Compare Viking to others...

[Rawmac]

Most comparisons seem to be between VO, Az and Oc.  How about Orion versus Star, Sky, Sea, Sun, Jupiter?   I am interested to find out why Orion gets such a consistently bad press.  Did the champagne bottle not break at the launch?  Or did someone drink the champagne and substitute cheap fizz?  I have my own ideas, and wonder if they are the same as yours.   

 

By the way, I have seen precious few adverse comments about the London office, and have none to add myself.  Are we just lucky, or what?

 

Should this be on a thread on its own??????

[CCWineLover]

1 hour ago, Cyber Kat said:

I don't have a lot of experience with any line other than Viking and Carnival (no comparison at all), but we recently did a cruise with Azamara - a first time for this line.  I wrote a review on the Site that Shall Not Be Named, and I was going to post it here, but I hesitated posting it on the Azamara site.  I know I will be shredded to little bits because I did not have the same opinion of their favorite line.  I'm just not in the mood for a shredding.  So this seems like as a good a spot as any.

If I'd posted it in a separate thread, the title would be "It's Not Viking!" 🙂

 

I will say first off that we thoroughly enjoyed the cruise. The ship is lovely - it is small, so the rooms are small and even though there were only 690 people, sometimes it felt a bit crowded - especially in the buffet.

One of the things we love about the Viking Ocean ships is that they never feel crowded.   There's lots of room to move and just be comfy.

The food was mostly good - some big hits, a few misses. I wasn't impressed with the service for the most part. Perhaps it's because I read so many people raving about the service, I expected something over the top. They often seemed distracted. They would say they would get cheese for pasta or more wine, then you would see them chatting at another table and either forgot what you wanted or returned long after what you wanted was needed.

We felt the service on our Viking cruise was very attentive and I thought the food was a notch better.  One of these days we will sail on Oceania so I can find out why people rave about their food. 

I got the feeling that they pay a lot of attention to regular Azamara cruisers, and not so much to first timers - which stuck me as odd, because one would think they would want to make a good first impression.

We had no interaction with the officers - something Azamara aficionados brag about - other than a brief chat with Eric, the CD, in the elevator, and I think he gave me his cold, though on all fairness, he was not the only one sick on this cruise.  And one sort of chat with Heike the hotel manager, who stopped by our table to chat with an Azamara regular - she mostly ignored the rest of us. In all fairness - it's not a reason I would choose a cruise line, but it's something we'd heard great deal of talk about.

The ports were great, the trivia was fun. Our cabin was small, but it worked for an 11 day cruise. It was bigger and nicer than the photos.  There were a few very young children that were not a bother, and no photographers or annoying announcements.

We ate in both specialty restaurants (which we had to pay extra for), and both were excellent. Better service, there than in the MDR.  Azamara also charges for internet and for drinks other than what is included on a kind of complicated list.  If you ask for a mixed drink, you have to check the list and ask for the included liquor or they will make it without and charge you.  We got an upgraded package because we had OBC.  Both people in the room do not have to upgrade or take the same level upgrade (they have 2 levels).

Unlike Viking, they do NOT include Wifi (and it was pricey!), nor do they include any excursions - which were also rather expensive.

We loved the 2 night stays in both ports. The Azamazing Evening - one of their touted included perks - was great fun and so well organized - I was impressed by that. We did not do the White Night party - another touted event - because our Bermuda visit was cut short due to a storm between there and NY. The WN conflicted with something we wanted to do in Hamilton.

We don't do shows - we prefer a cover band and the one on Journey was excellent. We went to see them after dinner each night in the Living Room. Drink waiters there were attentive and they have all sorts of good snacks and desserts at various times, and an afternoon tea with scones to rival those on Viking. We spent a lot of time there, because it was a bit chilly for the pool and there was always something going on.

One thing we found ourselves saying a lot was, "It's not Viking!" - and thus the title.

We just love Viking, but we try to give our bank account a break in between Viking cruises - which are more than the Azamara cruise. This cruise wasn't cheap, but we didn't get a big room, and we didn't have to fly or stay over before or after.  We had some OBC, that our TA was able to get for us that covered some things Viking includes, but Azamara does not.

Again - to be fair to Azamara - I don't think I would have noticed the service issues as much if I hadn't read so many rave reviews from Azamara regulars. I'm sure they are not aware of it, but they do the line a disservice by raving about it so much.

We would absolutely sail with Azamara again. I think I'd splurge for the Club Continent Suite because you get specialty dining included, and of course - more room.  Or we would go with the veranda we had and get a dining package, because the specialty restaurants were really that much better than the dining room.  I actually preferred the food in the buffet, but we like to be served for dinner.  You can do that if you sit out on the Patio Grill, but we never managed to try that.  We did eat lunch there and the service wasn't great there either.

They do have gelato - and it was very good.  I'd say comparable to Viking.  Viking's is creamier, but Azamara had some really creative, and very tasty flavors.

So in conclusion, Viking stays at the top of our list, but we would look at Azamara again.  We would also give Oceania a try one of these days.

 

 

 

What a good honest and detailed review of Azamara, CyberKat!  Thank you very much.  We also would look at them and Oceania if Viking starts getting less customer focused.   Note - there are some really good videos on YouTube on those 2 lines that appear to give a good feel for them (not the “shill” ones but the ones by us common amateur folks!)

[Pushka]

On 6/22/2019 at 9:54 AM, Rawmac said:

Most comparisons seem to be between VO, Az and Oc.  How about Orion versus Star, Sky, Sea, Sun, Jupiter?   I am interested to find out why Orion gets such a consistently bad press.  Did the champagne bottle not break at the launch?  Or did someone drink the champagne and substitute cheap fizz?  I have my own ideas, and wonder if they are the same as yours.   

 

By the way, I have seen precious few adverse comments about the London office, and have none to add myself.  Are we just lucky, or what?

 

Should this be on a thread on its own??????

 

I think you’ve reached the obvious conclusion. Something is amiss on Orion. Strangely we’ve not had the same kinds of stories, that I’ve read anyway, on the newer ship Jupiter.

[Pushka]

 

It’s all about putting the policy into execution. Delivering on the marketing promises. To put to right things that go wrong. To listen. That’s all I expected. 

[Captain_Morgan]

11 hours ago, Pushka said:

 

I think you’ve reached the obvious conclusion. Something is amiss on Orion. Strangely we’ve not had the same kinds of stories, that I’ve read anyway, on the newer ship Jupiter.

 

I think a lot of it has to do with the poor itinerary planning and sending the ship to ports they've never been to, or have limited experience with.  Sure the Sun visited some of the ports in SE Asia during the inaugural world cruise, but it was all 'one and done' unlike the ports in Norway, the Baltic and the Med where I think its safe to say they know front to back.

 

One thing we noticed as a trend seems to be that as soon as a new ship is launched, all of the focus is on the new ship and the 'older' ships are somewhat forgotten including sending the majority of the experienced crew to the new ships.  As has been mentioned, the Star being only 5 years old looks and feels a lot more tired and worn out than the Sky which is only 18 months 'younger'.  The downside of focusing on market share versus product improvement is that the little things seem to be neglected, which when they occur with frequency become big things...

[Pushka]

14 minutes ago, Captain_Morgan said:

 

I think a lot of it has to do with the poor itinerary planning and sending the ship to ports they've never been to, or have limited experience with.  Sure the Sun visited some of the ports in SE Asia during the inaugural world cruise, but it was all 'one and done' unlike the ports in Norway, the Baltic and the Med where I think its safe to say they know front to back.

 

One thing we noticed as a trend seems to be that as soon as a new ship is launched, all of the focus is on the new ship and the 'older' ships are somewhat forgotten including sending the majority of the experienced crew to the new ships.  As has been mentioned, the Star being only 5 years old looks and feels a lot more tired and worn out than the Sky which is only 18 months 'younger'.  The downside of focusing on market share versus product improvement is that the little things seem to be neglected, which when they occur with frequency become big things...

Heaven help Viking if it was an experienced crew onboard Orion then. 

 

[PJ1234]

We were recently on the Viking Sea "Viking Homelands"  We were on the Sea.

Overall, the experience was very good.  

The itinerary was great, although we were not able to get into the port at Gdansk, due to high winds and currents.  Apparently, they were close to closing that port the day we were going to dock there.

I've taken 7 cruises.  HAL and NCL to Alaska (4 times), Princess to Mexico, Sea Dream YC in the Caribbean, and now Viking.  

The food was better than HAL, but comparable to NCL, and not as good as Sea Dream.  That comparison might be unfair, because Sea Dream is super small and personal and cooks every plate to order.  

The service varied depending on the spot on the ship. The Cruise DIrector was fabulous.  The Bar on the stern next to the World Cafe gave amazing service.  

Cabin Steward was great. 

Some of the entertainment was very good, and some was so-so at best.  The Dance Party nights were really fun!

The cabin was quite small compared to NCL and HAL's comparable veranda cabins. 

One thing I found questionable... we had the Silver Spirits package, but we weren't allowed to have a bottle of wine in the stateroom refrigerator or anywhere in the room.  We were required to call room service and have individual glasses of wine delivered to the room.  Not a whole bottle, unless we paid market price for it. Not included in the package.  So, if we planned on staying in for the evening, we could not enjoy a bottle of wine in the room, unless we paid out of pocket for the bottle. LIkewise, we could not have any hard liquor stocked in our mini refrigerator.  Just soda and soft drinks.  We really don't drink soda, just water,  so it was essentially wasted space.  But we could order, say, 4 glasses of wine to the room.  Kinda stupid rule, if you ask me.  

Living in Seattle, we are very familiar with the cruise lines that go to Alaska.  Since Viking is new to this itinerary, I would be cautious to spend that kind of $$$ to go to Alaska with them until they work out the kinks.  HAL, Princess, Norwegian "own" Alaska, the ports are small, and the cruise lines that are newcomers to Alaska have to tender about a LOT.  I don't know the politics behind this but I have many friends who live in Alaska and have worked for the Cruise Ship industry and there is definitely some politics at play there. The top three really do enjoy preferential treatment when it comes to berth space in AK ports. Sounds like they're sorta "fitting Viking in" where they can.

So all in all, I'd probably sail with Viking again, but only itineraries that they are already established and familiar with.  

 

  

 

[angelhelly]

We just have come back from our Alaskan Cruise on the Viking Orion.

 

Maybe it is due to the fact we just had one tender (Juneau), or the new cruise director, or the chance to iron out the kinks, but our cruise went really well.

 

At Juneau, tender operation started at 8, and we were on the pier at 8:15 (we had a private excursion booked)

 

The ports we did the included excursions, everything ran like clockwork.

 

However, we did have the same issue about knowing about the tender. I knew what to expect because I went through the Alaska port schedule. But no info from Viking until Embarkation. That's a big miss in my book.

 

(I wont do a full review here...) This is my first cruise on a more luxury line, so I can't tell the difference. Just wanted to mention that things went better for us. Granted, I remember one crew member saying that the cruise after us had 3 tenders again, so that might be a better picture...

 

Edited July 10, 2019 by angelhelly

[suspaul]

We just returned from a mainstream cruise line, HAL, this was our 1st, last and only cruise we will do with them.  We liked the itinerary and while it was nice to see different ports, for us, but it just wasn’t Viking.  In our minds we constantly said, Viking wouldn’t do this or why did we choose this other cruise line?  

We felt we were constantly nickel and dimed to death, WiFi was ridiculously expensive and having read reviews we chose not to purchase, drink prices were higher tho we did have an included beverage package so that’s a moot point, we’re not into evening entertainment or gambling so while provided we didn’t do either, our choice.  

Shore excursions were very high, we did our own independent bookings and nothing thru the cruise line.  We missed our included, get acquainted with the port walks from Viking, we hardly ever book optional excursions and prefer doing our own thing.

Our actual cabin was quite nice however attention to detail wasn’t there, our sofa had stains which I felt was unacceptable and could have easily been cleaned even with a spray cleaner, the new and very nice large shower had mildew for 12 nights, on day 13 it was cleaned, just little nit-picky things.  

 

Having done 9 Viking river cruises and 3 Viking ocean we do realize Viking isn’t perfect but nearly is for our needs and interests.  Sometimes change is good, you realize what you miss.