New York debut for Viking Ocean Cruises

CruiseViking Ocean Cruises start an inaugural season of Caribbean cruises today (Tuesday 18 October) with VIKING STAR departing from New York's Manhattan Cruise Terminal for San Juan, Puerto Rico, on the first of a series of 11 night itineraries running through to February 2017.

Introduced last year and the first of six cruise vessels to be built in Italy by Fincantieri through to 2020, the 946 bed VIKING STAR arrived in New York yesterday (Monday) where company chairman Torstein Hagen hosted a reception for media and invited guests.

Hagen said the company, which began in 1997 with river ships and expanded to oceans last will year will sail to the Far East and Australia beginning winter 2018 with summer itineraries to Alaska from summer 2019. Next newbuilding VIKING SPIRIT will debut in June 2018, with a 93-day positioning cruise including a Pacific Ocean crossing from Aukland, New Zealand, to Vancouver, British Columbia.

Viking also has plans to add expedition vessels to a fleet also including 59 river cruise ships and is continuing to work towards introducing vessels on the Mississippi River in the USA.

Oct 18 2016