Our Lucky Day!!!

I don’t often think about luck, good or bad. I feel life mostly turns out for the best. And, if I have a few lucky breaks along the way, so much the better. You are probably wondering, why am I writing about luck? This is my story.

Last year I booked an ocean cruise for myself and my husband with Viking, two weeks sailing around the Mediterranean from Barcelona to Venice. It sounded wonderful!

When I make reservations, I usually go with a room somewhere in the middle price range. In this case I picked one with a balcony, so we could go outside, and on the port side, so we’d see the coastline along the way on most of the voyage.

Over the intervening months, various papers arrived from Viking telling me to do this or that. They all began with our names and our room number. Last week the final packet arrived and the first thing I did was check that everything was correct: our names, room number, flights, hotels, etc.

I was shocked! The room number was different! What had happened?

At first I felt upset. What had Viking done? Then I decided to see where this room was and what it looked like. I clicked on the ship’s deck plan and then on the room and the screen opened up with this picture:

Wow! The Explorer Suite which has 757 or more square feet, depending on where it’s located. It includes a private wrap around deck as well as a living room, bedroom and bathroom the size of the one we have at home. It also comes with a number of perks such as three complimentary guaranteed priority reservations in the specialty restaurants and a welcome bottle of champagne as well as a number of other complimentary items! Frankly, I was gone when I saw 757 square feet! Our original room, which I’d been very happy with, came with 270 square feet, one priority reservation and no champagne.

Now I was both excited and worried! How did this happen? Would we be charged the difference in fare? This room was two-thirds to twice as expensive as what I’d originally booked.

I decided to phone Viking. I told the man who answered that I had noticed a room number change on our final papers. What had happened? Would we be billed the price difference? I held my breath. There was a long pause. He said he had to check our account. He was gone for what seemed like FOREVER. Finally he came back. Viking found some maintenance issues in our original room so they decided to move us. There would be no charge.

Wow! I let my breath out slowly. This was certainly very, very good luck!!! The Explorer’s Suite! Our trip of a lifetime! What a lucky break!