Heidi13

Prior to moving to a more inclusive cruise line, I researched all of them, then shortlisted to Viking & Oceania, spending more time with thorough research. We now sail with Viking and your experience is exactly what we expected. With respect to the "Included" shore-ex, I concur, most are the most basic tours, being bus trips or walking tours. However, in some ports, the included tour is exceptional - Komodo Island included the walk with the dragons and Safaga was a 10-hr tour to Luxor and the Nile. When researching cruises, the "Included" tours are described on the website. Personally, we average about 30 - 50% of the included tours, with the remainder being private tours or the optional shore-ex. Overall, I found Viking's optional tours cost slightly less than similar tours with other cruise lines. On short cruises, Viking only provide complimentary drinks at lunch and dinner, although from what I read, they are very generous providing additional drinks as you leave. We take longer World Cruises, which are truly all-inclusive, with every drink up to $15 included. In 4-months we never found any drink that exceeded the $15, so had no bar bill. It has been a number of years since I did the research, but from memory, Regent did provide all-inclusive drinks (not sure if they had a max price point) and included a better selection of tours. They were also more formal than Viking and I found a disconnect between the cruise line "Rig of the Day" policy and what pax posted in CC. I seem to remember they also include complimentary flights on all cruises, whereas Viking only provide these on World Cruises, and some select cruises. Regent was more expensive, but definitely provided a more inclusive experience. Might be worth completing the same exercise I did, developing a State of Requirements. Since no cruise line will provide everything you want, my list includes "Must haves" and "Preferences" You can then research what each cruise line offers and compare it to your SoR. This exercise assists in determining if the more inclusive cruise lines provide the value you expect.

Sorry, not even close to being factual. - Prinsendam - Engine room fire caused sinking in Pacific Ocean in early 1980's - Achille Lauro - another fire resulting in sinking off Somalia in mid 1990's - Oceanos - flooding and sank off South Africa in early 1990's - Sun Vista - Engine room fire caused sinking in Malacca in late 1990's Just a few that I recall since I went to sea.

Affirmative, they have no DVD player and also don't have any accessible ports to plug your own hardware into the TV. From memory they had about a dozen TV programs, the usual US ones plus Sky News and Sky Sports. They don't have a separate film channel, but on the films tab you have a significant number of films available. In 4-months we never did watch any of the films, so no idea what was available. Checked the football results & highlights on Sky Sports, which was our only TV watching, so can't recall the other stations.

I have no doubt you could contribute by visiting the Purser's Desk.

They clearly didn't complete much fact checking for this article. Global Dream class of ships, 2 of them, were ordered by Genting's Dream Cruise brand at their own German shipyard. Based on double occupancy they had a capacity of about 5,000 pax. At max capacity, with crew, the total compliment may be close to 9,000. However, they could not carry 9,000 pax. When Genting and all their brands and shipyard filed for bankruptcy, the Global I was almost complete, so the liquidators are trying to sell the first ship in the Class. The 2nd ship, Global Dream II was early in construction. Since the shipyard was sold and the new owners are not building cruise ships, the partially completed hull of Global II was sold for scrap. At 208,000 GT, they do not have as much enclosed space as the RCCL Oasis Class ships. Since our pax preference is 750 to 1,250, we clearly wouldn't sail on those types of ships.

Affirmative, at least pre-COVID, the ships maintained a crew welfare fund. However, I'm not sure how pax could contribute to it, as we were on a World Cruise with the gratuities included. Viking contributed to the fund. This information was included the day we attended the crew training program, presented by the HR Manager, aboard Viking Sun.

Onboard ship, I am never expected to tip anyone. I provide tips at my discretion, at the end of the cruise, to those crew members that went the extra mile. The room service crew are all included in the "Discretionary Service Charges" that are added to cruises booked in North America. In the morning, the base room service crew is supplemented by waiters/waitresses from other dining venues, so on occasion you could have a member of the wait staff from the restaurant delivering breakfast.

Since your cruise is 30-days, you could probably go to one of the alternative restaurants every night, if you desired. Other than special occasions, we never book in advance at home and follow the same guidelines on cruises. We would normally decide that day we wanted something different, so would check on the TV what was available. Always got a table within 1/2 to 1 hr of our preferred time. Other nights we just turned up and were often seated after a short wait.

The Chief can provide a more detailed technical explanation. As a safety measure, the cabins maintain a slight over pressurisation, so that in the event of a fire, smoke does not enter the cabin from the alleyway. The Air Handling units provide this fresh air to a number of cabins within a fire zone. The fresh air supply is slightly greater than the volume removed by the bathroom extractor fan. Provided the doors are closed, all cabins should be slightly over pressurised. By opening the balcony door and leaving it open, the large opening removes the over pressurisation, so the fresh air supply for that zone takes the path of least resistance and tries to return the cabin pressure to normal. The other cabins get minimal fresh air from the Air handling Unit. Cabins with open balcony doors can be identified by listening for the air whistling under the cabin doors in the alleyway. Open the cabin door with the balcony door open and you create a wind tunnel.

I haven't seen any details yet, but they did mention a Galapagos tour on Viking TV the week they presented the Octantis re-positioning cruise back to Ushuaia.

All contact with fellow pax on an upcoming cruise should be on the "Roll Call" Board. If your cruise isn't listed, as per the previous post, you should start a thread, using the correct naming syntax to enable others to easily search.

I don't expect the duty-free prices have increased significantly. They were < $4 about 10-yrs ago, so probably still < $5 today for a bottle

The package may be "Included" but like everything else in the World, it most definitely isn't free. While they may not add the retail price of drinks to the cruise fare, they have at least added the product cost, which is minimal (duty free pricing). Back in my days, bottles cost less than $1.00 and even 10-yrs ago, when son worked for Princess, they were less than $4.00 and the cruise line still made profit selling to the officers. The $20 gratuity you pay per day more than pays for the cost of the drinks, and still provides money for the crew.

Singapore shipyards have extensive drydocks and are often used by the Cruise Lines, so based on the age of the ship, I suspect she is heading to drydock for her 1st Special Survey. Probably about 9 or 10 days in the shipyard, with another 3 to 4 days steaming, depending on speed, to cover the almost 1,400 n/miles to HK. Doesn't leave any additional time for another cruise, so the ship will probably deadhead up to HK.

Clearly ridiculous, but unfortunately that what our lovely Government published. It is less than an hour from YVR to Canada Place, but they require a 2nd submission on the same day. Typical bureaucratic largess. Here is a link to the requirements https://travel.gc.ca/travel-covid/travel-restrictions/cruise#entering-canada-before

We are about 30 miles from Canada Place in Vancouver and have completed numerous B2B's up to Alaska. Since I completed 2 seasons in Alaska on cruise ships and worked the BC Coast for many years I know the waters well. DW also joined me on the original Sun Princess from Vancouver when we deadheaded to Esquimalt for drydock and then also on the return to Vancouver. She also sailed on SS Oriana from Vancouver to Sydney.

Technically the North Atlantic Ocean is everything north of the Equator, where it changes to the South Atlantic Ocean. Even the furthest northern reaches of the North Atlantic when you follow the Gulf Stream and North Atlantic Drift, when Eastbound, can be pleasant sailing. I've completed a few Eastbound Great Circle crossings with max winds of about 20 kts. Just needs the right time of year and a little luck.

So true, with the exception of Thursday Island, all great ports Cairns - perfect for walking, with a walkway from the dock, around the hotel to the lagoon and then the promenade. I spent all morning one day. While most want to do the GBR, Cairns has lots of other brilliant tour options available, including the evening dinner in a candle-lit forest. Right at the end of the gangway is a brewery on the dock, just perfect after a long hot walk. Darwin - again a great waterfront with parks, beach, wave pool. Great for walking. Also has a number of great tours available and a brewery between the shops and the ship. Bali - has so many options available that a single day isn't enough. Downside is while private tour operators are available, you really can't walk into town from the ship. Singapore - ensure you read their restrictions, especially if taking public transport. Hopefully they will be at the closer dock and not out by the industrial port. You can easily purchase a transit pass and do everything on your own, or hire a local guide and take the transit.

You have a couple of points to consider - most Viking World Cruises don't have segments and they really step up the game on World Cruises. Although they are one of the newer entrants into World Cruising, they are one of the few cruise lines that can sell the entire ship for a World Cruise: - Inaugural 2018 WC, Sold out, so no segments - 2019 WC, if memory is correct, they had 4 segments - 2019/20 Ultimate 245-day WC: - The London to L/A did not sell, so this one had multiple segments and short 14-day cruises - The 119-night L/A-London had 4 segments (50% pax on WC) - 2021 WC - Sold out, no segments, but cancelled due to COVID - 2022 WC - Sold out, no segments - 2023 WC - Sold out, no segments - 2024 WC - 2 ships, with 1st ship almost sold out and 2nd ship well sold. No segments We compare this to our first WC on Princess where < 20% of pax we completing the full WC With respect to entertainment, we had a great selection of guest entertainers and the entertainment staff produced and presented individual and group shows in the Star Theatre, and also presented shows at 16:00 in the Living Room, at the piano. We also had a few game night evenings with Liar's Club, with 1 night featuring pax. The lecturers are also expanded, including astronomers, whale & dolphin chap, etc. Based on posts on the Viking Forum they also step up the meals from regular cruises, with way more specials (almost every day, sometimes both lunch & dinner). We had 3 tomahawk steak nights and a couple of T-bone specials, which are rarely, if ever offered on shorter cruises.

An interesting, but very minimal itinerary. Great price. I'm surprised they haven't included any S/Pacific stops before Cairns. Thursday Island doesn't have much - walk along the waterfront after disembarking the tender, then back for a quiet pool day.

Since you just returned from a VOC, I assume it was a short, regular cruise and not a World Cruise. The entertainment on World Cruise is significantly more varied than shorter cruises.

That is the classic issue with 3rd party websites - they often don't update the schedules. Viking has cancelled a number of the Trans-pacific cruises with the Sept 20th cruise ending in Hawaii. The ship will then deadhead to its next embarkation port. MarineTraffic provides the most accurate position information, accepting that the free version only provides AIS ground station reception.

In addition to the wait-staff, we have found situations where the housekeeping have similar excellent memories. One of our last Princess cruises, the Accommodation Supervisor stopped by the cabin to address an issue and said he had been our Cabin Steward a number of years previously. He also recalled our son was a Bridge Officer on the same ship.

Provided the management hold Certificates of Competency that are valid for use, and they are still current on the tonnage, they could operate a vessel. However, prior to my retirement, I found fewer shore staff could actually operate a vessel, never mind taking command.

You can always try the Alaska Ferry system, or check out the US Flag cruises, but they tend to be expensive.