Antarctic Cruise Day 4/40 - Amsterdam - We board the Polaris - welcome home

Antarctic Cruise Day 4 / 40 - We board the Polaris - Welcome home

Trip day: 4 / 40

Port days: 3
Sea days: 0
Countries: 1
Continents: 1
Ports: 1

I don't know what to make of the weather today.  Nothing fell from the sky all day.  It was weird.  We looked out our window and this is what we saw.

Yes, that is our Viking Polaris docked right next to our hotel

  Why was it docked so far west?  Here's why...

The Viking Venus was sailing into Amsterdam this morning and needed the other dock space

Here's a look at where we will be spending the next 36 days. It is all so shiny and new!

The process was a little weird.  We were instructed to leave our bags outside our hotel room by 10AM.  It sure seemed strange to put our luggage in the hotel hallway where anyone could walk by, but we did.  It all worked out and we didn't have to haul our bags to the ship.

After breakfast at the hotel, we grabbed the last of our stuff and after 10:30AM, we made the incredibly short walk from the Movenpick hotel to the port - about 200 paces.

The terminal has this incredible art installation where air jets are blown from a platform and two silk sheets dance in the resulting air column. It is mesmerizing and quite beautiful.

As soon as we boarded the ship, we met Sujith, the hotel general manager.

We were able to get into our room to drop off our hand-carry stuff.  Here is a look at our room, a DN2 - Deluxe Nordic Balcony 2 class room.

This shows just how close the ship is to the Movenpick Hotel - this is from our room on the ship - it is literally a stone's throw

The view from the entry - that's the bathroom door handle on the right

Turning around and looking back at the room door - the bathroom is on the left

The room control panel -four temperature adjustments in 2-degree Celcius plus a simple up/down on the bottom left and right- the second from the left on the bottom is the Do Not Disturb - it turns your doorbell button red - the next is the Service Room button - it turns the doorbell button green - no more doorknob hangers

The main room - king bed, a desk, couch, and table

The large flat-screen TV and desk

The two-door closet plus drawers and the drying closet - the drying closet will circulate warm, dry air for 3-4 hours to dry expedition clothing

With both doors open, you can see the safe, shelves, and drawers in the closet as well as the two hanging bars and lower shelves

You can see the end table and coffee station housed inside the upper cabinet - the lower cabinet has a drawer and the small mini-fridge

Here is the desk - you can also see the window shade lowered

Here is a look at the window controls - the shade controls are on the left and window controls on the right

A Nordic Balcony isn't a balcony, technically - it is a floor-to-ceiling window.  The upper portion of the window can be lowered when the ship is docked or anchored.

Hitting the button lowers the window to a point

You have to hold the button down to completely lower it

Likewise, hitting the raise button only takes the window up so far

It stops just short of crushing someone's arm - after that, you have to hold the button to completely close the window - a good safety feature

The bathroom is essentially identical to ones on the main ocean fleet

A single sink vanity with heated, no-fog mirror and modest side storage with two drawers

Like all Viking Ocean ships, the bathroom has a heated floor - now with a thermostat to vary the heat level

The shower is generously sized

It includes a small bench and grab bar

Each nightstand has a 220V socket, 110V socket, UBS-A port, and a USB-C port - the desk has the same, plus another 220V & 110V socket

The nightstand also has built-in Qi wireless charging - one of ours was working the other, not so much

I will be posting ship photos.  Today, I will feature deck #1.

Let's start midship.  This is the food service area, starting with Manfredi's on the port (left) side.

On the starboard (right) side, we find The Restaurant - the main dining venue.

Aft is the laboratory and hangar area.  These spaces are not open all the time, but there are viewing areas from deck #2 into the Hangar - the area housing the expedition vessels.

Ahead of the restaurants, we find the Explorer's Desk and a sitting area.

The requisite Officer display is also located here

One of the more challenging spaces to find on deck #1 is The Hide - a whiskey bar.  To access it, you have to go to the forward stairs on deck #2 and then go down to deck #1,

See this non-descript door?  That's the entry to The Hide.

The sign reads: These tubes carry chains to the anchors. Anchoring is a routine operation. Due to the length and weight of the chain, guests may experience loud noises during deployment. If you are sensitive to sound, please keep your distance while in use.

After our walk on deck #1 and some lunch in the World Cafe, we headed out for another walk in Amsterdam.

As we headed out, we passed by the Viking riverboat, Gersemi.  We have never been on a riverboat, so we walked over and asked if it was possible to take a look at the ship.  The Captain was the one at the main door and he welcomed us aboard.  He handed us over to his first officer who conducted the tour.  It was all very welcoming, very much in the Viking style.  We toured the upper two floors of the ship, leaving the lower floor as it was just guest rooms.  We then continued toward Amsterdam's Central Station.

Folks live on both sides of the main canal.  Amsterdam decided that providing passage across the canal made sense.  These ferries operate every six minutes or so, shuttling folks from one side to the other for free.

We made the four-ish minute crossing and took a walk along the canal.

The Viking Venus on the left and our Polaris on the right

Our shiny and new Viking Polaris

The central station, from the water

We also found this place...

After crossing back, we walked into town yet again. Our tour guide yesterday talked about cars driving into the canals.  Here's why. In many places, there is no guardrail.  Picture this - you're parking late at night - you can't see well.  You nudge a little too far to the left and...*splash*.  She said six or seven cars each year wind up in the canal or on top of a boat.

One place we didn't really see the past two days was Amsterdam's Chinatown.  We found it today.

Is there a resemblance?

Chinatown is right next to the red-light district.

I'm not sure who would wear these...

Oh, they have candles too...

Back on the ship, we headed to the Explorer's Bar for a pre-dinner cocktail.  While there, we heard live music coming from the bow, one floor below us and a little forward.  Norway's singing sensation, Sissel Kyrkjebø, was aboard and performing.

As it turns out, Torstein Hagen, Viking’s owner, and CEO was also aboard.  Tomorrow, they will perform the official naming ceremony and christen this ship. We have an excursion to the Rijksmuseum tomorrow morning but will be back for the ceremony.  It’s kind of a big deal christening a new ship.

Other interesting asides…

We found out that there will be somewhere between 80-100 of us on the ship for the transit to Ushuaia, Argentina.  There are more aboard at the moment, but many of those are friends or press and they will leave before we sail, or in Madeira. Once we get to Ushuaia, about 120 more guests will embark on the journey to Antarctica for a total of 200-220 passengers out of a 378-passenger max capacity.  

I titled this post “Welcome Home”.  Here’s why.  When we went up to the World Café, a smiling face met us. Katerina, who worked the desk at The Restaurant on our world cruise was there.  She immediately smiled and said, “Mr. & Mrs. Kolb – it is so good to see you!”  She let us know that Santos and Merial, also from the world cruise are also aboard.  As soon as we went in, both saw us and immediately came over to greet us.  Here’s the long and short of it – Viking’s crew is simply incredible.  We felt like we were home.  They are amazing.  Beyond that, we met the Captain and other officers who were out and about, greeting guests and welcoming them aboard.  I can’t speak highly enough about how they make every guest feel.

Finally, today has been humbling.  No less than four guests have come up and introduced themselves to us.  They have all read my blog from the world cruise. One even recounted several items including Arlona’s COVID adventure.  I am astonished and humbled that so many folks read what I wrote and got some benefit from it.  It makes it easier to spend time each day on these musings.

So with that, I will wrap it up for today.  Tomorrow, we’ll hit the Rijksmuseum, celebrate the ship’s christening, and then…we sail!