Viking River Cruises welcomed the latest additions to its river fleet on Tuesday, March 19, with the naming of 7 new river ships during a celebration on Rhine River in Basel Switzerland.
Of the 7 vessels, 6 are Viking Longships, including Viking Einar (christened by Leah Talactac), Viking Sigrun (godmother Wendy Atkin-Smith), Viking Sigyn (Rikke Semb Pertile), Viking Tir (Gisela Ruckert), Viking Ullur (Linh Banh) and Viking Vali (Minxuan Zhao), which will be deployed on the most popular itineraries of Viking on the Danube, Rhine, and Main Rivers.
The 7th new ship, Viking Helgrim (godmother Natalia Hofmann), was inspired by the Longships design and constructed specifically for sailing on the Douro River, bringing the total number of sisterships in Portugal to 4.
In keeping with the maritime tradition, Viking invited 7 members of the company's family and long-serving employees to serve as honorary godmothers of the newbuild riverboats.
The naming ceremony was executed via connecting the new ships through a satellite across 4 European cities. Viking Sigrun and Viking Einar were docked in Basel and christened by in-person by their godmothers, while the other 5 ships were "virtually" named: Viking Ullur and Viking Sigyn in Rostock Germany, Viking Vali and Viking Tir in Brunsbuttel Germany, Viking Helgrim in Oporto Portugal.
A bottle of Gammel Opland aquavit was broken on each of the ship's bow.