-hh wrote:
On Tuesday, September 13, 2016 at 2:28:29 PM UTC-4, Erilar wrote:
Martin wrote:
"Happy.Hobo" wrote:

While I still don't think cruises are worth the expense, I've never
heard anyone but you complain about the food.

Erilar complained about the food. I've never been on a cruise.

Odd. I don't recall complaining about the food. Eating arrangement
on the most recent one, definitely. The food itself was excellent.

Apologies for not reading rte for awhile. In breezing through, the
complaint I thought I read was on the level of quality of the wine.

In any event, I've DIY'ed and River Cruised the Rhine - both have their
advantages/disadvantages (unsurprisingly).

For EU river cruises, we used AMA Waterways on the Danube and
Uniworld on the Rhine (and Venice). Giving a quick broad brush,
I'd say that the table wine service was better on AMA than on Uni.

For the rivers themselves, we liked the Danube a bit better - - the
ports were more frequently "in town", requiring no bus transfer for
the included city walking tour routine. This freed us up a bit more
to strike out on our own (& at our own pace).

Uniworld did feature a "slow walkers" group which might be of some
interest here. Similarly, the Uniworld tour director also made arrangements
at times for taxis for some of the slow walkers to get them back to the boat.

FWIW, one thing with the river cruise companies - they often include a
complimentary pickup from the local airport on your day of arrival ... *IF*
said arrival day is the same as the boat's departure day. Arrive early and
you're on your own. We've done this both ways and one trick that did
work out pretty well was to fly to some city in EU that you want to visit
and spend a couple of days (jetlag recovery, etc). Then take a morning
flight ("puddle jumper") to whatever the arrival city is for the cruise and
they'll pick you up.

For DIYing, the last time that we did so were for a December Christmas
market tour for my parents (Dad was 80 at the time). Rented a car for
this and for the most part, arranged things to be able to drop them off
at the hotel, then go park the car ... found small places to stay down
near the Black Gate in Trier (Mosel River), in downtown Wursburg
(probably 2-3 blocks from the Residenze). A B&B in Bacharach on the
Rhine proper ... used the car to get around to see the various sights on
daytrips/stopovers. Also stayed in Rothenburg ob der Tabor .. think it
was the Guesthouse Griffin? It was ~1 block downhill from the main city
square & had parking inside their private courtyard.


-hh


I wonder whether my friend would like to drive in Germany? Cities don't
drive her into a blue funk as they do me. . . It's not something I'd
considered. Hmmmm

--
biblioholic medievalist via iPad