We have just begun this 15-day British Isles Explorer journey. Already, we are seeing some elements of the Viking Ocean experience that have evolved since the last time we sailed.   It’s a very nice, guest-focused evolution of what Viking does in nearly all areas of the operation.   Let me explain.

We always take the included tours, looking for a nice overview of each port of call. Viking delivers that nice overview every single time. This has been at the core of travelers’ experiences since Viking began. I have always checked that box and thought nothing of it. Until this trip.  

On a 90-minute walking tour of Greenwich, we explored the area in Viking’s familiar manner, hitting all the hot spots history has remembered. A knowledgeable local guide provided the narrative as we walked. Seeing other passengers around the ship after touring, nearly everyone could not stop talking about the high level of quality in that guide’s narrative.  The best way I can describe it is a free-flowing exchange of ideas instead of something leaning more toward a lecture.   One of those passengers we toured with put it best: “This is why we chose Viking.” 

Another example, totally unrelated, is how Viking does the Guest Emergency Drill.  We were instructed to watch a safety video on our stateroom TV and verify that we did so, at our convenience. It’s that “at your convenience” that is of interest here.  Commonly called “the lifeboat drill” by many, it often resulted in lots of people lined up on an outside deck awaiting instruction they might not hear, care about or pay attention to, life jacket in hand.  Go back a couple of decades, and avoiding the lifeboat drill might have been possible. Now, we know at least one human in each stateroom knows what to do because they verified it.  

Sailing away from Greenwich after dark, we touch on a part of cruising that has been given a lot of attention in recent years: staying late in port when possible. Here, we have scenes of sailing the Thames out of London on the way to our next port, Dover.