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We are Celebrity first timers and will be sailing the Constellation out of Tampa.

We just completed our first Ocean cruise on Viking aboard Orion. Here is our mini review The Ship…we simply loved it! The size, the layout, the decor, everything was perfect. We were particularly impressed with how many areas offered comfortable seating for just relaxation or conversation. We were in a DV6, cabin 3054, and had no issues. Yes we did some evenings hear Torshavn below, but nothing that disrupted our night or sleep. And right across the hall from the laundry is a non-issue. And having read reviews of limited storage and few outlets for charging devices, we had zero issues, and being in Alaska we packed a lot…lol The crew….first of all, our cabin steward was the best! Never have we been welcomed aboard where the steward has enthusiastically greeted us and taken the time to go over every detail of the cabin. Made us feel very welcome immediately. Overall, we found the crew to be very outgoing, and professional, and we found service throughout our cruise to be very good. Dining….we are not “foodies” and since food is a very subjective thing, our rating would be that we found dining to be good to very good, not great. We always had lunch and breakfast at the World Cafe. Our only complaint was breakfast offerings were the same daily. We ate in the Restaurant the first 3 evenings. We kinda miss not having the same waitstaff nightly, but service and food was good. After 3 nights, we tried World Cafe for dinner, and we found this more to our liking with more options and since we sat in the same area every time, we kinda developed a “relationship” with the waitstaff. We did dine at Manfredi's once and enjoyed it very much. Excursions…we were able to book every excursion we wanted. All were very well organized. Two were cancelled, one for lack of transportation people, and one due to weather. Some ports we only had 5-6 hours, so the excursion led to no time to further explore on our own. Entertainment…we enjoyed the Viking singers. But our favorite was Allen the guitarist/singer…we grabbed every moment with him that we could get in the Explorers Lounge in the evenings. I think we sailed with 830 passengers, so not at full capacity, but close. Never felt the least bit crowded. We were one of the few who masked most everywhere, but never did we feel or made to feel”out of place” as has been mentioned by others . We are the lucky minority in todays world who have so far avoided being infected…at least so far as we know. We were happy enough that we booked Empires of the Mediterranean while on board. We thought the 800 savings was good, and geez how can you not love 25 $ deposits!

We got 6 months final payment automatically as we already had another cruise booked. And we just did Orion/Alaska and booking while onboard gave us 6 months final payment too…could NOT pass up 25 $ deposits in addition to the 800 savings!

We just returned from Orion 3054. Immediately across from laundry was not an issue whatsoever from noise or traffic issue. Torshavn below we did hear a lil noise on a couple nights but not enough to keep us awake. Overall we loved the location and on our next cruise we booked on board we chose 3053 which eliminates being over Torshavn.

We just finished our Alaska cruise. We filled out a survey mid cruise and pointed out two minor areas that we felt could be improved/addressed in the World Cafe. Two days later a Mgr sought us out in the World Cafe to discuss

We are on Orion now in 3054. Yes there is some noise from below (Torshavn) but its only been noticeable a couple nights and not enough to keep me awake. Absolutely love the location overall! And we just booked onboard for 2024 and chose same room other side 3053 on the Sea.

We board Monday in Seward and Viking had us all test today…all meaning those on pre-extensions. I had thought for sure that requirement had gone away!

We are scheduled for same tour Tuesday! Board the Orion Monday

Well we head to Anchorage on Saturday to board the Orion on Monday so we will “report” our thoughts. This will be our first Ocean cruise on Viking, having just completed our first River cruise in May. Needless to say, very excited! We have remained Covid free throughout the pandemic. We were very cautious while on the River cruise and will be the same in AK.

No kidding, this paper copy is a joke! And with already two boosters, the back of the card is half full already

The only people that ever asked to see our vaccination cards were the Lufthansa agents here in the US. Noone ever even asked to see our negative Covid tests!

We originally had close to a 2 hour layover in Denver, but schedules slowly change over time

Yeah we had them for our Rhine cruise last month. Next trip is pre in Alaska and post cruise Vancouver

Good to know! I might look at purchasing while in port in AK and bring some onboard too

Just watching our upcoming flights to and from Alaska in a couple weeks, we see our return flights from Vancouver on UAL running about an hour late almost daily. Our connecting flight in Denver only gives us 1 hr 20 minutes. Pessimistically, Im convinced we will miss our connection, and our flight options to Tampa sure dont look pretty. So assuming we miss the connection, do we call Viking for help or just deal with UAL. The common reason for delay is “took longer to load baggage” in Vancouver. Already tried to get flights changed to an earlier flight that would allow for a long layover and Viking wanted 500 bucks.

Clay Its the Orion. And we decided we will not buy the adapters. We will make do!

Thanks everyone! Our new Ipads and phones both require the USB-C so not sure the USB ports are much help. We will just bring along a couple adapters…with the $$$ spent for the trip whats another 12 bucks…😂

Do we need to bring Euro C type adapters or are there enough 110V outlets? We would be using mostly for charging electronic devices.

On our Rhine River Cruise they had Becks NA beet

We just finished the Basel to Amsterdam Thursday. Our first 2 days we arrived to our destinations for the day 2-3 hours late due to issues with the locks. We were led to believe it was more an issue with labor authorities?

Welcome home! You mention the aircraft, Boeing 767, in our last few trips we have been comparing Airbus vs Boeing and we much prefer Airbus…slightly more legroom and seats way more comfortable. And we have flown the new Boeing 737 Max 8 and let me tell ya there isnt even elbow room in economy and seats have no cushion!

Tested first 3 days Masks were required onboard as you moved thru the boat, and on tour buses Viking reinstated masks 2 weeks before our cruise as I think there had been some high positivity on a couple cruises

We just returned from our first river cruise, Basel to Amsterdam Loved it! Just wanted to say how much we appreciated the info we have gotten from this board

I gotta share my story about booking excursions. I couldnt exactly remember when our Alaska cruise bookings would open, but on the 26 th I just happened to check MVJ while we were on our Viking river cruise in Europe. So I log on at 910 am in Europe which just happens to be 1210 am PST, and voila there were the excursions opened and we quickly booked every one we wanted…just happened to be in the right place at the right time! 😀

I know this is a VO board, but thought Id briefly review our Viking River cruise we just completed We were only tested the first 3 days, of course also the test as we boarded. Boat capacity was 190, we sailed at 130. Normal crew on board would be 50 or so and the Program Director admitted they were short about 8. In fact our fav bartender went MIA the last 3 days Mask wearing was mandatory while moving onboard, and required on tours, however common sense prevailed while outdoors touring Capt did acknowledge there was positive tests Im thinking just a couple And never were we asked to provide our pre cruise test results to anyone…we did a Viking pre extension in Switzerland