Roll call and booking private tours?

[Little Rascal]

I have enjoyed the tours that I have found on Cruise Critic on the roll call that are booked privately by other passengers. Is this common on Viking Oceans also? It was fun meeting folks prior to the cruise and having get togethers and lunches together. I found this on Oceania and Princess cruises. I have booked our first cruise with Viking Oceans for May of 2018. Dang, that's far off....

[fnewman]

So far, based on our cruises on the Star and Sea the roll calls don't seem to be too active so the interaction by passengers for private excursions has been light as well. I also noticed very little of that on river cruises as well. Don't know, but perhaps it is due to the fact that every port has an "included" tour that is designed to hit the main spots of interest. Or perhaps it is due to the fact that any specific cruise has fewer passengers - for Viking, only about a third or less compared to typical ocean cruises.

[Peregrina651]

So far, based on our cruises on the Star and Sea the roll calls don't seem to be too active so the interaction by passengers for private excursions has been light as well. I also noticed very little of that on river cruises as well. Don't know, but perhaps it is due to the fact that every port has an "included" tour that is designed to hit the main spots of interest. Or perhaps it is due to the fact that any specific cruise has fewer passengers - for Viking, only about a third or less compared to typical ocean cruises.

 

I agree that size is a factor and if any roll call, regardless of the size of the ship, gets much more than 5% participation, then it is doing great. One percent participation seems to be closer to the norm, especially on Viking -- and if you are talking 450 staterooms, then you are talking only 4 or 5 participants. Also, I find that even though folks are following the Viking roll calls, they aren't participating--and it is hard to keep a roll call going if no one is talking.

 

Yes, a lot of folks are depending on the included tours but I also think that, for various reasons, age and financial freedom have a lot to do with the lack of interest in tour-sharing. For the most part, folks who are opting for private tours don't need or want to share to make it work.

 

BUT. Little Rascal, don't let any of this stand in your way. If you are interested in sharing tours, let your roll call know. Who knows what will happen if you ask.

Edited September 2, 2016 by Peregrina651

[Vineyard View]

We were able to put together a couple of small group tours on our Star trip... (we tend to DIY or go private in the ports where we can)...this was the Maiden Voyage and it had a fairly busy roll call.

I plan on looking into doing the same for our Amazon trip as it gets closer - but I have no idea how well it will work. I have already reached out to a tour individual....I am requesting a max of 16 people for one of the ports....time will tell..in others we will probably look at private and for sure DIY. Once the excursions are posted we will also look at all of those as well to see if there are some of interest . It is really a great benefit to have included excursions as options IMHO, and feel that it absolutely impacts how many outside tours are booked by passengers.

Edited September 3, 2016 by Vineyard View

[huntersyaya]

We got a group together through our roll call for an extensive two day tour in St. Petersburg on the Viking Homelands tour we did last summer. There were 12 of us with a driver and guide. We saw so much in our two days and paid much less than the comparable excursion through Viking. No problems at all!