancelled. My trip was cancelled. 

Viking is refunding me the cruise portion. My comment is why do I pay for coverage of 100% of my airfare if they only cover rebooking fees? Better to save my $535 bucks for rebooking  fees.  
Really...fair, unfair..this is an insurance scam. 

Yes, this is the exact wording of my policy. I am holding off contacting the airlines and the insurance company. Singapore airlines has cancelled several flights and their list is growing. 
I am especially bothered by the fact  you must cover the cost of the entire flight, but we will only pay out $100. Rebooking fee. Really??  The fee to add the flights was much more than $100. 
just wondering what other travel insurance companies are telling their clients.

Ok..so Viking cancelled my cruise. I paid for airfare coverage long before Coronavirus was a word in my vocabulary. Booked business class with Singapore Air to the tune of $7800. Paid for travel insurance and had to cover the full amount of the airfare.  Now the story is...travel insurance  will only cover the cost to rebook even though I cannot take this trip. I don’t want to rebook. 
There are no destinations that I want to use $7800. In flights that Singapore Air offer.  Can this be true?? 

Don't forget that the cabin size and amenities for the deluxe veranda and the basic veranda are virtually the same.

 

The main difference would appear to be the ability to make an advance reservation in each of the two speciality restaurants plus the ability to book excursions slightly earlier. Also the mini-fridge is restocked with soft drinks in the DV cabins but not in the standard V cabins. A coffee machine, use of binoculars and a cashmere blanket make up the other differences as per the Viking website.

 

It is no surprise the the basic Veranda cabins sell out first.

 

Neil

Yes, thanks for the response Neil. But once you decide you want deluxe veranda and those amenities, then there is a price range of $1000.00 within the Deluxe Veranda category. My guess is that the higher decks command a higher price?

Just wondering if anyone can tell me the differences between the DV1-DV6 categories. I see a pricing difference of about $1000. from

top to bottom. Is the pricing difference based on cabin location on the ship?

Thanks

That's my cruise in September. Do you mind sharing your formula? Contact me ronh907@yahoo.com if you don't want to post it here. My first cruise so I need all the advice.

Thanks

Actually our formula is very simple and we do it for every trip we take because we don't like the unknown of finding a working ATM.

We just write our daily schedule of excursions and meals on and off the ship, plan for our free time in a port, look at transportation costs from the hotel to the port or transposition to and from airport. For the excursions, we look at tips for the guide and the driver each day. I know it does sounds complicated when listing everything out, but really it is not and it makes it calmer when you arrive and have money in hand. I used to be really crazy about getting the best exchange, but this puts my husband at ease and that is worth the cost of getting money in advance. The other thing is we always ask for smallest denomination bills available.

Once we get on the ship we, only carry the money for that country that day. We really did not get a lot of money because most things are paid for in advance. it was really just spending money and tips for the day.

Fortunately, the next trip on the Viking Star will be 9 ports all using the Euro!

Carolyn--My cruise covers 6 currencies in 2 weeks. With the included excursions, is it possible to get local currency before we take off? I know the ship doesn't provide it but will we able to obtain it before we leave port? In 3 locations there will be a journey before we reach the destination. I know we might stop for a break but I have heard that sometimes European places require coins for the rest room. I'm trying to figure out if we should get local currency for all ports from a US bank before we go to Europe just to be on the safe side. I know ATMs are probably available in most places but I just don't want to be stuck between a rock and a hard place when nature calls.

We had the same issue on the Viking Homelands last May. We did get some money for each country before we left home. Most likely the exchange wasn't the very best, but my husband does not like to be in a country with no money in his pocket. We went through each day and each country and what our plans were and kind of did an estimate of what we would need for each country. It worked out well and saved us the hunting of an ATM overtime we got off the ship.

CSB

 

Would you please post about the pizza. When we were on the maiden there was none, apparently the pizza stones didn't get on board until after we debarked.

We joined the Maiden voyage in Bergen and there was pizza the entire cruise.

We are boarding the Star

again late this month in Rome and will let you know about the pizza;)

I have been looking for smaller tours for some of the ports in Italy and have found this company, Mondoguide. They will cover the Amalfi Coast starting in Naples port, 8-9 hours for 50.Euro per person, small groups of 8-9 people, and they will put together the group for you if you are only 2 persons.

Their prices are very good and they are recommended by Rick Steves.

I believe if you contact them they can arrange other tours in Naples and other Italian ports.

https://www.sharedtours.com/

just heard from Mondoguide and the group size is 6-8 people.

This is a very good price for a trip along the Amalfi Coast.

They only conduct shared tours from Naples and private tours from other Italian cities.

I have been looking for smaller tours for some of the ports in Italy and have found this company, Mondoguide. They will cover the Amalfi Coast starting in Naples port, 8-9 hours for 50.Euro per person, small groups of 8-9 people, and they will put together the group for you if you are only 2 persons.

Their prices are very good and they are recommended by Rick Steves.

I believe if you contact them they can arrange other tours in Naples and other Italian ports.

https://www.sharedtours.com/

I would probably give this Viking "Star" tour 3 1/2 to 4 stars. ($109 pp) (Unfortunately Helsinki was right in between Stockholm and St. Petersburg and suffers a little in comparison.)

 

Relaxing bus ride out into the countryside. Visited a family-run horse farm and were welcomed into their lovely, very comfortable, large home. Very different from the palaces we would visit in St. Petersburg! The berry pie, ice cream, and coffee/tea were delicious. The owner then walked us down to the horse stables where the special treat was a teeny colt that had been born a few days early and was still very wobbly. He was very curious about us but his Mom wouldn't let him come over to the fence. Close enough though to get great pictures.

 

Tour of the tiny, ancient Church of St. Sigfrid was interesting but our guide missed pointing out some of the features - perhaps because she was trying to get her speaker to work with our headphones. There was one other bus with guide and I wound up eavesdropping on that talk. You may want to pick up a free brochure as you leave - filled in the gaps for me.

 

Back in Helsinki, we stopped off at the "Rock Church" for a short visit. That was one of the sights we particularly wanted to see and it was included in the 1/2 day tour. The bus passed by other landmarks and we had an opportunity at the end to get off the bus in the Senate Square where we could have visited the Helsinki Cathedral. Afterwards, we could have met the Viking shuttle to get back to the ship, but it was raining lightly and we decided to call it a day.

 

 

Our other choice for a ship's tour would have been to the Helsinki Ice Bar but we had been to one in Stockholm already on our own. Heard some good things about the Helsinki Ice Bar tour, but we enjoyed the one in Stockholm so much we didn't need to do this again. Plus wanted to be able to see more of Helsinki which were covered by the "Highlights and Visit to Sipoo".

Hello, OBX Cruises, just a quick question. Was the owner of the horse farm's first name Amalie?? Just wondering...we meet a Finnish woman who owned a horse farm on the maiden cruise. Thanks

There is a great video on Youtube "Baltic Cruise on the Viking Star" by scherago that shows them dining in The Restaurant and the Chef's Table while on their cruise and I would say that most people you see on the video are nicely dressed. I am bringing one jacket and tie plus several pairs of dress pants and one nice pair of shoes. Europeans tend to dress up more and since it will be cooler when we go (Nov. 26th from Venice) I expect there will not be many in shorts.

 

James

Yes Lagunajames, i agree the Europeans on the cruise tended to dress up more than the Americans. That said, my husband took one sports jacket, one tie and one pair of slacks. He wore them once to dinner. He did wear his slacks and dress shirt again sans the jacket. I wore slacks and nice sweaters and tops. I was not over or under dresses. It was May in the Baltic and cool. There were no shorts anywhere on the ship, morning, noon or night.

I had to be on the bus at 4:20 a.m. for a 6:55 a.m. flight from Venice to Rome. There was nothing available on the ship as breakfast started at 6 a.m. I did call room service and got coffee delivered to my room promptly at 3:30 a.m. This is something Viking needs to work on if they are getting people to the airport so early. They need at least a continental breakfast set up somewhere on the ship.

I thought there was 24 hours room service? I know we had an early excursion time one morning and ordered breakfast from the card we hung on the door. Even though the earliest printed delivery time was 7:00 am, we called and were told just to hand write in the time we wanted delivery. It worked for us. Hope it works again, we are joining the Star in Rome in December.

Oh and of course there is about a 30 minute photo stop at the Little Mermaid.

I know I'm either very early or very late for this question. I'm doing the Viking Homelands cruise next year and right now I'm planning Copenhagen. The included shore excursion seems very long for the description through Viking. A drive by of several well know places and then to the island where the palace and Parliament meet, among other things on the island and then back to the ship. The area covered seems to be very small and not that far from the port. Most panoramic tours I found are about one and a half hours. I did find one for 4 hours but it included touring the palace and some of that area. Panoramic usually means drive by so I'm a little confused as to what is being offered. Can anyone give me insight into the actual excursion experience?

 

Thanks

We were on the Maiden Voyage and took the Copenhagen included tour. I only mention the Maiden Voyage, because it was the first time Viking had operated tours in Copenhagen. That said, it was very enjoyable, the guide was very well informed, and you got a great overview of Copenhagen. We did get off the bus and watch the changing of the guard, but the remainder of the tour was all on the bus. Copenhagen is a very small town. That afternoon we took the Viking free shuttle back into town and then walked around for a few hours, stopped and had a drink along the water and at that point we decided we were closer to the ship than to the place where we would pick up the Viking bus so, we opted to enjoy more of the city and walk back to the ship.This gave us another visit to the Little Mermaid without the morning tourists around. The included tour gave us a very good taste of the sites and charm of Copenhagen.

this website works. We received our flight details today. Flights are fine, considering what we paid per person round trip. Thank you Viking for getting back to us. :D

Dear jkerr,

 

Thank you for reaching out. Air schedules are typically communicated to guests at 75 days prior to embarkation and we apologize yours has not yet arrived at 65 days.

 

Unfortunately, we will need your booking information to research further and would appreciate you providing it to us at TellUs@vikingcruises.com. Once received, we are happy to provide you with a more accurate response.

 

Best regards,

Viking Cruises

I sent an email on Tuesday 10/20 to the email address you suggested in earlier posts and referenced my booking number. I have sent another email today. looking forward to hearing from you, Jkerr

we depart on 12/27 for Rome so we are about 65 days out and Viking is not offering Custom Air for our cruise. I would really like to see what flights they have us on so we can upgrade or purchase our seats in advance. Viking... if you are reading this, can you please respond?

The Radisson Blu Scandanavian, good location to walk throughout the city.

We took the Flybussen from the airport to the hotel. It is the last stop on their route.

We had the least expensive Veranda room. Our room was right next door and on the same floor with the room size and configuration as those who paid more for a coffee pot and more again alcohol. You can order room service any time in the morning and they will deliver a pot of coffee within minutes. You can make a reservation for the speciality resturants once you board and there is no problem with availabilty for seating times or dates. You can walk into The Resturant ( finer dining than the World Cafe) and have no waiting for any meal. You can bring alcohol on the ship in your suitcase when you originally board and beer and wine daily if you like. But they really do serve beer and wine for about 3 hours at lunch and again for 3 hours at dinner, what they free flow.

Drinks in the bar are cheap $4-6.00. You would have a hard time spending the difference in room price in the bar.

We picked up a cancellation 18 months in advance for the Maiden Voyage and I was not disappointed in our decision to book a plain ole Veranda room.

It was fabulous!!!!

Totally agree PopsA. It was pleasure to be a part of the Maiden Voyage. It is a beautiful ship. Even the Veranda rooms were spacious. We had no coffee pot but room service delivered coffee within 5 minutes of our phone request every morning. The open spaces never seemed crowded. We were sitted immediately when we entered The Resturant. There was never a shortage of seating in the dining venues.

We were able to make reservations in Manfredi's upon boarding and were able to eat there as many times a s we liked.

Wine and beer is definitely free flow. Bar prices are very reasonable, food was incredible.

This was a fabluous way to see the Baltics. We stayed on board and watched the Christening from the ship and is was a thrill to be a part of the festivities. People who cancelled based on reviews they read on this website and have cancelled the trip of a lifetime.

I only did one load... So I can only report on that machine[emoji1]

Trying to edit... See comment below