mofrances

Thank you @DingoDan! That is helpful information. We are on the Nov 1 cruise as well! My conundrum now is when to arrive in Bangkok. We are flying from the US and our flight will most likely arrive just after midnight on Oct 30. So very early on that day. Hoping we can opt for a sleeping room at the ShangriLa - otherwise we will be sitting up until check in that day. Or we can choose to not arrive until very early on the morning of the 31st, but that means we miss the entire first day... First world problems I know but we are somewhat constrained by flight times. Leaning toward arriving on the 30th and hoping it will work out! Looking forward to my first Viking cruise!! Maureen

Our holiday cruise on the Muse departing Dec 21 doesn't have them posted yet either. Getting frustrated!

Hi @drron29, my husband and I are booked in Suite 1012 on the Muse for the Sydney to Auckland holiday cruise next month. We were originally in a superior verandah suite but I bumped us up as a surprise for him (he has always wanted to stay in a Silver Suite!). I am less concerned about elevator noise than smoke from the pool bar wafting toward our balcony. Was that an issue for you? It seems like an ideal location otherwise so hopefully not. Being on the pool deck will make it much easier for us to save seats at the pool in both sun and shade early in the morning that we have no intention of utilizing until much later in the day...😜 Take care, Maureen

@californiagirlwe are booked on this cruise for November 2024 as well, although the earlier one on the Orion. First time Viking cruisers so very much looking forward to the experience! Are you doing the pre or post extensions? We are - the pre in Bangkok and the 2-night post in Bali. Can't wait! On another note, I saw your post related to Diet Coke on board. All I can say is I certainly hope so! Two weeks of Diet Pepsi is unthinkable!😄

When we were on the holiday cruise in 2021 in South/Central America, the formal nights were the second night out, Christmas Day and NYE (so not Christmas Eve). But we embarked on Dec 18, so not quite as close to Christmas as your cruise. We are doing the holiday cruise on the Muse in AU/NZ this year and are assuming the formal nights will be similar. But not really sure as our second night out we are in port until 11 pm, so I don't know if that would kick the Formal Night to the third night out. Regardless, we are so looking forward to it!

Hello first time Viking cruiser here! Very excited to have booked the Bangkok to Bali trip on Orion in November 2024. We were also lucky to have booked both the pre- and post- extensions (they were sold out last week, but showed up as available today so we grabbed them!). I have two questions related to the extensions: 1. The Bangkok extension is 2 nights. Description as follows: Arrive in Bangkok and transfer to hotel for overnight. Next day included tour and free time. Overnight again. Day 2 talks about free time to visit flower markets or take a boat ride, or even an excursion to some far away temple. But isn't that the day we board the ship? And presumably it's a 2-hour ride to the port of Laem Chabang. When would the transfer bus typically leave the hotel? I'm confused... 2. The Bali extension is also 2 nights and sounds lovely. But most flights back to US leave around 1 am. So would Viking provide us transfers to the airport on the second evening (i.e. departing the hotel around 10 pm before sleeping that night), or would we have to stay that entire night in hotel, then figure out how to fill time between check out and flight time? Would love to hear any tips or comments if anyone has done either extension! Thanks!

Yes if I recall correctly there is a magnifying mirror on the credenza opposite the couch in the living room area. There is a small stool to sit at while doing makeup. Works great when trying to split up bathroom time with your sister (as I was 😊). Not sure but I believe the mirror is portable as well, so can be moved into bathroom if needed.

Oh my gosh - this would be a complete dealbreaker for me! I am with you all the way ggo85! To me that is like running out of coffee...completely unacceptable. I may have resorted to purchasing my own stash in Oslo if that happened. Very scary thought for a total Diet Coke addict...😁

Hi guys! We have only cruised once over the holidays (Christmas/New Years last year on the Moon) but I'm happy to share our experience. I also had questions about how the holidays are celebrated and which restaurants to book so you are not alone in your quest! On our cruise, both Christmas Day and New Years Eve were formal nights, and both had special menus that were served in the main restaurants of Atlantide and SALT Kitchen. These menus were the same so it didn't matter which of those restaurants you ate at. In fact, they requested that we make reservations for that night at one or the other even though neither are reservations-required venues (I'm guessing just to help them space out diners a bit - both restaurants were pretty full on those nights). I can't speak to the specialty restaurants as we ate in SALT on Christmas and in Atlantide on NYE. We chose to eat at LaDame on Christmas Eve and it was lovely. We dressed up for the occasion (it was Informal dress that night but we went full formal 🤗 as we had missed the first formal attire night due to lost luggage). And on New Years Day we ate at Kaiseki which is one of our favorites. Neither of these nights had anything particularly special going on in the restaurants. We did enjoy all the Christmas shows that the entertainment staff put on, and loved Santa's arrival in the Panorama Lounge on Christmas morning - due to Covid restrictions none of the crew could be Santa so my son Tom played the part! All in all it was a fantastic cruise and we cherish the memories. So much so that we booked again for Christmas 2023 on the Muse! Hope this helps. Take care, Maureen

I agree with Fletcher! We embarked on the Moon in Guayaquil in December (replacement for our original embarkation point of Lima). While I wasn't thrilled to miss Lima, I was pleasantly surprised at how much we enjoyed our short time in Guayaquil. We stayed at the Wyndham right by the water, which was very nice. Most of my family did a wonderful half-day tour of the city (private), with no restrictions whatsoever as to getting in or out of the van and certainly no armored guards. Of course, this was early days of Omicron so I suspect CatLover's experience the next month was tainted by that. My husband and I visited a lovely modern upscale mall with our 15-year old daughter in an effort to quickly purchase clothing for her - Delta had mishandled her luggage in ATL and it didn't catch up to us until Puntarenas. We were very grateful to the hotel concierge for advising us on where to shop, and to the multitude of shops in the mall that catered to her taste. What could have started our cruise on a sour note turned out kind of fun - we even had a great lunch at the mall food court sampling some Ecuadorian specialties! All in all, a very good experience in Guayaquil.