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Live from the Viking Neptune World Cruise 2022-23

Mcobean

By Mcobean,
in Viking Ocean

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Mcobean "Live from...." Rare

Mcobean

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On 4/13/2023 at 6:05 PM, Cathyvee said:

Petra looks amazing.

 

Curious - was your Luxor tour the included Viking tour?

No, it was a Viking optional excursion.

 

We wanted the addition of the Luxor museum and temple 

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mstadleraz

mstadleraz

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We just completed 2 days in Haifa. A group of about 30 (2 mini coaches) participated in a Holy Land excursion through Guided Tours Israel. Yonatan was our guide and he was absolutely fantastic. I would highly recommend Guided Tours Israel as the guides (both Jewish and Palestinian) were very good at what they do. We were able to get into an area of the Church of the Nativity, others, including Viking, could not get access or would have waited for over an hour. With our guides persistence, we were able to enter the Holy Sepulcher even on the Saturday before the Orthodox Easter. Amazing two days!

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Pushka

Pushka

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2 minutes ago, mstadleraz said:

We just completed 2 days in Haifa. A group of about 30 (2 mini coaches) participated in a Holy Land excursion through Guided Tours Israel. Yonatan was our guide and he was absolutely fantastic. I would highly recommend Guided Tours Israel as the guides (both Jewish and Palestinian) were very good at what they do. We were able to get into an area of the Church of the Nativity, others, including Viking, could not get access or would have waited for over an hour. With our guides persistence, we were able to enter the Holy Sepulcher even on the Saturday before the Orthodox Easter. Amazing two days!

Fantastic to hear. We are using the same tour group in May from Mars. Did Viking pack you a lunch? We've been advised not to expect much in the way of food in Haifa and beyond. 

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mstadleraz

mstadleraz

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2 minutes ago, Pushka said:

Fantastic to hear. We are using the same tour group in May from Mars. Did Viking pack you a lunch? We've been advised not to expect much in the way of food in Haifa and beyond. 

We had local food and the meals were good. We wanted what the locals eat - Falafel and Shawarma. I enjoyed the mixed Shawarma which included fries and a drink. The prices ranged from $13 to $16 per meal. Day one had an overlook of Jerusalem which was a great view during lunch.

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flowsue

flowsue

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17 hours ago, mstadleraz said:

We just completed 2 days in Haifa. A group of about 30 (2 mini coaches) participated in a Holy Land excursion through Guided Tours Israel. Yonatan was our guide and he was absolutely fantastic. I would highly recommend Guided Tours Israel as the guides (both Jewish and Palestinian) were very good at what they do. We were able to get into an area of the Church of the Nativity, others, including Viking, could not get access or would have waited for over an hour. With our guides persistence, we were able to enter the Holy Sepulcher even on the Saturday before the Orthodox Easter. Amazing two days!

I agree - We used them too and had Charles as our guide.  Highly recommend!

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mbviking2023

mbviking2023

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On 4/17/2023 at 7:38 AM, mstadleraz said:

We just completed 2 days in Haifa. A group of about 30 (2 mini coaches) participated in a Holy Land excursion through Guided Tours Israel. Yonatan was our guide and he was absolutely fantastic. I would highly recommend Guided Tours Israel as the guides (both Jewish and Palestinian) were very good at what they do. We were able to get into an area of the Church of the Nativity, others, including Viking, could not get access or would have waited for over an hour. With our guides persistence, we were able to enter the Holy Sepulcher even on the Saturday before the Orthodox Easter. Amazing two days!

 

What he said! Ditto. Amazing two days. So emotional and fabulous in a small group

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cruising denise

cruising denise

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I have been in touch with El Tayeb based on the glowing, wonderful recommendations @mbviking2023 and @BeckySt  have made.   I was thinking to organize a group of maybe six people?  He is willing to work with whatever size we want.  I'd like to go with others but not a large group.  How many people were in your group?  What size group would you recommend?

 

THANKS AGAIN!

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Pushka

Pushka

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3 hours ago, mbviking2023 said:

Finally finished our Luxor Egypt blog - it's a biggun!  We had a packed day visiting so many sites and tombs of the Pharaohs!  A great private tour booked by @BeckySt.

 

Valley of the Kings

Temple of Karnak

Valley of the Queens

Hatshepsut's Mortuary Temple

 

http://twohappysloths.com

 

 

 

 

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Wow. We will be doing this excursion but with Viking in a couple of weeks. We couldn't get a private tour happening as none wanted to take us for our time in Safaga so went with Viking   Very keen to see Valley of the Queens which is the difficult one to get into. Nefertiti's tomb is still undiscovered. 

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tomv2950

tomv2950

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4 hours ago, cruising denise said:

I have been in touch with El Tayeb based on the glowing, wonderful recommendations @mbviking2023 and @BeckySt  have made.   I was thinking to organize a group of maybe six people?  He is willing to work with whatever size we want.  I'd like to go with others but not a large group.  How many people were in your group?  What size group would you recommend?

 

THANKS AGAIN!

I believe you are on viking sky wc and if you are we might be interested in doing this with you.  We are leaving for Egypt for May 10 with the Israel pre and Jordan post with an additional 7 days on our own but probably will want to visit these sights again as they are memorable.  Joanne and Tom

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mbviking2023

mbviking2023

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6 hours ago, Pushka said:


Wow. We will be doing this excursion but with Viking in a couple of weeks. We couldn't get a private tour happening as none wanted to take us for our time in Safaga so went with Viking   Very keen to see Valley of the Queens which is the difficult one to get into. Nefertiti's tomb is still undiscovered. 

I think you have to book with Memphis Tours for the transportation. I'd about a4 hour drive from the port. LT is a great guide, not a driver.

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Pushka

Pushka

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2 minutes ago, mbviking2023 said:

I think you have to book with Memphis Tours for the transportation. I'd about a4 hour drive from the port. LT is a great guide, not a driver.

Yes, tried them with no joy.  They didn't want to put in Valley of the Queens.  Not to worry. 

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cruising denise

cruising denise

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3 hours ago, mbviking2023 said:

Interesting.  Maybe you want to contact LT directly?  We were able to go to Valley of the Queens without a problem.

Yes, I'd recommend that, too (contact him directly).  He has already told me no problem for next year, assuming the ship docks as early as it is supposed to.  He didn't mention anything about me needing to contact Memphis Tours for transportation.  He only uses his WhatsApp for contact (posted above)

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Jim Avery

Jim Avery

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Is the ship scheduled to leave early?  We also had no problem booking Memphis Tours from Safaga Port. Went to Valley of Kings/Queens, had a rooftop lunch by the Nile, boat across the Nile to Luxor/Karnak and still made it back to the ship so that we had showered and were sitting at the bar when the busses came back.

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cruising denise

cruising denise

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17 hours ago, tomv2950 said:

I believe you are on viking sky wc and if you are we might be interested in doing this with you.  We are leaving for Egypt for May 10 with the Israel pre and Jordan post with an additional 7 days on our own but probably will want to visit these sights again as they are memorable.  Joanne and Tom

Hi Joanne and Tom - yes!  We are Denise and Ed from Madbury, NH and we are on the Sky.  If you are interested, I'll keep track of your info.  My email is DENISEDLD@ATT.NET, in case you want to shoot me an email, sometimes that might be more direct than communicating via CC.  I will also post about this excursion on our Sky WC roll call and see if there are two others who might be interested.  I'm thinking six is probably ideal for a group size but will wait to see if those who went recently weigh in on that.  

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mbviking2023

mbviking2023

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We were in Israel for two days, but split our blog posts into three parts!  We saw and did so many things and took so many pictures.  The first part is ready - our visit to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and the Basilica of the Agony at Gethsemane.  Also some views of the Old City (which is part 2).

 

http://twohappysloths.com

 

Special thanks to @mstadleraz for organizing the small group tours!

 

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SempreMare

SempreMare

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On 4/6/2023 at 11:21 PM, Jazmyn49 said:

We well remember the repercussions from the posting of mask wearing passengers in the tender at Komodo.  Think before you post photos.

For those of us who don't know, what were those repercussions? 

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Jazmyn49

Jazmyn49

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Officials believing that the joking photo of the masks was indicative of a COVID outbreak.  The ship had to leave the country and had great difficulty finding anywhere that would accept us.  The outbreak was NOT on our ship but other cruises did have many cases.

 

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Pushka

Pushka

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5 hours ago, SempreMare said:

For those of us who don't know, what were those repercussions? 

It was one of those grim  times during early Covid when the ship had to exit the country and then struggled to find a port that would allow them access. 

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