VikingReviews of viking.com

We missed our scheduled river cruise because of flight delays. The Viking representative was awful and most unhelpful.

Viking cruise personnel put us in a grave danger during our Rheine river cruise. We (3 elderly senior citizens of ages up to 83 years old) got stranded in Speyer, Germany during a shore excursion, (1) due to the last minute change in the tour guide (from the guide lady to the program director Andy) without letting us know; and (2) due to the faulty door key which caused the exit door tagging problem. This happened when the guide lady gave us free time toward the end the tour and told the group (35E) to meet her at the right hand side of the cathedral at 10:45am to get back to the ship. But instead of her taking us back, Andy took the group and went back to the ship, without us, while the guide lady was having coffee sitting close to where we were having coffee. We got back to the appointed location by 10:45am, but we found that they had already left. I almost had a heart attack when the realization hit me hard. Luckily, we found a policeman who speaks English at the local police station. Thanks to this policeman who helped us finding the docking location of the ship's next destination, Worms (about 50 km away). We took a taxi and went to Worms, but we could not find the ship there. After making several frantic calls, we were able to connect with the manager of the ship, Victor, who our taxi driver was able to communicate in German to find the ship's destination and the time and the location of the next port that they they were supposed to arrive in Rudesheim The taxi driver was kind enough to take us to Rudesheim, which was about 100 km away from Worms. But when we got there, we could not find the port that Victor had told the taxi driver, because the address and instruction provided by him was too vague and not accurate according to the driver. By talking to several local people, he finally figured out the general location of the Viking port and dropped us there and took off. But the correct location happened to be on the opposite side of the river 2-3 miles away. We ended up taking a ferryboat to get across and walked for 2-3 miles to finally get to the ship, which, to our surprise, had already arrived, earlier than the time Victor had told us. Later when I complained to Victor and Andy, they were both busy in making excuses. Andy said we had not tagged the exit button when we left the ship in the morning and that he had no way of knowing that we were in the 35E group, which was hard to believe, because one of us had conversation with him about the weather as we were exiting the ship in the morning. Victor said he had given the taxi driver the proper location of the docking location, which is hard to believe, because the driver had written down the location on a piece of paper and he loudly repeated twice to make sure he got it right, which we all heard clearly over the speaker phone. Overall, this was a very dangerous situation for me because I had 2 strokes in the past. I could have been seriously ill or dropped dead in a remote country where I don't even speak the language. What bothered me the most was, instead of trying to come up with positive plans to prevent this kind of problem in the future, as I had recommended, both of them were too busy to find excuses, and they actually blamed us, the victims, as if it was all our fault. This was contrary to what Victor had announced the night before that safety of the passengers is the utmost important responsibility. If so, why did they have to change from the guide lady to Andy at the last minute without letting us know? Two days later, the front desk clerk Mr. Bulz apologized that he forgot to correct the faulty door key of my room which caused the exit door tagging problem. I am very disappointed with Viking and I will never go on any Viking cruise. But for the safety of their customers, I strongly urge Viking to improve their safety standards to ensure that no customers are left behind during their shore excursions, and to train their personnel to better handle this kind of problem in the future.

Do NOT get the trip insurance from Viking. TripMate is the worst. Viking may tell you that it covers your illness, family member illness and so on, but the reality is that TripMate will deluge you with demands for minutiae until they have managed to squeeze enough interest from the money they have been withholding from you. My trip companion was my brother who was struck down with renal cancer, and ultimately died weeks before our trip was to start and I am STILL waiting for TripMate to make a payout of the money they have been holding since I paid Viking for this "insured" trip four months ago. UPDATE - TripMate approved my claim, 2 months after I filed it, BUT someone in their office decided (on their own) to separately file a claim for my brother (my intended guest ) so the amount they approved for me is 1/2 of what I filed for and am owed AND they --again on their own -- indicate that the other half will go to my brothers wife, who paid nothing for the trip, was not part of the trip, is nowhere mentioned in the trip documents or insurance and has not filed anything with anyone. So now I have to undo the fraudulent claim TripMate filed to themselves and make sure that they do not give 1/2 of my claim to a third party. Nightmare

Cancelled our trip extension ONE day before our cruise. $2200 for the extension, only getting a $250 on board credit!!! Paris yo the Swiss Alps river cruise. The only reason I picked this cruise was for the extension in SW. Booking number 7390630. There is no customer service.

I am currently on an Amsterdam to Budapest cruise on the Viking Skadi and have never been so underwhelmed and bored in my life. The daily cruise schedule seems to center around lengthy meals and continuous drinking with a short walk around some little town once a day. The town guides vary in quality from fair to quite good but because the walking speed of each walk approximates that of nearly dead turtles, there is little opportunity to actually learn very much. These cruises should come with a warning that only those in assisted living should participate. We seem to pull in to ports on days and at times when most museums are closed. Most city/town visits are just a few hours long anyway so there really is no way to get more than a passing sense of a place. The ship is too small for the number of people on board with no areas able to hold everyone for the evening port briefings or for events such as the glass blowing presentation. The ship is clean and the staff generally pleasant and helpful but this is an experience I will never repeat and that I will strongly encourage others to avoid.

Boring. Definitely for old people 65 and up!

If you work there , and you got sick, they take off their masks and the throw you in the lake or ocean like garbage. Nothing else. One star is too much for their “managers” . Absolutely unprofessionals and rude to the staff.

My husband and I are both 73 years old, retired, on fixed income, and have been saving for a trip down the Danube for five years. Our troubles began in Minneapolis when our flight was delayed two hours, then finally eight hours, pushing it to the middle of the night of the next day. We contacted Viking Customer Service and were told they could do nothing for us, had no other flights that would get us to the boat before it sailed. I asked the Viking CS rep if he’d checked all the other airlines (because Amsterdam is a European hub), and he said nothing was available for the next two days. I didn’t believe him. I believe he only wanted to honor Viking’s contract with Delta. The best he could do was get us to Amsterdam the next day, and then we would have to find our own accommodations (lodging, transportation, airlines) to try and find the ship, which would be in Vienna by then. I proceeded to go from the Delta Customer Service (which was of no help whatsoever after waiting in line for more than 20 minutes) and to several Delta flight stations that offered a flight to Amsterdam in the terminal in the next eight hours. By this time, I had put seven miles on my FitBit and was exhausted. I was told all the flights were full and some were “overbooked” through the entire next day. I worried that I’d never find two seats on a flight then from Amsterdam to Vienna. That’s poor planning on Delta’s part, and poor planning on Viking’s part for not having contingencies and backup plans for these kinds of situations. After spending all our savings to book the trip, we did not have the financial resources to try and get to Amsterdam on our own with other airlines and risk the cost of lodging and transportation to try and find the boat in a country that does not speak primarily English, especially since we learned how hard it was to get a flight to Amsterdam. We did not want to travel all day and night to miss half of our cruise. We’d rather be stuck in the U.S. (Minneapolis) and go back home, than get lost somewhere in Europe. Thank goodness we purchased travel insurance. Don't want to travel with Viking again.