VikingReviews of viking.com

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

Viking cruise around Iceland July 2024, Experienced a great Viking cruise from Barcelona to Puerto Rico in 2023, poor pre and post cruise hotels, but the cruise was really good. So we booked on the Viking Mars to sail around Iceland. Unfortunately it rained for 5 of the 7 days and the penultimate port was cancelled due to bad weather - all of the foregoing outside of Vikings control. However we noticed a distinct decline in staff and crew attentiveness, service and engagement from our previous cruise with Viking. Cabin steward was really very good, and the Maitre D at the chefs table was good, but otherwise no interest from the cruise director, the hotel director or staff, who made no obvious effort to raise the moral of the passengers crew or staff. It would seem that the weather got to everyone. Nice cabin, average food, good cabin staff, uninspiring excursions, and from our experience disengaged crew and staff. Off with Silversea next.

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.

Did our 2nd Grand European cruise in 2017 and it was a disaster. The water levels were down and we misses a third of our cruise. Viking did refund 25% and the rep out in California promised a 850 dollar discount for me and my wife on our next cruise. Well no luck with that when we tried in 2019 or 2022 or 2024. What a shame Viking just does not care!

Food, ship, staff, drinks, excursions 5/5. However, only 3 stars/5 rating by me due to problem with our room. Paid premium $$ for a two room suite with wrap around balcony. Beautiful and spacious. Unfortunately, when the ship moved, the fact that our room was directly over the motors was VERY apparent: could hear the engines, could feel the room shudder and worse a constant rattle in the ceiling above the bed !!!! All so noisy that we had to wear our noise cancellation ear pieces to drown out the noise to able to fall asleep😖

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.