karen11g

Very excited for you - have a fantastic trip!

Just returned from an Antarctica Circle Expedition on Hurtigruten's MS Roald Amundsen. I can't say enough positive things about the cruise, the ship, the crew and the cruise line. Some comments: 1. Our cruise was cancelled twice due to Covid. The second time it wasn't cancelled until after we had arrived in South America. We booked with and so dealt with the Norwegian office, and their customer service was stellar throughout. Though we booked our own flights and flew to Chili several days early, we were refunded all sunk costs for our trip to South America for the cancelled cruise - airfare, trip insurance, hotel in Santiago - and rebooked the following season at the price we originally paid back in early 2020. 2. The Roald Amundsen will book up to 500 passengers on cruises to Antarctica. Because only 100 people are allowed on landings at a time, that means you'd expect only one landing per day. Our itinerary included 10 days in Antarctica, so we were good with choosing a trip/ship with one landing per day. However, there were just over 300 passengers on our cruise. Hurtigruten could have chosen to stick with one landing per day, and we wouldn't have complained - it's what we signed up for. They didn't do that. The crew worked hard to give us two experiences every day that weather and seas permitted. Several days we did two landings, other days we did a landing and a Zodiac cruise. Twice we sailed and landed where no Hurtigruten ship had ever been, and the crew's excitement about that enhanced our experience of it even more. 3. The entire crew was fantastic - expedition team, restaurant/kitchen staff, hospitality/cabin staff, officers. They worked hard, but were unfailingly friendly and positive. There was clearly camaraderie among the staff, and the friendly interactions with passengers came across as very genuine. Scientists and naturalists on board were obviously excited about their fields and seemed genuinely thrilled to share their knowledge with us. I kept thinking about how many times they must have given their lectures and answered the same questions, but if they were tired of any of it, they sure didn't let us see it. At every opportunity the crew of the Amundsen went above and beyond. 4. The ship was beautiful and was kept spotlessly clean, our cabin was spacious and well designed, and the food was very good. We were not their top paying customers - we were in a "polar outside" cabin on Deck 5 paying 2019 fares - and we had a stellar experience. Antarctica is otherworldy, stunning, indescribable. We expected to enjoy an expedition to the 7th continent, but were blown away at every turn. If you're thinking about an expedition cruise, we couldn't recommend Hurtigruten and the MS Roald Amundsen more highly.

I need to add one more "kudo" to Hurtigruten for their customer service. When our January Antarctica cruise was cancelled and rebooked, the fully paid cruise price was transferred to our new booking for Jan 2023. The problem was that we need a pre-existing condition coverage waiver with our trip insurance, and you can only get that if you buy trip insurance within a couple of weeks of making the first payment toward your trip. Our first payment toward our (now) 2023 trip was early 2021 (the deposit for what was supposed to be our 2022 trip), and we needed new trip insurance. Hurtigruten worked with us to cancel our booking and give us a completely new booking at the same price, then refunded us the first cruise's payment, so we could pay from scratch. Our new first payment is now April 2022, so we were able to get the insurance waiver we needed. (Checked with the insurance company first to make sure that would work.) It's really just an administrative thing, but we appreciate they did this for us and took care of the refund quickly. Again, very impressed.

I've read some negative reviews of Hurtigruten customer service, and I'm sorry some have experienced that. But I feel compelled to give another view based on our experience. We booked through the Norwegian site, so our customer service experience has been with that office. Every contact with anyone from their office has been positive, but I have to call out one person in particular. Several months before the cruise, I emailed Hurtigruten with some questions and a customer service agent named Diana responded. From that point forward, I just replied to the same email if I had a question or concern, and Diana made it a point to respond to me, even though it was a general customer service email address. We were booked on the Jan 11 MS Roald Amundsen cruise to Antarctica that was cancelled at the last minute due to the Omicron surge. Diana knew we had already flown to Santiago a couple of days before the cruise (I had contacted her to make sure the cruise wasn't going to be cancelled), so she called me to give me the bad news. She had to try several times before reaching me, and she said she wanted to catch me before we got the news via email or text. Very, very kind. Because we had already embarked on the trip, the money we spent for trip insurance, airfare and the Mandarin Oriental in Santiago were sunk costs. I asked Diana if Hurtigruten would do anything about that, and she said she really couldn't help - we'd have to fill out the "feedback form" on the website. This did not sound good. However, a couple of weeks later, Guest Relations replied and asked for receipts for those expenses and the information needed to wire funds. Today - the next day - the full amount was deposited into our bank account, about $5,500 USD. Hurtigruten had no control over Omicron, but they took full responsibility for the last-minute call to cancel. We couldn't be more pleased with our experience and are already looking at a Northern Lights cruise with them in the future.