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Clay Clayton

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Posts posted by Clay Clayton

  1. 37 minutes ago, toolworker said:

    Do Viking Ocean ships have these features?

     

    1. 1. Booking and changing tours at reception 24/7 Yes

    2. Booking and changing things on the app - tours, dining reservations, ... ?Yes/but often is glitchy

    3. Quietvox or equivalent for tours (phone app doesn't count) Yes

    4. Starlink internet Yes but even so, pretty awful 

    5. Play enrichment talks on TV with pause, resume, save your place.I think so

    6. 800 number to call Reception from shore for international phone charges only.Not that I am aware. 

     

    I'm asking because we've been cruising Regent lately, and it doesn't have any of them (except phasing in Starlink).  I've seen these on other lines but can't remember which lines have which ones.

    See my responses after your questions. 

    • Like 1
  2. We have always gone on a day early and the easiest and cheapest for us was to rent a car at LAX and drop it off in San Pedro. This let us do some sightseeing the day before boarding and then the morning of the cruise, we dropped off the luggage at the ship before returning the car.  We then had a nice stroll to the pier-Uber was our backup if it had of been raining. 

    IMG_9643.jpeg

    IMG_9650.jpeg

    • Like 5
  3. As mentioned previously, both of this year’s World Cruises docked at Phu My.  Viking provide a shuttle to the Opera House in HCM City.  The port provides a shuttle from the dock to the port gates which is where any independent tours will pick up and drop you off.  If you’re there overnight, highly recommend booking a hotel in the city, relatively cheap and saves anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and a half each way.  Traffic can be awful and hence the wide range of times you are seeing.  
     

    Just for fun, here is a video of us on Sky waving to Neptune as we passed each other as we left and she arrived at Phu My. 

     

    • Like 2
  4. 2 minutes ago, Kountess said:

    Darn!  We'll miss you again.  We are booked on The Americas, Chile and Antarctica cruise from Ft. Lauderdale on October 13.

    Never say never.  We have decided we will wait and see if there are any promos later this fall.  If we went one cruise earlier the cost is $1000pp less and while it has a great deal more staterooms available, there are still a lot empty on the 12th so 🤞

  5. 1 hour ago, Kountess said:

    Clay, When are you planning to go?

     

    9 minutes ago, CurlerRob said:

     

    Clay, we are booked for Jan 25 - maybe we'll meet!

     

    In my research, you would have to be extremely unlucky not to land at all and I have not found a single cruise that has missed entirely thus far. You'd need a terrible combination of poor weather and likely a mechanical or medical emergency to lose the whole thing. That said, "00" in on the roulette wheel for a reason 👿

     

    My larger concern with our timing is actually Avian flu. There are areas of South Georgia that are currently off limits to all expedition landings, and no-one knows for sure how the disease will progress in the far south. It has been detected in wildlife on the Peninsula, but no restrictions thus far. We've decided to roll the dice - not getting any younger, but you may want to monitor the expedition threads for Silversea and Seabourn.

     

    Here's one I found, it's over now, so not completely current. I think it was post #212. Best of luck! 🍺🥌

     

     

     

    We have some friends from the World Cruise who are going on Octantis on Jan 12 and we are considering changing our currently booked March Buenos Aires to Barcelona to join them. But had hoped to get our other friends to come along but at least one of them is pretty set on flying to Antarctica.  

  6. We have friends who we are trying to convince to take Viking to Antartica with us but they are worried about not actually landing.  They are looking at the NatGeo cruises that start with an expensive flight to Antartica which is beyond our budget.  
     

    Other than diversions due to medical evacuations, I don’t recall any cruises that didn’t make a landing on Antartica-can others confirm? 
     

    TIA!

  7. 1 minute ago, Islandbc said:

    Hello Clay.  Do you recall if 5060 was a few cabins forward of the elevators as shown on the deck map?

    The deck plans are pretty accurate.  We met folks on board whose stateroom opened directly into the elevator lobby and they reported no sound issues-only problem was making sure they were fully prepared to greet the public whenever they opened their door😂

    • Like 1
    • Haha 2
  8. On 6/1/2024 at 7:54 PM, pcalv said:

    Hi folks, I'm planning of our first cruise onboard a Viking ship for the 8 day Iberian Explorer itinerary and I was considering a Verandah (V2) Aft location.  Can anyone who has stayed in a V2 category AFT cabin please give me some insights on;

    - The location of Deck 3 Aft cabins - do they get noise from surrounding public areas, e.g restaurant below

    - The inconvenience of not being able to pre-book dining venues until on the ship.  Have you been disadvantaged booking onboard?

    - The inconvenience of not being having priority access to book shore excursions until 60 days prior to sailing

     

    best regards,

    Paul.

    Paul

    Can’t respond to our aft Deck 3 questions but can to your other V related questions. 
     

    We have never had an issue getting into Manfredi’s or Chef’s Table once onboard as long as we were flexible with time and day. Even when we have been able to book ahead, we don’t bother as I barely know what I want for dinner tonight, how do I know months ahead?  
     

    We tend to either do included excursions or private ones, we haven’t had an issue with getting our excursions we want either.  Again, we may have to be flexible on the timing. 

  9. 15 hours ago, jmfdr said:

    What is a pilaster?

     

    15 hours ago, pcalv said:

    Good question so I looked it up.  Apparently a pilaster is a wall bump out https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2950221-wall-bump-outs/page/2/

     

    15 hours ago, Ready to Sail! said:

    Funny. Who knew! Many us increased our vocabulary today. Thanks Peregrina. 😁

     

    15 hours ago, pcalv said:

    Thanks Peregrina 😉

     

    13 hours ago, Peregrina651 said:

    Don't thank me. Thank our resident architect @Clay Clayton for explaining what those damned annoyances are called.

    After 121 days in 5054 which had a pilaster, I came to like ours-it kept me from bumping into the TV when returning from a middle of the night toilet visit AND during rough seas made a good handhold 😂

    • Like 3
  10. 4 hours ago, FLORIDA FLOUNDER said:

    Same code with an extended expiration date of June 30th. 😃

     

     

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    open?params=v1.1BYevKFYnwWOf7JnPd5nHSZLoyrX6Gx1uNeO3cHpoSvg_yLsLTOEYS6FxMCbNnZTOEyPu4pBLgwJquMtd8_8npSTl0X6m5DId8Fusv00ksRywPa3YR7AfflKqINVaio31HqrisuyZto6yoXZ-x9yeoZsvd0nXWmFgsJEtgTMC10SN2X-WMArBzfpZg1z3ihgxY_9-q5D_TJmwrEsCsL876WDMj3i3F3K5a6KCmaYIDl2nWcej1t8nSdJ7JLqh1877_hckR-2vUXW0agLRpJUZe_-WGrJSmjf-y_EKUPBqlYba1MR_v3Trq2Mp09qOGrNXlMpyO8jFJpoU8d00qS8Ery4EW7PoS-EoilGlyTRp3eaqcTivZ5hSzR0J5PiCS84mulXSkDqJBsWwCDLfy_oGaLJcyllGX0DIQJzbQM3i3CSNyle3NCQ8jfFM6NImmHHYTIDTf5pNYlvBev6EFMsAtNnp53plTjY-dlattc9hA&pid=v1.yA7ClTD9dOlLKz0yXGV53naYqpKe5MZOpipdYR_nlngMSjQUdzngy56xkOzmK5E8xCIORWkpj7Ae1XjMgGi3&tuid=6659ded5ec67582fed1676ec&configId=2f8538b3-0a8b-4ad8-b75c-7f5d1c8367ab:PROD

    It appears this deal does NOT include the onboard credits which paid for all our optional excursions as well as a couple of massages and haircuts. So while still probably a good deal, it’s not as good as previous promos.  

    • Like 1
  11. 10 hours ago, AveSaloon said:

    And remember that "free air" may very well NOT include deviations, either on dates and/or airports.  Or they may be at a significant up-charge in addition to deviation/AirPlus fees.

    Just as often it may very well include the ability to deviate-it always has for us. 

    3 hours ago, CDNPolar said:

     

    It may not, but it also may...

     

    Free Air is still air that is in Viking's air contract rates and would fall under the same rules and costs as air that they are charging us for.  We always have to pay the deviation fees and any up=charges if they are there.

     

    The air is not "free", this is just Viking's way of discounting the price of the cruise without discounting the cabin price.

     

    To me, and this may or may not be the real truth, I see this as a brilliant marketing move.  By offering a deal to guests with free air, Viking never reduces the cabin price which keeps a certain value of that cabin in front of us.  If they were to discount the cabin significantly then we would see non-discounted cabins as very expensive for future cruises...  

     

    Not sure if the above is making sense the way I am saying it?  It makes perfect sense to me however as this is a pricing type of strategy that is used in different industries.  The act of lowering your price makes the consumer only see the lower price in the future and then they see the regular price as high.

     

    With Viking we always see the air as extra cost, which it is.  Don't get me wrong, this is a deal when they give free air, and a strategic way to do it.

    Agree completely and very understandable!

  12. On 5/28/2024 at 4:56 PM, rizello said:

    I just discovered this.  We are taking the Bordeaux river cruise but staying an extra week, probably going to Portugal. We just have to pick the airport we want to fly out of.  That is a very nice feature that Viking offers.

    Just note that not all airports qualify so I would have some options

  13. 3 hours ago, rizello said:

    Thanks for all the responses.  I booked the cruise via the phone and then let the rep know about the deviation.  I found out that one can add a deviation or AirPlus as long as it is before the flight is ticketed.

    Just to add a little more info, your “deviation” can also be to a city different than your embarkation or disembarkation port.  We for example took a transatlantic that began in San Juan. We had “free” air from RDU to SJU and then home from Barcelona.  We paid the deviation fee and arrived in San Juan a day early, stayed an extra week in Barcelona after disembarking, and then flew ourselves to Rome where we spent another week before taking our “free” flight back home to RDU.  It’s my understanding that there was a possibility for an additional cost but in this case we only paid the deviation fee. 

    • Like 1
  14. A lot will depend on when you book.  Last year we took advantage of a promo in August for the World Journey leaving in January. We spoke with Steve who was very helpful and after hearing the cost of the Viking Tripmate insurance he agreed that his two options were more costly and didn’t provide any additional coverages.  Of course YMMV. 
     

    I’d suggest giving him a call (or email).

  15. To add another data point, for our just completed world cruise on Sky, the Guest Services Manager was our contact point for requesting the two Meet & Greets we held (one for the FLL to LA group and a second when the rest of us embarked in LA). 
     

    The email address we used was osk_guestservicesmgr@vikingcruises.com It is my understanding that each ship’s guest services manager is similar, replace the sk with the first two letters of your ship’s name.  For example, Orion would be oor_guestservicesmgr@vikingcruises.com

    • Like 2
    • Thanks 1
  16. On 5/9/2024 at 10:31 AM, cruising denise said:

    We're both working on removing those pounds that somehow glommed themselves onto our bodies during our nearly 4 months onboard...sadly that involves little to no wine...or cookies....Oh well, it took a while to put them on, we anticipate it will be a while to take them off again!!!  But well worth it!

    Just got home and while during the cruise I lost and gained 5 pounds, happy to say that per our home scale, I only gained 1/2 a pound.  Of course part of that could be I’m dried out as we both have colds (just took a Covid test, negative thank goodness) and have been taking cold meds.  But I’ll prefer to say that despite drinking more, and eating worse, we did ok!

    • Like 7
    • Thanks 1
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