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Rhein cruises
-hh wrote:
Erilar wrote: -hh wrote: 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. 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 If it helps, here's a rough cut at what I recall our itinerary was, from roughly a decade ago. I've used Google to try to fill in some of the gaps. Arrived - Frankfort. Rental company was probably AutoEurope. Was an Audi A6 Avant with turbo diesel. Nice car; averaged a respectable 27mpg over ~1000km, with stuff about equally split into thirds on time (not mileage): 25mph city/urban, 45mph countryside, and 95+0mph Autobahn. Only complaint was that with five adults & bags, it was tail-heavy, so the nose got a bit uncomfortably light when cruising above 120mph, especially in the rain. I think our overall route was something like this: https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Airp...50.0379326!3e0 In case that doesn't come up, its FRA Bacharach (on the Rhine) Trier Widdern (day stop) Rothenburg ob der Tauber Bamburg (day stop) Wurzburg FRA For hotel specifics, I think we originally found most of these through the Rick Steves guidebooks. Bacharach: Pension Lettie Address: Kranenstraße 6, 55422 Bacharach, Germany Phone: +49 6743 2115 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pe...99!4d7.7685024 Parking for Bacharach is outside of the city wall, near the Rhine river. IIRC, they started to charge a nominal fee. FYI, I've also stayed at "Kranenturm" here too, but prefer Lettie (great hostess too!). Kranenturm is on top of the train tracks. Makes for an interesting dinner on the patio, but even if you ask to be put on the "quiet side" of their building, their proximity is now only 20ft away & can still wake you up. Trier: Altstadt-Hotel (today: $145/night) Porta-Nigra-Platz 6, 54292 Trier, Germany https://www.google.com/maps/place/Al...19!4d6.6447303 My recollection of parking here was that it was (included?) around a block around the back of the hotel .. on Rindertanzstrasse? Rothenburg: Guesthouse Griffin (today: $56/night) (parking was on site, although a tight squeeze) Obere Schmiedgasse 5, 91541 Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Germany gasthof-greifen-rothenburg.de https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ho...1!4d10.1796222 Wurzburg Sorry, can't recall the name of the place. I did find a dinner receipt from "Bürgerspital Weinstuben", so that was within walking distance. I do recall that we parked in front to unload, and then the car "disappeared" into a parking garage ... I don't remember the garage, so I want to say that they hotel staff did a "valet parking" for this? In general, I'd simply find a likely hotel/pension in the place I'm looking at staying, then specifically asking them about where a car can be parked. Finally, all of this was done in the days of paper maps (Michelin & MapQuest) for the human navigator, before the electronic devices which know (in real time) just where you are and can give tailored turn-by-turn instructions, so it all would be a lot easier to do today. Hope this helps...and if you want to make it an expensive trip, do a European Delivery for a new BMW, Mercedes, Audi or Porsche ;-) -hh Saved this for future reference, thanks 8-) -- biblioholic medievalist via iPad |
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