River cruises

We are thinking about taking a river cruise next spring. Can anyone recommend a cruise in Europe with nice accommodations. ANy help would be helpful. We are clueless. We'd like to do something special for our anniversary.

Try Viking River Cruises.

http://www.vikingrivercruises.com/regions/europe/index.aspx

Scenic Tours.

http://ca.scenictours.com/

Hi,

We returned from our 3rd Viking River Cruise yesterday. I will be posting a trip report as soon as I get my act together, which may be awhile.

In the meantime, you can read my trip reports of the other cruises in the archives here.

The first one we took was Tulips and Windmills. This only runs for a short time because tulip time is around April to early May. It is quite cool to downright cold in the Netherlands at that time of year. Still a very enjoyable trip. I will have to look up the exact date. I think it was in 2007.

In August of 2009, we took Viking's Romantic Danube Cruise. Of the 3, I think that is my favorite, and the one I would recommend for an anniversary.

The third was Portraits of Southern France with a 2 day extension in Marseille. It involved much more walking that was much more difficult than the other 2 cruises. Do keep in mind that we were a group of 4 ranging from 69 to 80, however, there were more younger passengers on this cruise than the others.

Some advice:
1. Book early. Viking's cruises fill up fast.
2. Use a travel agent that has experience booking river cruises. Booking the cruise is not difficult, but airline reservations can get tricky even if you book air through the cruise line. We were very thankful to have a great travel agent this time.

Hopes this gives you a starting point.

Sue

Read Sues reports. They are fantastic. We did the Romantic Danube last Nov and it was very cold. We loved the cruise but would go in better weather. Loved Viking and will use them again. Sues report in the archives will give you complete detail. She is great.

This topic caught my eye. We have friends who have done several Grand Circle River Cruises and swear by them. I am interested in input on this as well, although I still need to do the Panama Canal first! <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Grin.gif" alt="" />

Been swanmped lately and not as attentive as would like.

With regard to river cruise; finally Viking has introduced newer vessels. Heretofore their fleet had no balconies or French balconies, windows only. A feature I'm not excited about is their payment policy; full amount within thirty days of booking regardless of sail date.

May want to look at others doing vurtually identical itineraries (they all do), AMA Waterways and Avalon Waterways. I've never had an unhappy client.

Hi Bonnie,

Our travel agent also sends her customers on the other lines you mentioned, as well as traveling on them and Viking herself. She also has never had an unhappy cruiser.

On our September cruise we were told that Viking is building 3 more "longships." The Viking Europe is to be retired at the end of this season, and I expect the others in this class will also be retired as soon as there are longship replacements.

The new ships have mostly French balconies and suites. In fact the one that they will be using for their new Portuguese tour is almost all French balconies and suites with only a total of 8 cabins that are not. It is smaller than the other long ships with a passenger capacity of only 124.

Despite their payment policy, we continue to cruise with them because as past cruisers we have gotten substantial discounts in addition to the "past cruisers discount." I would guess that the other cruise companies do the same to get repeat cruisers. Obviously we like the way we have been treated or we would not be return cruisers. Their handling of my complaints about Marseille knocked our socks off.

Sue

Hmm, we were told on our cruise this past September that 2012 would be the last season for the Viking Europe. However, we just received a catalog for Viking's 2013 cruises and it is still listed for the Portraits of Southern France cruise.

Sue

You might also try Vantage's Windmills and waterways of Holland and Belgium. Enjoyed it a few years ago. The tulips at Kukenhof gardens are spectacular!