In today's video, a look at the most unusual feature on Viking's new expedition ship.
This cruise ship carries a submarine onboard. In fact, not just one, but two!
I got to take a ride in one, and I'm going to bring you along with me.
Plus, I'll show you how the subs get to the water from their storage location within the ship...
And how they're brought back onboard again at the end of an expedition.
I've had a lot of fun on cruise ships over the years, but...
What you're going to see me do in this video, I will never forget!
I'm Jim Zim, a licensed commercial drone pilot...
And this is a little aerial video I shot of Viking's new expedition ship, Viking Octantis...
During our recent cruise in the Caribbean.
Viking invited me and my wife to fly down to Barbados, at their expense...
To meet up with the ship and spend 9 days aboard making videos for my YouTube channel.
Today's video is just going to focus on the ship's submarines...
Because that's something you sure don't see on cruise ships very often, do you?
And then in the coming weeks, there will be several more videos here on my YouTube channel...
About all the things I liked about this new ship.
It truly is one of the coolest cruise ships I've ever been on.
A submarine ride was THE hot ticket during our recent cruise.
Not everyone was able to experience a ride in the sub, but I got lucky.
Now in the preview video I made about this ship before the cruise...
I said something that turned out to be not correct.
Viking had supplied me with this computer generated artist's concept video
Of one of the submarines being lowered down to the water.
And I incorrectly stated that passengers board the subs while the subs are inside the ship...
And then the subs are lowered down in to the water.
That turned out to be a very wrong assumption on my part.
Once I actually got aboard and saw the subs in action, I found out that...
The way it actually works is that when the subs are winched up or down,
in to or out of the ship... They are empty.
The submarine pilot and the passengers use a Zodiac to get from the ship to the sub...
And then they all climb in to the sub while it bobs around on the surface.
Each sub holds six passengers, three on each side...
And the pilot sits in the center with the controls.
The passenger seats face the center when you board the sub...
But then they rotate 180 degrees to face out to the view when the sub is in motion.
When the sub is at the surface, it's an odd view to see the waves splashing around the top of the sub.
And it was a very unusual experience when the pilot closed the hatch and started to submerge the sub.
As the sub went deeper and deeper down in to the water...
It was weird looking out the window. I had no sense of how deep we were.
It just seemed like we were 3 or 4 feet below the surface when the pilot said we were 30 feet...
And then a little later, 60 feet.
And finally, when we got down to just a few feet above the ocean floor...
We were something like 90 feet below the surface.
Now I have to apologize that there's really not much to see in this video of the view out the sub's big glass bubble.
The particular place that we did our little sub excursion just didn't offer much to see on the ocean floor.
There was a little bit of coral, but not much. Mostly just sand. And hardly any fish, either.
I'm sure that in other places the ship visits, there are much better views under the water...
Just not where we happened to be on this particular day.
Now I can sometimes get a little freaked out in very tight spaces...
But I wanted to get video of the submarine so badly that I just put on a brave face.
The one part of the sub ride that did make me a little anxious was at the very end when we surfaced.
The pilot got out of his seat, climbed up the ladder, opened the hatch, and got out.
While all of us passengers waited for our turn to climb out.
So there we were, on a sub, with no pilot aboard, the hatch open...
And waves splashing all around the top of the sub.
The thought did occur to me that this would be a really bad time for a big wave to hit.
But of course, that didn't happen and everything was fine as we all got out.
Later, back onboard Viking Octantis, I got a look around the area where the submarines are stored and serviced.
This part of the ship is known as The Hangar...
And this is not only where the submarines are stored...
But also the special operations boats that can take passengers out to visit colonies of penguins in Antarctica...
Or give passengers an up-close look at icebergs and leopard seals and things like that.
Of course, in the Caribbean we didn't see anything like that.
Now this is the storage bay where the submarine sits when it's not in use, and when it is being serviced.
You can see the rails in the floor that are used to slide the sub in and out.
Overhead there's a crane that lifts the sub up off the floor and in to the air...
And the whole thing can then slide out this hatch in the side of the ship...
To winch the sub up or down as needed.
There's one of these big hatches on each side of the ship...
And one of the submarines is stored on each side of the ship.
The submarines are labeled as 01 and 02...
But they are more commonly known as John and Paul.
The new sister ship coming out later this year, Viking Polaris...
Will also have two submarines. They will be George and Ringo.
If you're of a certain age, you get Viking's joke.
Well, I think that gives you a pretty good look at the submarines...
One of the most unusual things about Viking's new expedition ships.
In the coming weeks, I'll have more videos about all the things I saw during my cruise aboard Viking Octantis.
I'll give you a good look around the inside of the ship...
Not only all the public spaces, but also a close look at two different types of cabins.
I'll show you how similar this ship is to the rest of Viking's fleet of ocean ships...
But also some of the ways that it's better. In fact, that was something that surprised me.
I expected the expedition ship to be a smaller, lesser version of Viking's ocean ships...
But what I actually found was that it's not a lesser version, it's an improved version...
Taking a lot of features from the previous ships and improving on many of them.
Subscribe to my YouTube channel (it's free)... So that you don't miss those upcoming videos.
And if you're interested in booking a cruise on Viking, or any other cruise line...
Feel free to use the services of my travel agent, Caitlin Gallagher.
I'm Jim Zim. Thanks for watching.