cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 #1 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Hi all!! Before I start..... THANK YOU!! Thank you to all of you who answered my questions throughout our planning stage and to all of you who contributed to these Cruise Critic Boards (and Tripadvisor) with your questions and responses which I was able to peruse and use (steal) your answers to plan our trip. CC truly is an awesome resource and I would not consider taking a cruise without consulting my fellow cruisers who truly are a wealth of information. And now is my chance to pay it forward. What will follow on these pages are details of our 23 day adventure, 7 of which was aboard the Viking Ingvi cruising the Rhine River, Amsterdam to Basel, from July 25 - August 1, 2014. So grab a glass of wine (or maybe a bottle would be better as this will take quite some time to pull together) and settle in to travel along with us vicariously. There will be written details, there will be photos (lots of photos...not sure how many I took but lets just say hundreds, only a small percent of which will be posted here!!), there will be the Viking Dailies, there will be some menus (with some food photos), and there will be lots of other information that you may or may not find useful with your planning process. And we will do our best to answer all questions along the way. In addition to the 7 day Rhine River cruise on the Viking Ingvi, we had travel plans both pre and post cruise which we had arranged ourselves. Our flight was booked flying Toronto – Brussels with our first 3 days based in Ypres, Belgium. This was our base to visit numerous WW1 sites, with an emphasis on those with Canadian significance. The next 3 days we were based in Amsterdam before boarding our river cruise. Post cruise, we spent 3 nights in Switzerland (2 in Lucerne and 1 in Basel). We then took the train to Paris where we spent 5 nights prior to heading back to Brussels for our final evening prior to returning to Toronto. There were six of us along on this adventure, myself (Jerry - 51) and my wife (Patti -50), my sister-in-law (mid 50’s who was celebrating obtaining her Master’s degree) and her recently retired husband (mid 60’s), and my in-laws who are late 70’s but still very active. So we had a wide age-range among our group which may give differing perspectives...or not. What will follow throughout this review are our personal thoughts, observations, and experiences. Different people will see the same event differently but we are all fairly easy going, are active travelers, and try to get the best out of each experience. I apologize now for all spelling mistakes (and there will be some) and any errors I make in posts....my goal is to provide information and pay forward to try to assist others in the planning of their adventures. I am also going to try to provide links to websites we used during our 18 months of pre-cruise planning. OK, confession time.....yes I am a planner, I am one who searches for all available info, researches, compiles lists, researches some more, and needs to know the details / options before I leave home. I do not need to have every minute of the day planned out, but I do need to know what I could do in each town / city so I can decide how to spend my time in each location and adjust based on weather, time available, delays, energy level, etc. And I travel with lots of stuff. This includes a detailed spreadsheet of our full itinerary by port / city, an Ipad with numerous PDF’s/maps saved for each city, a Lenovo laptop, a GPS (for our rental vehicle in Belgium), an Iphone, a camera (nothing fancy but a nice point & shoot that will fit in my pocket and has served me well – for those interested it is a Sony Cybershot DSC-HX9V, 16.2 megapixel with a 16x optical zoom but no interchangeable lens, etc that a DSLR would have).... and numerous power cords / adapters to make this all work....ok, now that I have admitted that we can move on..... Jerry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #2 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Our itinerary was as follows: Day 1: Amsterdam, Netherlands Day 2: Kinderdijk, Netherlands Day 3: Cologne, Germany Day 4: Koblenz & Rüdesheim , Germany Day 5: Heidelberg & Speyer, Germany Day 6: Strasbourg, France Day 7: Breisach, Germany Day 8: Basel, Switzerland Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nana541 Posted August 11, 2014 #3 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Looking forward to it !! Sent from my iPhone using Forums Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #4 Share Posted August 11, 2014 We sailed on the Viking Ingvi, what Viking refers to as a Longship. The Ingvi looked brand new, having been launched earlier this year. The layout of the ship is as follows: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #5 Share Posted August 11, 2014 The Ingvi was longer than I had anticipated Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KirkNC Posted August 11, 2014 #6 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Thanks for the report! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #7 Share Posted August 11, 2014 I will start with our arrival at the boat, given this site is based on cruising. Once we have toured the ship in full , I will then provide some details of each port / city, including our pre and post details as these can easily be arranged for anyone who is somewhat adventurous (which if you are looking on these boards, you are!). So we arrived at the Ingvi via private shuttle given we had spent 3 days in Amsterdam pre-cruise (details to follow later). We used "Shuttle Amsterdam" and they were very reliable. Bags were taken by staff upon our arrival Boarding the ship (those red items are umbrellas for your use if needed) This is the lobby you see when you board Check in was a breeze...maybe 2 minutes at most The front desk area Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #8 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Across from the Front Desk, is a small area selling Viking amenities Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #9 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Also in the lobby is a future cruise sales desk And a guest book that very few people sign... And here is our crew for the week, all of which were professional, hard working and given the small ship, performed numerous duties A different angle of the main lobby And there was an elevator (it does not go to the sun deck) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #10 Share Posted August 11, 2014 The view of the lobby from above You will find this painting at the top of the stairs And this description of the painting Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #11 Share Posted August 11, 2014 The small library is in the upper lobby The papers on the table are a daily recap of the news. We saw versions for the US, Canada and the UK. The computer station is also in the area. There was free WIFI on-board but it was very slow in the cabins or on the sun deck. Numerous people were sitting in the main lobby to use the internet as it seemed to work best there, but still very slow. Another sitting area Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #12 Share Posted August 11, 2014 On either side of the lobby is a coffee station, available 24 hours. Options.... And for those like us who prefer tea.... In the mornings there are pastries available And OJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 11, 2014 Author #13 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nana541 Posted August 11, 2014 #14 Share Posted August 11, 2014 This is great! I had to go get my IPad as I was reading your report on my phone and the pictures needed to be bigger so I could enjoy them!! Can't wait to share with my DH, we are not even sailing on Viking but I am excited to read and see everything. Thanks so much for taking the time, and please write some more :) Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rothbury Posted August 11, 2014 #15 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Taking this same itinerary in December. You are doing a great review. Can't wait for the next "chapter". Thank you so much for taking the time & effort to do this! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare Got2Cruise Posted August 11, 2014 #16 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Great pics and it gives folks a good idea what River Cruising is all about. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
travelqueen555 Posted August 11, 2014 #17 Share Posted August 11, 2014 Thank you so much for taking the time to put all of this together. I too, have been pouring over the boards for any and all information for our upcoming river cruise in 2015, just as it sounds like you did the year and a half before your cruise. I have posted reviews in the past and know how time consuming it can be. So again, thank you so much taking the time to share your knowledge and pictures of what looks like was an amazing trip down the Rhine. So looking forward to reading the rest. I have my glass (bottle) of wine ready :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexkrn46 Posted August 11, 2014 #18 Share Posted August 11, 2014 thank you reading with interest since we have a similar cruise in December. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 12, 2014 Author #19 Share Posted August 12, 2014 Thanks folks for you comments...they are always appreciated! Moving on, going forward down the hall from the coffee station takes us into the Viking Lounge. This area was used for nightly briefings about the next days events, however there is never enough seating for the number of guests on-board. Viking does need to resolve this somehow. This area was also used for the nightly entertainment. The lounge was packed for trivia night and for a music trivia night. Most nights it was a piano player who could not keep a crowd even when he started with a full room. There was not much nightly entertainment on this cruise and the piano player lacked charisma to engage the crowd in any way. The entertainment was certainly one area we felt was lacking and could have been much better, but we also know we are towards the lower end of the age scale for the target market. Having said that, my in-laws in their late 70's felt the night life was lacking.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 12, 2014 Author #20 Share Posted August 12, 2014 As we continued our walk around the boat, we went fully forward to the Aquavit Terrace where we had our first lunch on-board. This area had casual meals available as an option instead of the formal dining room. We enjoy sitting outside on our cruises and this area had great ambiance. We ate lunch here a couple of times during the week but always had dinner in the main dining room. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 12, 2014 Author #21 Share Posted August 12, 2014 After lunch we moved up to explore the sun deck. It was drizzling some that afternoon so the photos here are from various points throughout the week... The sun deck was open most of our cruise, closing just for the occasional very low bridge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 12, 2014 Author #22 Share Posted August 12, 2014 More of the sun deck.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 12, 2014 Author #23 Share Posted August 12, 2014 Hi everyone, that is all I can post for today. Still working through downloading and sorting photos. Lots more to follow soon! Jerry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rosethorn40 Posted August 12, 2014 #24 Share Posted August 12, 2014 Can't wait to see and read more. Our first Viking cruise is 4-months away, but reading and seeing about yours will make the time seem to go faster. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruisinskier Posted August 12, 2014 Author #25 Share Posted August 12, 2014 After we were finished lunch, we stopped by the front desk and were told our room was now ready. We were given our room card and were off to see our home for the next week. We had booked a balcony cabin on the second level as we always prefer to have cabins above & below to ensure no public space (noise) is nearby. We were in cabin 211 and it was a perfect spot, close enough to the main lobby for quick access (not that anything is far on these boats!) and far enough away there was no noise. We had no engine noise and it was a quiet location. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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