If you are on a “butterfly” (back to back river cruises in different locations), can you…..

[PRH]

We are on what Viking calls “butterfly cruise” which means our Douro River cruise is on the same booking number as our Budapest to Bucharest cruise with a few days in between to get from one to the other.  Viking will not do airfare between the two but does transfers at the beginning cruise and the end of the second.  I have no interest in purchasing silver spirits for the first cruise as there will be lots of port and Portuguese wines around to drink, in addition to having very full days.  On the second cruise, I would like to have SS but not sure I can purchase it separately.  In MVJ, it is sold as covering both.  We leave for Portugal in two weeks.  Anyone have experience with this on a “butterfly”?  I will call my TA later today but wondering about personal experience.  Thanks!

[Mich3554]

Yes, on an ocean butterfly I would have been able to add the SS package.  It was recommended to me during our B2B2B where we lost a good chunk of the ports on the second cruise so had tons of non refundable OBC and a very picked over gift shop.  Only problem was that our experience does not make the SS package valuable for us, we only drink less than half of what it would cost.

[MikeyB]

5 hours ago, PRH said:

We are on what Viking calls “butterfly cruise” which means our Douro River cruise is on the same booking number as our Budapest to Bucharest cruise with a few days in between to get from one to the other.  Viking will not do airfare between the two but does transfers at the beginning cruise and the end of the second.  I have no interest in purchasing silver spirits for the first cruise as there will be lots of port and Portuguese wines around to drink, in addition to having very full days.  On the second cruise, I would like to have SS but not sure I can purchase it separately.  In MVJ, it is sold as covering both.  We leave for Portugal in two weeks.  Anyone have experience with this on a “butterfly”?  I will call my TA later today but wondering about personal experience.  Thanks!

I had the same type of situation you have.  Two cruises with a gap in between where you are on your own.  Viking wanted to call it a "butterfly".  I said "no way".  I told them that I was on my own and had to arrange my own air to get to the second cruise.  Both cruises had free air.  This was last year.  I told them that I wanted separate bookings in case I needed to go home due to Covid.  I also told them that I might just fly home for the couple of days and then fly back.

After my insistence, they made it two separate cruises.  I don't know why they wanted to combine the cruises.  It's not like they have a loyalty program.

Anyway, if you cannot do it on MVJ, I would just wait till you board the second cruise and tell the friendly bartender to add  SS too your account.  They have no way of knowing about your "butterfly".

[BigBee51]

Our experience this past spring with back-to-back river cruises was are you described. Viking will not transport you from the first cruise to the second cruise, you are on your own.

 

As far as the beverage package for the river cruises, we waited to purchase the package on the board the first boat and did not purchase it for the second boat. My advice is to wait until you are on board the second boat to purchase the package.