CDNPolar

I know what you are saying. I see Nexus advertising here and there on social media to increase membership, but that would only slow us all down. The only thing with Nexus and arriving back into Toronto, is there really is no time saving because Toronto is so SLOW at bringing luggage, by the time the luggage shows the whole aircraft has come through customs/immigration. Nexus gets us to the luggage hall in minutes, but then we wait for 30-40-50 minutes for luggage. Hope it is better in Montreal.

I have said many times before, we know what we want, cabin location, port or starboard, so we book and work out the details direct with the cruise line, and then we move the booking to our TA for the OBC, coupons, and cheque at the end of the year. Our preferred cruise line Viking, does allow us - if we pay for their Air Plus program - to still call ourselves to arrange our air, and we do without the TA being involved. For everything else, because we know Viking so well, we really don't have any issues that come up, but if we do, we email our TA and she deals with it.

Absolutely.... Our American friends talk about the cost of adding TSA and then I say "That is included in my $50 bucks every 5 years!" Nexus is a great deal for us Canadians. I did not realize at first as we typically do not transit through the USA, but the latest couple of times we did, the Global Entry was so quick and easy. Did not realize that we could use that.

Sometimes, not always, but sometimes, when you use a discounter, and you have a problem, it is harder to remedy.

On one of our cruises, the cabin crew could not get their cart past a scooter that was always parked in the hallway AND plugged in to a wall socket. A couple days into the cruise we never saw the scooter again, so I assume they were instructed that they had to keep it in the cabin. I am all for inclusion and everyone should have the same opportunity to travel, but not at the expense of the health and safety of everyone else on the ship. Ship hallways are not built as scooter parking lots, and although I see both sides, I support the cruise line mandating that the scooter must fit in the cabin. Some cruise lines don't allow electric scooters at all.

What GeezerCouple said. Costco in Canada use Manulife for travel insurance, and we have gone online with Costco and Manulife directly and not found any significant different in the cost. It is all about the policy inclusions and exclusions. What pre-existing conditions do you have including recommended tests or procedures for the future. What is the stable period for any condition. There is so much to consider outside of price for insurance and every company has different language and inclusions and exclusions. As much as I appreciate the comment that you should only take a recommendation from someone that has filed a claim - or attempted to - this is only a valid statement if your cancel or medical reason is the exact same. Everyone's need for insurance can be vastly different.

Our latest river cruise - Treasures of the Rhine - we were on the ship at 11am, but did not get our cabin until almost 3pm. Lunch was a buffet in the dining room and we were given a card to keep face up on the table wherever we were as crew came around looking for you as your cabin was ready.

We have found Viking Ocean ships well regulated in temperature. I am always hot, but also know when it is over air conditioned. Viking Ocean seem to do well in our opinion. Viking River is a different story. We find the dining room and lounge on River Ships to be far to warm. The last three River Cruises we have been on, I have left the lounge in the evening early because it is just too hot.

Am I correct that you are saying that the South African agent is a VIKING agent? If that is the case, you don't have to deal with that agent. As lovetosew says, just call Viking and talk to anyone. In our experience we have never had luck with any Viking agent being around for follow up questions.

Pre-registration will not help. For both included and optional (paid for) excursions, when you choose them you must go to the cart and pay for them at the time you book them.

I would ask the question - respectfully - if the country does not use Euros, how is tipping in Euros any better or worse than tipping in USD? They would have to go to the bank to exchange either.

The crew at the docks will know what to do. Guaranteed cabins are very common. Our last cruise, we had our cabin number only a few days before, and our cruise line sends special tags out for embarkation, which we did not get because of the short notice of our cabin. When we arrived at the dock, they just attached stickers to the tops of our bags and all was good.

Also never noticed exhaust from other ships. The Douro however does only sail in daylight hours. The ship does not move very far in total from the start to the finish of the cruise and the busses follow you the entire trip.

I did this same river cruise port to port. I researched the currencies. There were too many for me to purchase at home, and some of them were not available through my bank. Sorry, I am not going to go to a ATM with my bank card and buy currency in each country. My understanding and the direction that my favourite cruise line has given me is that the American dollar in Europe is easily exchanged at the banks and the guides and drivers are good to receive American dollars. I have gotten off excursion busses where 80% of the people on the bus are American and they are all tipping with American bills. What we should not do is tip in coins because banks will not exchange coins as a general rule. Additionally, it seems fairly well known that they like to receive crisp, clean, new American bills and at my bank in Canada, it is easy for me to get brand new bills.

We typically only book deck three of Viking Ocean and we have been the first cabin in from the Atrium and never had any issue with noise from the lifeboats/tender boats. The lifeboats are along both sides of the Atrium on deck 3, so if you are close to the atrium then you are close to the lifeboats. I have also sat in the atrium while sailing and never heard any noise. I also walk the deck 2 under the lifeboats and have never noticed any noise while the ship is sailing. Perhaps those that have stayed in cabins directly above the lifeboats might have some input?

Great Apple News article explaining the trusted traveller programs - PreCheck, Global Entry, Nexus, and Sentri https://apple.news/ANta0XyVhQTCTkvSxsDYIfg

We did a partial transit on Viking - they always offer this.

We are doing Rhine Getaway late November for 15 days - basically a Christmas Market cruise. If you are talking about Viking Homelands, that is a faboulous cruise.

This post of mine was almost a year ago and since then we use and promote eSIMS. What you are saying makes sense, and I understand your comments re the phone costs. We have tried Wifi calling with Rogers and could not get it to work. We did several trials with complicated setup and settings, but it never worked. We are now Airalo customers and use the data eSIMs from them. We shut off our home cell number and advise friends and family that we can be reached via WhatsApp calling while away. This works great for us. If someone is trying to call us that is not in the friends family circle that we email before travelling then their call is not that important. Just as a precaution that a doctors office or someone unexpectedly calls, we put change our voice mail while away to say: "This voice mailbox is not monitored. If your message is important then please email us." We change back to a regular voice mail message when we return.

I think that this is the first time that you have mentioned that you are cruising with Norwegian. Although this is the Ask a Cruise Question forum, you might be better to go to the Norwegian forum and ask this question of others that sail Norwegian and know about this? We are pretty loyal Viking cruisers and we flip between booking air through Viking and air booked on our own - totally depends on the price and if there are savings either direction. However, Viking's air program now posts your booked flights in their MyVikingJourney site well before they are ticketed, and you have the option to change airlines, flights, connections, book seats, etc. It is not just take what they give you. The cruise line or agent company will book you on contracted rates that may not be the best schedule in your eyes. The connections or airlines may not be what you want. You may not be able to upgrade your seats... There can be many restrictions when a cruise line is booking your air.

Was not thinking, but CFAR could be your best friend here as crystalspin mentioned... If you have not booked yet, but CFAR is available at the point of booking, that could be your option, but it can have its restrictions too including not full fare back. All very good advice above....

We loved both the Rhine and the Douro, but found the Douro to be one of our all time favourites that we have cruised so far. Now at about 14 Viking cruises (river and ocean) the Douro comes in at 3rd place for us with Antarctica and The Nile being in spots 1 and 2. Cannot compare these two with any other destination, so really that makes the Douro our favourite river cruise. Now for the Douro, we went in early October when the colours of the fall were covering the river banks of the vineyards. This was fantastic to say the least. Of the river cruises we have done so far, we love the river banks of the Douro the most. They were the most scenic. The Rhine can be good too for scenery, but it depends on what part of the Rhine. The Eastern Europe cruise we were on had zero scenery compared to the Douro. The Treasures of the Rhine did not compare to the Douro in scenery - in our opinion. The Viking River Ships for the Douro are smaller purpose built ships for the locks that you must pass on this river. They are half the size of a typical long ship, so the journey is much more intimate. If you look to my signature, there is a link to our YouTube channel and you will find our various river cruises on the Rhine and the Douro. These are not "commercial" videos, these are just documenting our journeys with music and scenery. This is not a monetized site, and I am not trying to drive traffic, just sharing some insights to help you to make your decision.

Yes, that single supplement is too high on many if not most cruise lines. I do understand the cruise line pricing strategy and each cabin has a value that they divide in half for the pp pricing. I would hope that one of these days new cruise ships that are built - or retrofitted - will have more single cabins. The challenge that I see is that a bathroom and reasonable closet and bed take up so much space, it would be hard to make a cabin much smaller than it already is. But some cruise lines are starting to offer more single options.

Just looking to maximize the fare where possible. The fare is really low already and even the Viking agent commented on the low fare.

Probably not, but worth the call to an insurance company and ask them right out and give them the situation. You have nothing to lose to ask.