Valentina's first encounter with the sea was at the age of three, when her family moved from Transbaikalia to Vladivostok in 1918. There, she studied at the Water Transport College and worked at a shipyard. She later moved to Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) and, just before the war, graduated from the navigation department of the Institute of Water Transport Engineers. During the war, Orlikova served as a navigator and first mate on ships in the Baltic Sea and the Arctic Ocean, delivering cargo and evacuating the wounded. Later, Orlikova alternated between office work and voyages at sea, becoming the first female captain of a large freezer fishing trawler.