Viking plans to add 10 new river and ocean-going cruise ships
The cruise industry is growing by leaps and bounds, with companies regularly announcing the upcoming launch of new ships. But none can compete with the marathon efforts of Viking, which is adding two new ships to its fleet in 2018, another ship in 2019 and seven new river boats.
Viking, which currently operates a fleet of 62 vessels, offers scenic cruising along the rivers and oceans of the Americas, Europe, Russia, Egypt, China and Southeast Asia.
By 2019, the company will operate six 930-passenger ocean cruise ships and will sail itineraries in Scandinavia and the Baltic, the western and eastern Mediterranean, Asia, Australia, North America and the Caribbean.
Upcoming additions to its fleet include the Viking Ra, which will launch next March, sailing on the Nile River in Egypt; and the Viking Orion, which will become the company’s fifth ocean ship when it launches next summer. Retired U.S. NASA astronaut Anna Fisher has been named godmother. It will spend its maiden year sailing itineraries in the Mediterranean, before sailing to Asia, Australia and then Alaska.
In 2019, the company plans to launch seven new river ships. Six of these will be the company’s standard river ships, call longships, which will sail itineraries on the Rhine, Main and Danube rivers. The additional vessel will be smaller and is being designed specifically for Portugal’s Douro River.
With the addition of the new river ships, Viking will operate a fleet of 69 river vessels.
Also scheduled to launch in 2019 is the line’s sixth ocean-going ship, which has just had its keel-laying ceremony at Fincantieri shipyard in Ancona, Italy. The yet-to-be named ship is the sixth of eight sister ships Viking has ordered from Fincantieri.
Viking was founded in 1997 with the purchase of four ships in Russia and is now celebrating its 20th anniversary.
Info: Viking, (855) 338-4546
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Twitter: @latimestravel
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