We had an excellent experience with this, our third Viking cruise. We had land-based stays in Shanghai, xian, and Beijing. The hotels, which Viking had arranged, were fabulous, especially the Wyndem Grande in Xian. The ship, the Emerald, is not owned byViking, but it was quite nice. The bed was not the most comfortable, but there were a lot of nice amenities on board. The food, in general, was good, although we're got tired of the endless buffets. We appreciated the few times we could order more standard meals from a menu. The very best part of the cruise (and there were many, many great things to see on the excursions!) was Viking' practice of assigning a specific guide to a group of about 30 cruisers. Our group had only 28 people not, and our guide, Jack, was just wonderful! We were with him the entire trip, so we really got to know him, and he told us so many interesting things about China, and even a lot about himself and his family. No other guide has ever done that, in our experience. He really made China come alive for us. Ben, the cruise director(?), was also excellent and gave some extremely thorough and interesting talks and slideshows.
Viking had arranged the air travel for us, as we also spent a few days on our own in Japan and South Korea, before and after the China portion of the trip. There were a few glitches, but all in all, everything worked out very well. I would recommend Viking cruises to anyone who likes to travel!
We have cruised on many different ships, including Holland-American, Regent,, Oceania, Princess and Celebrity. We consider Viking River Cruises one of the best, because of its interesting itineraries.
The cabin was larger than on some Viking ships. It was adequate, with a small love seat and a French balcony. The beds were quite hard.