Nearly there! (First VOC)

[SailorPaulH]

After having our 2021 Iceland's Majestic Landscapes cancelled (COVID) and then the same cancelled in 2022 (injury), we are now 5 days away from our outbound flight for a hastily rescheduled substitute Viking Homelands cruise - so this is the closest we have made it to our first VOC! Hopefully, there won't be a Lufthansa strike to screw it up this upcoming weekend (although I assume Viking has a contingency plan for things like that). Looking forward to being an official member of the VOC family!

[duquephart]

2 hours ago, SailorPaulH said:

After having our 2021 Iceland's Majestic Landscapes cancelled (COVID) and then the same cancelled in 2022 (injury), we are now 5 days away from our outbound flight for a hastily rescheduled substitute Viking Homelands cruise - so this is the closest we have made it to our first VOC! Hopefully, there won't be a Lufthansa strike to screw it up this upcoming weekend (although I assume Viking has a contingency plan for things like that). Looking forward to being an official member of the VOC family!

 

Their contingency plan will be to put you in a hotel until they figure things out.

[Peregrina651]

3 hours ago, SailorPaulH said:

Looking forward to being an official member of the VOC family!

 

With the amount of time you have already spent here, I would say you are already a member of the family.

 

May these five days just fly by!

[Jim Avery]

45 minutes ago, duquephart said:

 

Their contingency plan will be to put you in a hotel until they figure things out.

That drug rehab hostel in Frankfurt they put us up in was nice.  Lots of interesting folks.....😎  Ha, just a kidder.  They have always put us in really nice hotels.

[SailorPaulH]

We made it! Our outbound flights made for a long day as we had a 6-hour layover in Frankfurt.

 

Viking Jupiter is a great ship and the crew have been attentive and excellent. Really like our cabin. Good food in all locations we tried - trying Mandredi's tonight. Stockholm and Mariehamn were first two stops, good excursions. Sea day today, getting a lot of use out of spa.

 

So far, so great .

[CDNPolar]

1 hour ago, SailorPaulH said:

We made it! Our outbound flights made for a long day as we had a 6-hour layover in Frankfurt.

 

Viking Jupiter is a great ship and the crew have been attentive and excellent. Really like our cabin. Good food in all locations we tried - trying Mandredi's tonight. Stockholm and Mariehamn were first two stops, good excursions. Sea day today, getting a lot of use out of spa.

 

So far, so great .

Happy you are enjoying yourself.  Our last cruise was Homelands on Jupiter.  We did not get to Mariehamn so hope you enjoy that too.  Our favourite is Chef's Table.  The menu changes every three days and we book for each menu change.  

[SailorPaulH]

On 9/13/2022 at 5:03 PM, CDNPolar said:

Happy you are enjoying yourself.  Our last cruise was Homelands on Jupiter.  We did not get to Mariehamn so hope you enjoy that too.  Our favourite is Chef's Table.  The menu changes every three days and we book for each menu change.  

We got to Mariehamn, and did the cycling excursion. Unfortunately, wind levels prevented docking at Bornholm, so basically another Sea Day. Viking refunded our prepaid bike excursion on Bornholm quickly to our onboard account.

 

What happens when a port is missed with a sea day substituted? Does Viking issue any kind of credit?

 

P.S. Loving every aspect of our first VOC. This Viking Homelands is a nice itinerary. I can't believe how quiet our cabin is, and most of the time it feels like there is hardly anyone on board.

[CDNPolar]

36 minutes ago, SailorPaulH said:

What happens when a port is missed with a sea day substituted? Does Viking issue any kind of credit?

 

P.S. Loving every aspect of our first VOC. This Viking Homelands is a nice itinerary. I can't believe how quiet our cabin is, and most of the time it feels like there is hardly anyone on board.

Unfortunately, there is no credit for missed port.  We missed Bornholm too because of high winds.  I think that this is in your ticket contract that ports can be missed or substituted based on weather and other reasons.  This is one part of cruising that you just have to accept.

 

We travel to Antarctica in December and our TA made it very clear that landing on the continent any day is 100% down to the weather and there is no credit for missing a landing.  Horrible to think that you travel that distance to step on Antarctica and you may not get the chance to.  Again - this is just a part of cruising.

 

Glad you are loving it.  We love Viking.

[Peregrina651]

No credit for missed ports.  These things happen.  It's mother nature and it is just one of the gambles we take.  

[duquephart]

Tellus will throw you a bone if you ask. Bornholm is often missed. What is the definition of insanity?

[SailorPaulH]

1 hour ago, Peregrina651 said:

No credit for missed ports.  These things happen.  It's mother nature and it is just one of the gambles we take.  

I figured that, and it's OK. I would imagine small island ports like Bornholm, Aland, Faroes are vulnerable to such conditions.

 

I am trapped on a Viking Cruise ship, lol. What can I eat and drink next?

[bookbabe]

Does Viking not at least refund the port fees related to that missed port?  

[FetaCheese]

Have experience with X, RCCL. If port was CXL'd, received an OBC for charges.  On HAL, received an OBC for a portion of port charges, although no ports missed.  Presumed port charges were an estimate, and actual were less.  

[Haqdeluxe]

Viking does not break out and charge you separately for any port fees. So there is nothing to reimburse. Of course if you can find such a charge on your billing...

[SoDakPirate]

On a Viking cruise in 2018 we were unable to stop in Porto due to rough seas. Upon returning I spoke with my (now former) travel agent to see if she could get us a small credit as we were considering a 2019 cruise. She said she spoke with the Viking business agent and there was nothing they could do.

I called Viking and explained that we missed a port that we were very much looking forward to. He asked if we would be satisfied with $800 PER PERSON, if we booked a cruise within one year. Satisfied?  I was elated and proceeded to book a new cruise with my new agent.

It doesn't hurt to try. Tell them how much you enjoyed your 1st Viking experience and are looking forward to additional cruises. You may get lucky and get a sympathetic Viking ear!

[SoDakPirate]

To clarify - this was a credit taken off our invoice, NOT an onboard credit!

[LindaS272]

6 hours ago, duquephart said:

Tellus will throw you a bone if you ask. Bornholm is often missed. What is the definition of insanity?

Missed Bornholm due to winds on our first VOC to St. Petersburg. Never thought of asking for any OBC, just enjoyed a sea day in an otherwise busy itinerary!

[duquephart]

1 hour ago, LindaS272 said:

Missed Bornholm due to winds on our first VOC to St. Petersburg. Never thought of asking for any OBC, just enjoyed a sea day in an otherwise busy itinerary!

 

We also enjoyed a sea day. And $1,000.

[Mrs Miggins]

SailorPaulH, my good friend Dorothy and her husband Tony are on your cruise.  There are only 20 from the UK onboard apparently so their accent will give them away.    Lovely couple so if you come across them say Hi from Pam.

[Spurlady]

Please share port experiences and excursions that you have enjoyed.  We will do the Viking Homelands revised next summer and want to choose wisely.  We are mid 50s and reasonably fit, so longer walks and stairs, hills are okay.  Thanks

[duquephart]

Pulpit Rock (via Rodne) cruise. Flam Railway.

[SailorPaulH]

Just heading into Stavanger during the closing days of our first VOC (Viking Homelands). Here are our impressions:

 

Our cabin is really quiet and comfortable (we have a deck 7 PS). Excellent cabin attendants. Great ship.

 

We usually do WC (and sometimes room service) for breakfast - overall very good.

 

The Restaurant - we have had great meals here every evening. Lots of regional variety.

 

Manfredis - hit and miss. Good veal, steak. Mushroom soup was very good. One pasta dish was a bad miss. For me, being spoilt by some great Italian restaurants near my home, I would say Manfredi's is about average.

 

Have not tried Chef's Table - its not our thing, but fellow pax like it a lot.

 

Fortunately, we both like to exercise a lot, or we would be in trouble with all these extra calories!

 

We have enjoyed all the ports - we like this itinerary and we look forward to the remaining ones. Guides have been very good to excellent.

 

In Oslo, we did our own thing and for a $12 all day tram ticket and 10 miles of walking got to see a lot. We will be in Oslo (and Bergen) for more than a week in the future, so we are getting a taste now.

 

Looking forward to our re-re-scheduled VOC Norway/FI/Iceland cruise in 2024. Will even have same cabin on Venus.

 

Viking has a new satisfied VOC customer.

[SailorPaulH]

On 9/16/2022 at 3:20 AM, Spurlady said:

Please share port experiences and excursions that you have enjoyed.  We will do the Viking Homelands revised next summer and want to choose wisely.  We are mid 50s and reasonably fit, so longer walks and stairs, hills are okay.  Thanks

What we did:

 

Stockholm: Vasa Museum and port cruise. Nice lunch.

Mariehamn: we went cycling. If you are used to real hybrid or road bikes, these bikes are uncomfortable and make things harder than it needs to be, but for us a 10-12 mile ride in the Aland/Finnish countryside was a positive.

Gdansk: we did the town walk and Malbork Castle tour. Excellent and our guide was great.

Borholm: missed port (weather). We had planned to go cycling.

Berlin: It's a long day with the train rides, but worth it. You see a lot in a compressed time frame (coach then river cruise), and our guide was very good.

Copenhagen: did the included walking tour in the morning. Good photo opps and good guide. We did the Palace and Tivoli in the afternoon - very good.

Aalborg - we enjoyed the included walking tour, we had a fantastic guide on this one.

Oslo - did our own thing, putting our research to good use.

Gothenburg - did the included Panorama tour in the morning, could take this or leave it, but guide was good. Did the Gunnebo House tour in afternoon. Interesting history, good guide and the host at the house was great.

 

We plan to do a Lysefjord cruise at Stavanger. For this visit to Flam, we will do the all day train (to Voss). A future visit we have other activities planned (hiking, cycling). In Bergen, we will do our own thing (booked our Floibanen independently), some hiking and booked lunch at Fjellskal.

 

Hope that helps.

[Spurlady]

Thank you so much SailorPaulH.  

[SailorPaulH]

On 9/21/2022 at 4:05 AM, SailorPaulH said:

 

We plan to do a Lysefjord cruise at Stavanger. For this visit to Flam, we will do the all day train (to Voss). A future visit we have other activities planned (hiking, cycling). In Bergen, we will do our own thing (booked our Floibanen independently), some hiking and booked lunch at Fjellskal.

 

Update to the above:

 

Stavanger: we went on the Pulpit Rock Cruise - we liked this a lot, and our guide was excellent. Note: as the stay in Stavanger is short, you will not have time to do anything else if you do this Lysefjorden cruise.

Flam: the reason we booked the Full-Day Train to Voss excursion was it was advertised as including a visit to the world-famous Stalheim Hotel, an important historical sight that was of great interest to us. Instead of boarding the train in Flam as advertised, we were bussed to Voss, completely side-stepping Stalheim. Our tour instead concluded with a descent by train to Flam after a lunch in Voss. Some elements of this tour were very enjoyable, but I was beyond annoyed to miss Stalheim and feel this Excursion was improperly advertised. Our guide was below average also. I sent a complaint about this mis-leading advertising to tellus@vikingcruises.com. No response as yet.

Bergen: we did our own thing. Booked our own Floibanen train tickets, booked our own Mt. Ulriken cable car tickets, hiked in both areas at the top. Explored Bryggen, the town center and had an amazing lunch at Fjellskal. No need for the Viking excursions here for Bergen-centric explorations, IMO - but next time we are in Bergen we will likely do the Dale of Norway excursion.

 

Also a note about the spa: I thought I would try this one time as a novelty - instead I ended up there 6-7 times after long day, hike or cycling days. The hot/cold/hot/cold cycles work great. I got more use out of the spa than I would have thought. Wifey had 3 massages at the spa during our cruise and loved it.