My wife and I recently returned from a riverboat cruise to Ukraine. This was our fourth trip with Viking and possibly our last. We have recommended Viking to all our friends and worst of all we invited our very best friends to join us on this trip and they accepted to join us on board.
This was by far the worst trip I have ever experienced; not just on Viking but also on any trip we have ever taken.
1. To start with, since our second cruise we have always been recognized as special travelers and have always received a gift, not this time.
2. The communication with the staff was at best minimal. Most of the staff could barely speak English and had trouble speaking and understanding our requests. At breakfast, lunch and dinner we would just point to what we wanted. Requesting wine was impossible, the staff had to get the head maître d’ to decipher.
3. The tours had only one guide that could speak English and that was Anna. The tours were poorly organized. It was really terrible when 200 people show up and one statue or a church at the same time. The Viking travelers were not pleased with such long lines to get anywhere.
4. We paid $100 for the Kiev Jewish tour. We were shown statues/monuments and a ravine where the Jews were shot. In our opinion, that is not worth $100.
5. There were too many optional tours on this cruise. The previous Viking river cruises did not have “optional” tours that cost more money than the expense of this trip. And this trip to Ukraine was “very expensive for what we got.”
6. We have no complaints about the boat, the rooms were very good. The food was nothing out of the ordinary. There was not as large of a selection of breakfast or dinner items on the menu as we have seen on our other trips. The wait staff was less than adequate, very difficult to communicate with. On all of our other trips with Viking and other companies, the staff knew our names and what we always had to drink and most times they would even guess what we wanted to eat. They were always exceptional but not on this trip. This trip was by far the worst we have ever experienced!
On “Captains night” The Captain left after just a few minutes and of course he could not speak English either. Yet another disappointment!
Finally, our overall impression was one of very poor preparation for the tours, as well as poor advance information. The billing cycle was not explained clearly, I received the final bill stating we were behind on our payments and were about to be canceled if payment was not received immediately! Upon calling I received no explanation. We are not sure how you can advertise this as an English speaking tour when most of the staff did not speak English?
Also I can’t even start to explain our air travel, too many stops, too many layovers plus much confusion with all the booking problems. It would take another page to explain all of the problems we had with our air travel. Extremely terrible planning on your part.
This trip was definitely terrible, not up to your usual standards. Generally speaking we are not sure if we will ever book on Viking again if this is representative of your current standards. I must say that traveling with Viking is not inexpensive.
I am requesting at least a 50% refund in the form of a check.
Please respond.
Try to laugh, especially when there is a fly in your drink.
Staff are eager to please, but not all waitstaff speak good English. Be patient and speak slowly