Joost Ouendag

Joost Ouendag has been with Viking since 2002. Before that, he worked for one of America’s largest tour operators, covering the United States and Canada. Since joining Viking, he has shaped the company’s river cruises around the world for more than ten years, and he now focuses on ocean and expedition cruising. Joost has worked at the company’s Woodland Hills, California, office but now works in Basel, Switzerland. He lived and studied in The Netherlands and Germany, and he holds a master’s degree in linguistics from Utrecht University.

Aaron Lawton

Aaron Lawton, Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society (RCGS), joined Viking in 2020 as Expedition Operations Manager. Based in British Columbia, Canada, he brings over two decades of experience in expedition cruising as a leader and kayak guide on more than 150 voyages to the polar regions of the Arctic and Antarctica. In 2001, Aaron and his wife, Cathy, also kayaked the length of the Antarctic Peninsula on an unsupported sea kayak expedition. Aaron’s passion for adventure and firsthand knowledge ensures exciting developments for our new Viking Expeditions launching in 2022.

In 2015, Aaron received the RCGS Erebus Medal. It was presented to him and the other senior members of Parks Canada’s Underwater Archaeology Team for their successful discovery of HMS Erebus—an exploration ship lost during Sir John Franklin’s 1845–1848 search for the Northwest Passage—in the Arctic Archipelago during the 2014 Victoria Strait Expedition.