Viking Gefjon Cruise Reviews - Reviews

Viking, through its advertisements, created high expectations which were not realized. The issues that we had were that the food was bland; not gourmet quality. Not even close. Those who we spoke with fully agreed. However, the service was excellent, and we overall enjoyed the experience. We wouldn't rule out another cruise with Viking now that our expectations are less. Another issue that we had was that when the ship fell behind schedule due to a malfunctioning lock, they decided to make up the time by reducing the time that we had on our excursion to Salzburg by approximately 2 hours, thus limiting our free time in a destination that we paid over $500 for to a mere one hour. We suffered in order for the ship to catch up to their schedule. No apology or even explanation was issued. It seemed like they hoped that we wouldn't notice. The Amsterdam experience was disappointing. We were relegated to a Hotel well outside any central location. And the Walking Tour compounded the problem; only touring sites outside the Old Town.

Tulips and Windmills was all that we hoped. The towns and sights were lovely, the guides were knowledgeable, the history and water management were interesting, the waffles and chocolate were delicious and Viking's ship and staff were excellent. We had a wonderful trip and made some new friends.

This was our 4th Viking Cruise. We obviously think highly of them. The service and staff are a step above and the ships are beautiful. We were given voucher bonuses for rescheduling after our initial cruise was cancelled due to the pandemic. It was very generous of Viking to do that and it allowed us to take many optional excursions and fly business class. The port cities on this cruise are so beautiful and the Danube/Main/Rhine canal and locks are interesting to experience. We highly recommend this trip.

Due to low water level, we ended up in motor coaches, 3 different ships, having to pack and unpack. Viking's air reservation had our arrival basically enough time to get to the ship and too tired to leave the ship to enjoy Budapest port and 11am air departure did not enable a visit the last port, amsterdam. The optional tours were more expensive than the larger ocean cruises. The best part of all the changes was staying at the Sheraton at the amsterdam airport.

Great cruise. Viking has truly exceptional service, excellent food and very professional. Included tours were less than what we expected. The optional tours were very good to excellent, except for Munich, which was a terrible tour - not worth 25% of the cost of the tour. Viking handled our transition from one ship to another because of water conditions very efficiently. Almost seemed like we were on the same ship. The upper deck was closed for 5 days, which was unfortunate.

This cruise did not meet our expectations for the following reasons:

1. The boat has a top deck area with covered seating, a few games (poorly maintained two hole putt-putt course and shuffle board) and a walking track.  However after day two until approximately day 12, the top deck was not available because of danger due to low bridges on the Rhine, Main, and Danube.

2. It seemed that every day we were being "nickel and dimed" (actually 80 to 100 Euros) for additional/optional tours and events. We were also asked to pay significant (voluntary? gratuities) to the crew and social director. We paid a lot of money for this cruise. We are aware of other tour operators who bill for everything up front so there are no "hidden, unexpected, and annoying extra charges. 

3. We paid extra money to assure that we could fly our intercontinental flights on United Airlines so that we could accrue miles and use our previoiusly accumulated miles to upgrade. We were accommodated, and we did spend miles plus money to get the desired upgraded airline seats. However, when we returned to the US we were only awarded half of the traveled miles. When we asked why, we were told that the tickets were "highly discounted" so they only gave us half the miles. No one told us this before hand. It was not printed in any of the travel information, and our United Cruise Lines concierge expressed surprise as well. Viking responded with a discount voucher for our next cruise (which we will NEVER take) so we essentially received nothing for the lost miles. 

4. The food was average

The Bright Side: The crew and service on the boat were excellent!!

I sea cruise a lot and this was my first river cruise experience. It was horrible. We were given the wrong port to embark. The ship was 8km from where we were told. I spent the first 2 nights looking at a skip outside the window, a further 4 nights looking at the dock wall. Entertainment is nearly zero, food is average, ship is tired and staff uninterested. A dreadful experience. We would have left the ship had we not been travelling with another couple.