Started off our first full day onboard Viking Radgrid with breakfast in the restaurant. Breakfast is served with multiple options that allow you to choose what you want to eat and how much based on your schedule and preferences. There is table service from a menu. There is also somewhat of a buffet option with cold and hot foods available to serve yourself. A chef stands behind the center counter space replenishing the hot food and cooking made to order eggs.
We opted for table service this morning and you could tell by the dining staff's reaction and delay of service that they weren't too pleased with our choice. I was looking forward to trying out this ship's version of Eggs Benedict. My first thought when this dish arrived was how lonely it looked with only one Egg Benedict. Guess this ship wasn't a believer in the buddy system. The Canadian Bacon was also uniquely presented as a thick slice cut roast beef style that was then folded over onto the English Muffin. I excitedly started to dig in by cutting into the poached egg only for the egg to slough right off and seemingly disintegrate disappearing into the surface of my plate.
One rule of thumb to keep in mind with Viking Cruises and booking ship provided excursions - If you want to cancel and get a refund for an optional excursion, you must let the ship know 48 hours in advance. This rule proved to be frustrating to us when it came time for the afternoon tour.
The first ship tour we signed up for pre-cruise was the included option called Panoramic Paris. This four hour tour ran from 8:30AM until 12:30PM and was listed as Easy. Here is Viking's provided description for the tour: See the major sights of the romantic "City of Light" with a knowledgeable local guide. Meet your motor coach and drive along the famed Champs-Elysees, viewing the Arc de Triomphe, commissioned by Napoleon in 1806 to commemorate his victories. Pass many of Paris' classic highlights, including the beautiful Grand Palais and Petit Palais, Place de la Concorde, Bridge of Alexandre III, the celebrated Louvre Museum, and La Conciergerie. Ride along the banks of the Seine to I'ile de la Cite, where you will stroll through the island and marvel at the stately facade of Notre Dame de Paris before reboarding your coach. Continue into the Latin Quarter and view the picturesque St. Sulpice Church, Luxembourg Gardens and the Museee d' Orsay. Conclude your drive around Paris with Les Invalides complex, which houses Napoleon's Tomb and the military school.
Given that we'd already done a Paris highlights tour during a previous visit and realizing that this description included a walking segment, Dad did not feel comfortable attending this excursion after all the walking we did on the London tours. One of the things I found surprising during the first day's excursion briefing (which thankfully worked a lot better when it came to streaming to our cabin TVs than our experience on the Viking Mississippi) was the mention by our Cruise Director Mia that there would be no front seat saving on tour buses for those with mobility issues. I don't know if this was different due to being a European river cruise or a change that was made since we last cruised with Viking. Countless other cruise lines we've used both river and ocean have had at least the first row of bus seats set aside for those with mobility issues. Another mention that surprised me is when Mia mentioned that they won't be caring if you aren't there when it's time to board the bus. There will not be any calls to your cabin or knocks at your door. We've been in the group on the bus waiting to leave when the shore excursion team is scrambling to try and reach that one couple who didn't show up on time in an effort to confirm that they aren't still planning to come. As a cruise line that is required to be all adults on board, I can understand making the cruiser be responsible for being at the bus on time.
Since there are no tour photos to provide, please enjoy these candid photos I took while the ship was empty:
The unmonitored (besides the ever present cameras) electronic scanners that cruisers were on the honor system to scan themselves in and out when leaving the ship. They did bring a smile to my face when the screen would display "Welcome Back Danielle" to confirm the scan had worked. It may look like it but no, the ship was not listing while this photo was being taken.
How it looks when your ship is tied up at the dock next to another ship and you need to pass through the second ship to reach the gangway.
When we boarded the ship on day one, we took the time at the suggestion of past cruisers to visit Guest Services and let them know that we'd like to be in the Leisure Group for excursions. The Leisure Group is Viking's nice way of describing the slow group that might need more time during a walking section and/or might need an alternative option when the other tourgoers would normally be climbing a bunch of stairs or going to a locale with uneven terrain or tight spaces. The crew member at the desk assured us that we would be put on the list for that group. We confirmed with her that this would be the case for All Excursions and she confirmed yes that was true. Our only thought at this moment was that it applied to more than just excursions with walking times.
Given that this was our first full day onboard and the excursions had been closed on MyVikingJourney a few days before the start date of this itinerary, we had asked at Guest Services the night before how much walking our afternoon tour, The Palace of Versailles, required. The different gentleman manning the desk confirmed that it would be a good bit of walking. We asked if it was too late to cancel and were told yes, as it was less than 48 hours before the tour. I know this itinerary with four days before the cruise in a hotel was unique but it really seemed wrong to stick to a 48 hour cancellation rule when we hadn't even yet been on the ship for 48 hours. Without the ability to cancel, we decided to try and make the best of it believing at the start of this tour that we would be included in the Leisure Group.
The Palace of Versailles is an optional tour (aka upcharge), to use the terminology Viking includes on the daily schedules, and is listed as moderate. This four hour tour cost us each $209 to book. The description from Viking's website reads: Enjoy a day at the former home of French kings: the awe-inspiring Chateau de Versailles. The palace and its sprawling gardens, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, began as a small hunting lodge. Over the years, it was enlarged by each of its three resident kings - most famously Louis XIV, the "Sun King." A local guide will accompany you to the chateau, where you will marvel at the extravagance and excess of French royalty. See the state apartments of the king, the Hercules Drawing Room with its magnificent painted ceiling and the famed Hall of Mirrors - the glittering corridor of chandeliers and glass in which the Treaty of Versailles was signed, thus ending World War I. Learn about court life in the 18th century, and see the queen's apartments and the chamber of Marie Antoinette. Later, there will be time to explore the vast elaborate gardens.
Upon arrival at the Palace of Versailles, our tour bus circled around until parking on this large open cobblestone covered space that was being used as a parking lot for visitors. Our guide had us all file off the bus and stand on the uneven cobblestones for a not so brief overview of what we would be seeing during the tour. When he finally finished talking, Dad approached him to ask about the leisure group. The guide declared that there was no such leisure group on this tour. When we mentioned how we had signed up with Viking to be in this group, the guide led us to believe that he was the one choosing not to accommodate such a group. We asked about options like a room to wait in while the walking tour went on or even to stay on the bus until the group returned. The guide refused both options and instead told us we'd have to go find some coffee shop to sit and wait gesturing a couple blocks away across this cobblestone covered parking lot. If that was something feasible, we would have simply walked across the cobblestones to enter the palace grounds as the bus was parked several yards away from the entrance.
Despite our attempt to continue the conversation, the guide turned and left leading the remainder of the group toward the palace entrance. Dad did offer to make his own way to a cafe if I wanted to participate in the tour but I didn't feel comfortable leaving him alone. Nor, to be honest, did I feel up to a large walking tour myself. We stayed by the bus and asked the thankfully bilingual driver about staying on the bus. He too said that wasn't allowed because they had to move the buses and park elsewhere until it was time to pick the group up. However, he was a lot more considerate and enlisted the other two bus drivers to help us by making a call for a taxi to take us back to the ship. When the taxi didn't show up within the company's estimated 25 minute wait time, the bus drivers called again. This time the taxi company said it would take an hour wait. Our bus driver took the initiative to slowly escort us across the large cobblestone lot to a side street where he knew several taxis sit parked and waiting. He translated for us with the driver and told him that we needed a ride back to the dock. We are so grateful to this kind bus driver for helping us get back to the ship. We did pay out of pocket at the time for the taxi ride.
The few pictures I grabbed of the palace grounds while we were waiting for the first taxi:
Our not zoomed in perspective from in front of the buses:
A good tip for future Viking cruisers traveling to countries with a different language - Guest Services puts out these cards with the dock address and telephone number on each port day for cruisers to take before getting off the ship. Such a card would have come in handy for us to give to the taxi driver so he could get us back to the ship despite the language barrier.
Once back at the ship, we talked to Guest Services and learned what Viking's real Leisure Group policy meant. What we didn't know beforehand, and thank you to all the social media users who felt the need to chew us out for not automatically knowing this, is that the Leisure Group is only an option for the Included tours that Viking offers. Their philosophy is that it's a choice for you to book the extra cost optional excursions and thus they are not going to offer any accommodations for those cruisers with limited mobility needs. Their stance is that if you can't make do and participate as much as everyone else in these upcharge tours, then you shouldn't participate at all. Had we not been told by the first crew member at Guest Services that All Excursions would feature a Leisure Group, then we would not have attempted this tour. In this case, the crew member should have clarified by saying "yes you will be in the Leisure Group for all included excursions. There is no such group for the optional excursions." We would have also accepted that financially we would not be getting the cost of the tour back.
Hotel Director Sven overheard us talking to Guest Services and stepped up to help. He insisted that they couldn't give any amount of refund for the incomplete tour as it was company policy to stick to the 48 hours prior rule. He did however, agree that the guide shouldn't have told us to "go find a cafe and wait" and offered a reimbursement of the cab fare. We took him up on it and submitted the cab receipt to him. Cash was dropped off at our cabin later that evening.
Cruise Director Mia asked us to share our experience with her as well when she'd heard about our complaint. She too agreed that the guide shouldn't have spoken that way. Mia was not surprised to hear the name when she asked us to tell her which tour guide we had. Others had reported issues with this guide in the past. She asked about our future excursion plans. We told her about having booked Utah Beach and Pointe du Hoc and Paris Cruise by Night as optional excursions later in the cruise. She wanted to make sure we were well informed with enough time to cancel before the 48 hour rule took effect. Mia took the time to show us pictures from the Utah Beach excursion and a map of the area to show the route and terrain that was where we'd be walking. She also told us that she'd assign a guide she knew well to our tour group so that we'd have a guide who would be willing to wait for the slower people and offer alternatives like pointing out shortcut routes so we wouldn't have to walk the entire path. Mia also looked out for us throughout the rest of the cruise making sure that we were doing okay and would drop what she was doing to come over and help Dad make his way on and off the ship. Thank you Mia for all of your help and consideration!
We also learned from Mia that another way to tell if you've been placed in the Leisure Group is that your tour tickets delivered to your cabin the night before will say Group L versus any other letter. We took that tip to heart and checked every included tour ticket for the group letter before deciding whether to participate.
As seen on our tour ticket for The Palace of Versailles - we were placed in Group 4A which rode on Bus 4A and would have used Channel 1 on our Quiet VoxBoxes to hear our guide's narration. Unfortunately once our guide got past the entrance, we were no longer in range to even hear his commentary should we have decided to wait on site.
Full disclaimer - this tour was paid for with some of our On Board Credit (OBC). With the taxi fare reimbursement and the use of OBC to pay for the tour, we were not out of pocket any cost. The exception being that we would have used the large chunk of OBC for something else like the gratuities that we did end up paying out of pocket for since not enough OBC was leftover. It was also disappointing because this tour was sold out and our dinner table companions had been lamenting that they were hoping to clear the waitlist. We would have gladly handed over our tickets to them had we known about the Leisure Group policy.
To end this post on a more pleasant note, I took the time we wouldn't have had if we'd stayed on the tour to walk up on the bridge and get pictures of the Viking Radgrid and the Viking Kari docked side by side.
If you turn your back to the ships, it also allows for a great picture of Paris' Lady Liberty.
Stepping out onto the bow after nightfall makes for a great view of the Eiffel Tower lit up as our ships untethered and started to sail away.
Later we were preceded out of the dock by the Viking Skaga and the Viking Kari perfectly framing the lit tower.
And for all my fellow foodies, here's our dinner in the restaurant from this night:
Caesar salad with anchovies from the always available or classics side of the menu. I ended up ordering this many times throughout the cruise. A few times I was surprised to find that the anchovies had a rough underside (bones, scales, abandoned tour tickets?) that scraped against my tongue.
The NY Strip Steak also from the classics menu. I got this multiple times as well during the cruise. We ended up dining more than once with several of the same passengers by chance. One such couple had dined with us on days that I ordered the steak at dinner and then a hot dog at lunch. Halfway through the lunch, the wife asks "Do you normally eat a lot of plain food or are you just a picky eater?" I was a bit surprised that I was the one being called a picky eater given all that I've tried on my travels. It took me a moment to realize she'd only seen me order from the classics options. I politely assured her that despite my being one of the youngest passengers on this cruise, I was not the picky eater in our traveling party. Then again, the next time I happily ordered escargot for the umpteenth time after trying it on a cruise and loving it, even Dad claimed he'd never seen me try escargot. Must have been his long lost twin I was traveling with all those other times.
Our two different dessert choices:
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