by Jim Bellomo | Oct 6, 2026 | Photography
We boarded Octantis on Friday, but this cruise also included an overnight in Milwaukee on the first night. So when we got up the next morning, we were scheduled to take an overview tour of the city we had spent the last two nights in. That worked for us because a "luxury motor coach" overview tour takes you to the outskirts of town and into residential areas we never got to see. That was the case with this tour, but there was a twist. It turns out that Viking hires the same group of local tour guides as the food tour we took last week, so when Kathleen and I got on the bus, who should we find in the tour guide seat but our old buddy Paul. We knew right then that even if we saw the same stuff, we were in for an entertaining tour. We weren’t wrong.
The tour took us into those residential areas and included two one-hour stops. One of the stops far exceeded my expectations, and the other was a snooze fest. They should skip it entirely, except for a drive-by. First up was the good stop—the Harley-Davidson Museum. I had no idea that Harley was based in Milwaukee, but that’s where they started, and their museum is a masterpiece showcasing everything about the coolest bikes in the world.
When we first arrived, our “luxury motor coach” dropped us off right in front of a large group of riders getting ready for a sunny Saturday run. Their bikes were gorgeous, especially one particular bike. The owner of that bike saw me shooting him and asked if I could take a couple of photos to send him. I gave him my card and hope to hear from him because I really like the photos I took of him. It was really fun connecting with him. When the group was finally all together, they roared out of the parking lot one at a time, each showing off his bike. The rider I had connected with roared past me, keeping his eye on my lens the entire time.
One thing I may not have mentioned in my previous post about our food tour was that our guide, Paul, was also a photographer. As we went into the museum, he walked over and said, “Look for the wall of gas tanks. It makes an awesome photo.” He was right. It did. And so did more of the exhibits than I expected. See the pics below.
Our second stop on the “luxury motor coach” tour was the Pabst Mansion, built by the founder of the Pabst Brewery, the maker of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer…or, as we like to call it, yellow-colored water. This is the stop I mentioned should have just been a drive-by. Inside the home (which, as you can see, is beautiful outside), the house was cluttered and typical of a rich guy’s home from the 1890s. It also had a mildew-and-rot smell. I went in but couldn’t find a single thing worth wasting a pixel on. So, as you will see below, I took all my photos in and around the Harley-Davidson museum. The rest of the tour was excellent, and much of that was due to Paul’s narration.
After we returned from our “luxury motor coach” tour, it was time for lunch. Then Octantis sailed out of Milwaukee, and we waved goodbye to a city we liked a whole lot more than we ever thought we would. We (just the October Bunch) went up to deck six, where we could take some great pics…see below. I got a couple of the Art Museum with the wings open. A beautiful building.
I love Milwaukee! I'm going to be in Milwaukee 20 years! I'll be here so long, they'll be sick of me!—Giannis Antetokounmpo
by Jim Bellomo | Oct 5, 2026 | Uncategorized
It is not often that we board a new kind of ship. We took our first ocean cruise in 1999 and our first river cruise in 2021. Since then, we've sailed on all kinds of ships, from small riverboats (American Cruise Line, with fewer than 200 passengers) to big ships (Royal Caribbean’s Allure of the Seas, with 6,500+ passengers). During that time, we have sailed on three basic types of ship: ocean, river, and just once on an expedition-type ship (Celebrity’s Flora in the Galapagos). So, when considering this Great Lakes Cruise, one of the big selling points was the chance to sail on an expedition ship again. And I have to say that so far, we are loving Viking Octantis.
If you aren’t a cruise fan, you may find this entire post a snooze. So I won’t blame you if you skip this one. Just sayin’. Come back tomorrow for a report on our last day in Milwaukee while onboard the ship. But if you are even a little interested in what I think is the most beautiful and best-designed ship we have ever sailed on, then by all means read on.
A few ship facts:
- Octantis accommodates a maximum of 374 guests. Some ships show different numbers depending on how many people are in a stateroom, but since Octantis does not allow children under 18, it limits each stateroom to a maximum of two people, even the biggest suites.
- Octantis is very thin, only 77 feet across. By contrast, Celebrity Solstice, which we sailed on to Alaska in June, is 121 feet across. On a ship, that makes a difference. In a few days, we will sail through the Welland Canal, which will take the ship to Toronto, then on to Montreal, Québec City, and out to the Atlantic. A large cruise ship could not do that.
- Octantis is four years old. That’s new by ship standards. And she is going into dry dock to keep her that new in just a month or so.
- She has only seven decks (really eight, but the top deck is crew-only), so it is easy to go up and down.
Enough about facts and figures. Let’s look at the ship from the top down. Of course, her photo is at the top of this page. I took this yesterday when we stopped on Mackinac Island in upper Michigan. She was anchored just offshore, and I had to walk quite a ways to get this shot, so I hope you appreciate it ?
Deck 6
As you can see from the deck diagram above, Deck 6 is pretty much an open deck. Lots of space to sit and catch some sun, or a great place to take photos. We were up there as we sailed out of Milwaukee. I should add that we were completely alone. Most people had gone to the bow for a sail-away celebration with live music and drinks, but we just wanted the photos, so the six of us were all by our lonesomes up there. Also, on Deck 6 are the BIG suites. The Owner’s Suite you see on the deck plan is more than 700 square feet and has its own private garden area. Seriously. The other suites on that deck are all over 500 square feet. I should point out that Octantis has no verandas/balconies. That would have made her too wide. Instead, you have large windows that open and take up almost the entire width of the stateroom. More about that below when we show you our stateroom.
Deck 5
This deck is completely public. No staterooms. From the front of the ship, my favorite place to sit while writing is the Explorer’s Lounge. Then you run into The Library, followed by The Living Room, a very nice and intimate meeting space, much like your living room at home. It is on two decks (4 and 5), and I am sitting in it right now as I write this. On the starboard side of the ship, you reach Mamsen’s next. This is one of my favorite places to eat breakfast. But I'll talk more about the food later, at the end of the cruise, in my roundup.
Moving aft, you run into the ship’s main restaurant, the World Cafe. Long-time cruisers may be surprised to learn that Octantis and her sister ship Polaris have no main dining room. We'll get to two specialty restaurants below, but the main place to eat is the World Cafe buffet. As I said, more about the food later on, but suffice it to say, it is an amazing buffet. An absolute plethora of choices.
At the aft end of the ship on deck five is the Aquavit Terrace, a very nice bar area that serves The Pools. They are interesting. When I say “The Pools,” you might think of more than one big swimming pool that you would find on a big cruise ship. There are three small ones (about the size of a large hot tub), and each is a different temperature. One is warm, one is cooler, and one is downright cold. Check out the photos; the pictures and captions explain everything.
Deck 4
Our stateroom is on deck four. The entire deck, except the very front, is staterooms. On deck four, there is also the lower level of the Explorer’s Lounge and a launderette. More about our stateroom below. Decks two, three and four all have launderettes (six washers/six dryers and an ironing board—this is crazy for a ship of 374 people when the Ocean ships have three washer/dryers for almost 1,000).Not only that but suites get free laundry done for them.
Deck 3
Much like decks two and four, this deck is mostly staterooms, but it also has two interesting features. At the very front of the deck, you will find The Bow. Every ship has a bow. It’s the front of the ship. But on most ocean cruise ships, it is not always accessible. Usually it’s reserved for special occasions, like going through the Panama Canal or a glacier day in Alaska. But on Octantis, The Bow is always open. And right behind it is a really cool (or should I say warm) spot called The Shelter. This is mostly for those who go up on The Bow to look at the scenery and then need a place to get warm. Since this ship sails the Arctic in the summer and the Antarctic in the winter, this comes in handy. It’s a cool space—photos below. Midships is a tiny shop that sells Viking-branded merchandise, as well as the office of the “Travel Consultant,” who sells future cruises. I should add that this is the ONLY place on board where you can buy anything. Something I truly appreciate.
At the aft end of deck three is the upper entrance to the Aula. The Aula is the ship’s “theater.” I put that in quotes because there really aren’t any shows. And that’s OK because this is an expedition ship. Instead, there are scientific talks, port presentations and discussions of shore excursions. The room is amazing, with a huge screen that comes down from the ceiling in a most unusual way. When the screen is not down, the room is completely glass-enclosed, and the views are amazing. This is probably much more impressive in the Arctic or Antarctic. Here on the Great Lakes, we just see water. Lots of water. The Aula is two decks high, so you can enter either from deck three or deck two.
Deck 2
This deck is about half staterooms (forward) and half public (midships to aft). After the staterooms at the front, you run into Expedition Central, which focuses on shore excursions and expeditions off the ship. There is also a lot of science going on there, and they hold small-group talks from time to time. Then come the lifeboats (there are four lifeboats, and they each hold 160 people). Since there are 374 passengers and 260 crew members, they can easily accommodate everyone, and they are also used as tenders. I must say, they are the nicest tenders we have ever been on. So clean you could eat off the deck. Impressive.
Behind the lifeboat area are the spa and fitness centers. The spa has all the usual indoor pool amenities, including steam rooms, a snow shower room, saunas, and an indoor pool. There is NO CHARGE to use any of this. There is also a full-service spa where you can get anything from a haircut to a full-body massage. Past the spa is the lower level of The Aula, and beyond that is a deck area called the Finse Terrace. Just a nice place to relax outdoors, looking at the ship’s wake.
Deck 1
This is about half a service deck, which means that area is used for service and crew quarters. At the front of the ship is a small lounge called The Hide. It is called that because you can hide there and no one will find you. Seriously, it is very hard to find. There is only one way down there from deck two, and once you are down there, you are not sure where it is. There is a huge door that looks like it goes into a vault. It’s a cool space, and you can lean out over the windows to look down into the sea. They also use it at night for Expedition Tales, where different members of the Expedition Team tell stories of their adventures.
Midships on Deck 1 are the two specialty restaurants. One is Manfredi’s (an Italian-themed dining room), and the other is The Restaurant, which serves food similar to what you would find in the main dining room of most cruise ships. You need reservations for both of these venues, but eating there is free. We snagged two reservations for each, and at this point we have been to both once. We will go back to The Restaurant in a few nights, but after our experience at Manfredi’s we have decided to skip our other visit. More about that when I write about the food.
Then, all the way at the back of the ship, are The Laboratory and The Hanger. I have not seen them yet, as they are only open during presentations. But they both relate to the expedition side of things. The Hanger houses the ship’s Zodiac fleet, two Special Operations Boats, and two six-man submarines. Yes, submarines. I hope to include photos of these in a couple of days.
Deck A
This is about 90% of the service area. The medical team is stationed at the infirmary and on the lower level of The Hangar. This is also where you board tenders for excursions. Because we visit so many small ports, all our stops except Detroit are tender ports. That means we board a tender (lifeboat) and it takes us to shore.
Our Stateroom
We splurged on this trip and booked a Nordic Junior Suite. It is a really nice stateroom. As far as I am concerned, Viking’s ship and stateroom design are so far ahead of everyone else’s that it’s just not fair. The only comparable stateroom to what we have experienced with Viking is Celebrity’s Flora. That’s it. Below are some photos and above is a floor plan. The floor plan is a little off because they removed the table and replaced it with a desk, which makes more sense. It is a beautiful and very functional room, and I will say more in the photo captions.
If your ship doesn't come in, swim out to it. —Jonathan Winters
by Jim Bellomo | Sep 23, 2026 | Uncategorized
Not sure if you remember this, but we have a group of six people who travel every October. We call ourselves the October Bunch. We have traveled together every October since 2023, when we sailed on Oceania’s Vista from Montreal to Miami. Since then, we have done river cruises on both the Douro in Portugal and the Columbia River. And since it is almost October, we are off to sail again with the Bunch.
The October Bunch includes me, Kathleen, my brother Steve (of the famous Steve test of restaurants), my sister-in-law Jamie, and our incredible Florida friends Mike and Cathy. Kathleen and I have been traveling with Mike since 2005, and I consider him one of my two best friends in the world.
This year, our trip will start in Chicago this Saturday, and we will spend four days touring the city. We haven’t been there together since 2013. (I was back in 2014 to deal with my youngest brother’s death, but that doesn’t count as a city visit. Jamie and Steve have been there most recently, and our other two Bunchers haven’t been there for more than 25 years.)This should be fun.
We are in Chicago from Saturday afternoon until Wednesday morning, when we rent a car and drive north to the home of cheese and beer—Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I am pretty sure none of us have been there before. We stay two nights at a really cool hotel (which you will see when we get there). Then, on Friday morning, we board the Viking Octantis for a seven-night cruise that takes us to five of the six Great Lakes (we don’t get to Superior).
We are very excited about the cruise because, after all our years of cruising, this is an entirely new kind of ship we have never been on before. In fact, as cruise ships go, only two like it exist in the world: Octantis and her sister ship, Polaris. Octantis holds only 374 passengers in 187 staterooms, so it is much smaller than a Viking Ocean ship and larger than a Viking River boat.
As an expedition ship, she spends most of the year in either the Arctic or the Antarctic. On the way between her two main destinations, she visits the Great Lakes and the Caribbean. This gives us a chance to check her out. She has a lot of very cool gear, including Special Operations Boats for exploring, Zodiacs, and even two six-man submarines (John and Paul). The ship has a scientific lab for oceanic exploration.
You can see our route at the top of this page. We love where this cruise ends… when we sail into Lake Ontario (NOT Lake America) and disembark in Toronto, one of our favorite cities. We will spend the night so we can see our good friends Tim and Perry. It’s been way too long since we last saw them.
That’s the coming two weeks. I will be blogging away, and as always, I will have photos. I hope to use what I learned in Belgium two weeks ago on this trip.
“An account of an expedition is not a novel. Therefore, an authentic account can never be given, let alone written down by someone who was not present.” —Reinhold Messner
