georose

I discovered this thread only about 2 weeks ago. I am finally caught up. Thank you everyone for your most valuable insights. It is good to hear the overall experience was excellent in spite of a few glitches and the many industrial ports. Thankfully, Viking always makes it right.

Also, thank you to Passepartout, Bruce and Kathy for your blogs. Loved your stories and your amazing photos.

Happy travels!

In a way, but a different kind of “family.” Richard Wagner(1813-1883) was a German Romantic composer. “Der Ring des Nibelungen” is a four opera cycle based on Norse legends. It is traditionally performed on 6 nights, with nights off on 3 and 5. The total length of the four opera is about 15 hours.

 

It’s not for everyone but those who attend are fanatics. Friendships are formed and we have seen some people in a lot of different countries at Ring Cycles.

 

The “shrine” of Wagner is Bayreuth in Bavaria, where he built a theater devoted solely to performing his operas. We have been there twice during the yearly festival.

Thank you Ira. I would have been guessing a long time. I know of Wagner the composer from my piano days. I was not aware of this opera. Have a wonderful time!

This has been quite an experience on so many different levels. Special thanks to Glenda for her friendship and to Chuck as well for his insights and even disposition. I've enjoyed everyone with whom I've come in contact at meals, on excursions, in trivia or just walking around the ship.

 

Thanks to Tom and Sylvia for being our partners in Name That tune and for recruiting two team members whose knowledge filled the gaps.

 

I'm still not a big fan of sea days or buses, but we knew about those before we booked. right now looking forward to a couple of days in London, packed with theatre and a couple of museums, before returning to the "Sweetest Place on Earth."

 

Three, count em' 3(!) Wagner ring Cycles in the next 12 months and a ride on the California Zephyr from Chicago to San Francisco.

 

I'm on the mailing list for just about every cruise line, hotel and airline that exists, plus The Points Guy and others of his ilk so have to figure out where to spend my points and miles.

 

To all of you who followed this thread, I hope that you gained some knowledge about the Viking way of life. In the long run........we know what John Maynard Keynes said, so enjoy while you can.

Ok, I'm curious! What is a Wagner ring Cycle? Family reunion?

Sea days where blessings- you Go Go Go so it was nice not to have to get into the grind on sea days . We loved the route Viking took on this WC - this cruise with the off the ship segments was Great for us . We’ve never seen most of India, Egypt and Cambodia, so it allowed us to do these adventures .

We have decided that it’s the civilized way to see the world so we are doing Viking’s unannounced 245 day WC in 2019/20 but only the first half . God willing !

 

 

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It's been announced! What an adventure that will be!

Wagnerite, aka Ira and Carol. We thoroughly enjoyed your gregariousness while we were on the Cuba/Panama part of the cruise. We also enjoyed your pics on the My Viking page.

Thank you for your comments regarding your overall thoughts of the trip . We appreciate your insights. We are having second thoughts regarding our Grand Pacific Voyage. There aren't very many sea days, but it's the industrial ports being so far from where we might want to be that concern us.

Have a safe trip home. Who knows, we may meet again. Bob and Rose-Marie

Day 141 is fast approaching. What are your overall thoughts?

Food?

Tours?

Time on your own?

Ports? (Industrial vs Cruise)

People?

Days at sea? (Too many? Not enough?)

Activities?

Entertainment?

Repetition of food and entertainment?

What was your favourite thing to do?

Recommendations?

Anything else you can think of.

My cruise summary page is totally blank except for dates and ports. No arrival time, no excursions, no departure times. I may not have had excursions booked(lowest cabin level) when they printed it but final confirmed arrival and departure times would have been nice.

Our first Viking cruise, 50 day Viking Empire, we had a booklet personalized with all our tour reservations, recommended restaurants in each port. We did not get this for our second tour. We were very disappointed. It would be great if Viking could do this again. It was very helpful.

I am enjoying your posts, Jim Avery. Sure liking the idea of hiring a taxi for a tour. Have you tried the idea of asking the driver to take you where he lives? To visit his family, neighbourhood?

Great idea, I can possibly tie it in with one of our tour's photo stops.

Good luck! Enjoy the adventure!

My problem may be getting off the ship without a visa :(

Will you be going on a tour? Maybe you can arrange something around that. If Algiers is like Russia, you will not be allowed off the boat unless you have that expensive visa or are part of a tour.

Georose,

 

A friend pointed me to your post. We are on the Viking Star next month. The one questionable port for caching is Algiers. Closest cache is about 3 miles from the port in a sketchy area and an expensive visa needed if not on a ship's excursion. I'm intrigued about setting up an event. Any problem with approval?

No problem. We chose a square close to the port area. It has to be away from the ships. At first they said we could not have an event with the name of the ship. When Bob pointed out there was a Norwegian event and another with a ship name, and that the reviewer himself had approved one of them, why could we not have a Viking event. It was immediately approved.

Have done some in the past but that’s not the source of my moniker. Have looked for caches in Europe. Wonder if there might be some on board. Never thought about that!

None on the ship. It would be rather difficult because the coords would be forever changing.

Have done some in the past . Not the source of my moniker though. Gee, never thought about geocaching at the various ports - or even on the ship? Maybe you should check that out!

On the Viking Empire trip, we found caches in 20 countries including the Vatican. Geocaching brought us to hidden gems we would not have found otherwise. For the Cuba Panama part of this trip, only one country, Nicaragus, has no caches so we created an event. We noticed other geocachers on other ships had done this. The time frame is vey tight because of the tours. We hope it will work out.

Geosez..are you a geocacher?

This happened to me. I contacted Viking. It was a glitch in the system and was fixed right away. Included tours are garanteed.

We were tempted. We did the 50 day Viking Empire in 2016. At that time we felt it was one week too long, mainly because we did not know what to eat anymore. Having said this, we are booked for 70 days in 2019 to explore the South Pacific and Asia. Meanwhile we are doing the MIA to LAX leg of this journey. Like everyone says, you can't take it with you and do it while you are able to. Anything can happen at anytime. It might as well be while we are doing something we enjoy!

Thank you for all these details. We really appreciate the info. Regarding the new drawers in the closet...are these along the bottom, or along one side, of the closet. When we were on the Star, we had brought folding shelves which hung over the curtain rod. Sounds like we may only no one of these. Now, awaiting info re the Internet. We couldn't post photos on our blog last time. So...very...slow.