SS Maria Theresa Budapest to Amsterdam - A Users Guide

I am writing this thread for two reasons. One is to keep a small record of our trip. Of course I could do that privately, but by posting it here I put pressure on my lazy self to keep it up ( I know me). And secondly to provide some info to first time cruisers, as we are, and answer basic questions that I had for the last several months. I was inspired to do this based on a thread started by Jpalbny earlier this year - http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2185546&highlight=jpalbny. Now I don't remotely intend to replicate that great thread. I will take a lot of photos and video, buy that will be for my own home movie DVD. I do hope to provide info on the ship, what the excursions are like, and any other info that I think would be helpful. OK, let's get to day one, I'm already writing this a day late.

We arrived in Budapest on Friday, June 12th and checked into the Boutique Hotel Victoria (I highly recommend it). As an interesting side note, on Saturday were walking along the Danube near the Great Market and spotted the MT (I'll use that from now on) berthed there. I was surprised because that was about 4 miles from where our instructions said it would be berthed. So I went on board to see if this is where I should come the next morning. They explained that they berth there to be closer to the city center, but that for disembarkation and embarkation they at the berth at the other location. At that berth there is much more room for buses, vans and taxis.

On Sunday morning we checked out and took a taxi to the ship. A crew member met us and took our bags to the ship. We arrived about noon and rooms are not available until 3 PM. We were able to check in. You do not need your tickets, they only wanted to see your passports. My wife was a little dismayed because they take a digital face photo and she hadn't worn make up. So ladies be warned, although I don't know what they do with the photo, it's not on your key card.

We relaxed a little on the ship and explored a few of the public spaces. Snacks and beverages were available if you wanted it. Since the ship is berthed about 2 1/2 miles from the city center, a shuttle van is provided to take you there and pick you up. We did this and spent few hours before returning to the MT about 4 PM. Tea was served from 3 to 5. There was a nice assortment of cakes, tarts, finger sandwiches and fruit.

With my next post I'll resume with the check in to our stateroom.

Thank you No Spin. We (me, my DH, DB, SIL and her mom) will all be first time river cruisers in August on the other Uniworld ship (River Empress) doing this same route. I'll be sharing your postings with the group. Have a wonderful cruise!

Looking forward to hearing more in preparation for our Uniworld cruise next month!

Thanks No spin for this users guide. We will be on MT in December for the Christmas Market cruise from Budapest to Passau. JP inspired me to do the same for the Christmas Market cruise after reading his Antoinette(right before we sailed her last year) and the Catherine a few months ago. Can't wait for what follows. Have a great time.

No Spin - looking forward to following along with your review. We are booked on the River Beatrice for the Danube portion of this cruise next spring. Thanks for mentioning my blog - I hope you have as much fun as we did!

This is a very technologically advanced ship. At check in each passenger is issued a key card in a nice leather holder. It has your name on it as well as the dates of embarkation and disembarkation. There is also a barcode that is unique to you. Entry into the room is easier than some hotels. I hate the hotels that get fancy with their key card and you don't know which side is up, and with no arrow pointing which end should be inserted. With this card you simply hold it up to the pad next to your doorknob. PULL the doorknob towards you and then push in on the door.

Hopefully the photo appears full size. I also tried to do everything in one post, but it appears I will have to make a separate post for each photo.

Once inside if you want lights, you have to insert your key card in the slot just inside the door. Places where electricity is expensive are moving to this system so that you do not leave the room for the day with all your lights on. Touch the switch to the right to turn your room lights on. There is a similar switch in the bathroom to turn those lights on. Now here is something that may throw you off. All the lights in your room are LED's. About a year ago I changed all the bulbs in my house to LED. My wife turns on every light in any room she enters at our house and leaves them on even though she will never return to that room. As my father used to say, "I don't own the electric company". So LED lights save me a lot of money. The only problem with them is unlike incandescent bulbs, they are not instant on. It takes them like a half second to turn on. So when you touch the switch to turn the lights on and they don't immediately turn on, the normal reaction is to touch the switch again. Of course what this does is turns the light off. So touch the switch on and wait a second.

These are the light switches on either side of the bed. When you place your hand near them they illuminate, very helpful in the dark. In addition to the power outlet there is also a USB outlet.

Once inside if you want lights, you have to insert your key card in the slot just inside the door. Places where electricity is expensive are moving to this system so that you do not leave the room for the day with all your lights on. Touch the switch to the right to turn your room lights on. There is a similar switch in the bathroom to turn those lights on. Now here is something that may throw you off. All the lights in your room are LED's. About a year ago I changed all the bulbs in my house to LED. My wife turns on every light in any room she enters at our house and leaves them on even though she will never return to that room. As my father used to say, "I don't own the electric company". So LED lights save me a lot of money. The only problem with them is unlike incandescent bulbs, they are not instant on. It takes them like a half second to turn on. So when you touch the switch to turn the lights on and they don't immediately turn on, the normal reaction is to touch the switch again. Of course what this does is turns the light off. So touch the switch on and wait a second.

On a cruise ship the cabin attendant enters your room shortly after you leave (up to 3x a day), so there's little opportunity to leave the lights on all day. And LED lights, while better than the fluorescent ones they tried to foist on us, are not as pleasing as good old incandescents. De gustibus ...

Now as for the shower controls I'll give you the benefit of avoiding my misstep. I don't know how clearly this will show in the picture, but the smaller top knob controls whether the water will flow from the handheld wand or the overhead rain shower. The larger bottom handle controls water temperature. Be sure to turn the top knob to the left to turn on the wand. If you turn it to the right the rain shower will come on full force with initially cold water and splash water on the floor since you have the door open.

Once you have the water temperature regulated, you can step in and use either shower head.

A nice touch in the bathroom is heated floors and a towel warmer. Although with temps in the low 90's here right now we haven't used either.

Love all the detail you're providing--I'm sure upcoming cruisers will find your photos and instructions extremely helpful!

On our first full day in Budapest we took the "Do as the Locals Do" walking tour. We almost took the city bus tour since we had already done all the Rick Steves walking tours (Leopoldo Town, Andrassy Street, Jewish Quarter, Pest Town Center and Castle Hill). However, they explained that this one does not go where the tourists go. The walking on this tour is not strenuous as it was all flat, even when we were in Buda. However there are stairs.

Our guide was Kata. She was excellent. Her English was good and she was very informative. She took us on the newest subway to Buda where we toured a local market. We also took the tram later to another part of Pest. Some of the sites were not remarkable, but she explained a lot about Hungarian life in the process of walking through the streets. Near the end of the tour we stopped at a very nice cafe for coffee and pastry (included).

If you haven't seen most of the main sites in Budapest, I would suggest you skip this tour and do the city bus tour.

Additional info: in your stateroom there are two QuietVox units in a charger. You take these with you on a tour. The guide speaks into a mic and with your unit and an ear piece you can clearly hear even if you are many yards away. This unit is also used when you are on the Sun Deck and the Cruise Manager is pointing out sites as the ship cruises.

Since we took the Tulips on the Maria Theresa in April, thought would add my

2 cents. The shower is luscious!! The heated floor is wonderful...BUT for some reason the size of the shower stall seems much bigger. I agree about the controls for the lights..a bit confusing in the beginning but works out after a few tries.

rick

Welcome to Europe's technology!:)

Your photo is in the ship's system. On ocean cruises, they swipe your card when you're leaving and entering the ship and the security officer sees your photo on his screen. On my only river cruise, they had no such system.

Ok, here are the last two parts on the stateroom functions. Pictured below is the climate control pad. I first saw this earlier this year when we stayed at a friend's condo in West Palm Beach. They had just had a complete renovation and this was how they controlled the temperature. Frankly I don't know what was wrong with the old thermostats, but I guess this is the wave of the future. Like the light switches, only a wave of your hand causes it to light up.

You probably can't tell in the photo, but around the lighted circle there is a slight groove. So you can place your finger in this groove and "dial" the desired temperature. It's a little finicky in that it is easy to dial past the temp that you want and have to go back and forth until you hit the number you want. It only reads in centigrade (22C is almost 72F). The button with the fan symbol toggles between auto, low, medium and high speeds.

Note: This pad will not work if the outside window is down even a half inch. Make sure it is fully closed before you try to adjust the thermostat.

These are the switches by the window. The up and down arrows on the right raise and lower the window. The one on the right control the mosquito screen. Again, make sure the window is fully up or your thermostat control will not operate.

Pictured here are three items and I only know how one of them works. As you can see that in addition to European continent style outlets, there is also a U.S. 110V outlet. There is also another one in the bathroom.

The stubby little thing is your TV remote control, and then there's a keyboard. We've been so busy I haven't had time to use either. Stay tuned.

Oh, and the big red button is the emergency alarm. Don't use it to call for room service!

No Spin

This is great! I really appreciate the time you are putting into this. However, I do find your blog is interfering with my work day since I have it forwarded to my phone and I stop to read it then can't stop thinking about my upcoming trip in December LOL. Hope you are having a great time.

No_Spin,

First, thanks for taking this on. Your blog will help lots of folks.

Second, here's how to post photos that will be viewable by your readers (lifted from someone else's post):

1. Get a hosting site like Shutterfly or Photobucket

2. Upload your pictures there.

3. When your pix are there, bring one up on the site by itself. You can resize it, work with it if you want. Put your mouse pointer over it, right click to copy it.

4. Come to CC, and respond to a post, in the response, place your mouse pointer where you want the pic to appear, right click again, this time, paste it.

FuelScience

Here are CC's official instructions on images:

How do I add an image to a post?

If you have uploaded an image as an attachment, you can click the arrow next to the 'Attachment Icon' and select it from the list. This will be inserted into your post and can be located where you want it displayed.

To include an image that is not uploaded as an attachment and is located on another website, you can do so by copying the full URL to the image, (not the page on which the image is located), and either pressing the 'Insert Image' icon or by typing after it, ensuring that you do not have any spaces before or after the URL of the image. You can insert pictures from your albums (?) in this way too.

From: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/faq.php?faq=vb3_reading_posting#faq_vb3_attachments

Duplicate post. Darn slow internet.

Thanks for that tip. I am trying to download Shutterfly right now, it is taking forever. We've had internet on the ship the whole time so far, but sometimes it's slower than others.

Anyway we cruised all day on Tuesday (day 3) and we are due to arrive in Vienna at 8:30 AM. For some reason I'm awake now at 3:45.

There was nothing remarkable to see on the Danube through Hungary and Slovakia, but it was pretty scenery. We went through one lock which our captain said was the largest one we will go through. It was impressive and I would encourage anyone to go onto the top deck to experience it.

Meanwhile as I pecked out this post, Shutterfly is only 25% downloaded. My next update won't be for a while. This morning is a tour of Vienna, the afternoon a tour of the Schonbruun Palace, and this evening a classical music concert in Vienna. This looks like this vacation is going to be one of those vacations where you need a vacation when you get back!

This morning we took the Vienna city tour including the Winter Palace of Prince Eugene. Excluding the bus time of about 30 minutes r/t, it lasted almost 3 hours. The guide was good. The problem is Vienna is such a large city with so many things to see, this tour barely scratched the surface. We decided we will have to return to Vienna and spend at least 5 days here.

The afternoon was free time to spend in the city or back on the ship. UniWorld offers a free shuttle between the city center and the ship. We took an optional tour of the Schonbruun Palace (€45). Frankly knowing what I know now, we should have just stayed in the city after our morning tour and headed over to the Palace on our own. The Palace offered two tours (one a little more extensive than the other) with a price of €13 and €16. And this included a free audio guide. So we spent almost three times as much. Now I will say the guide, Maggie, was excellent and offered a lot of info on the bus back and forth, and also answered all questions. However, in my opinion the value wasn't there. I would advise you to skip this optional cost tour. The Palace is beautiful, reminiscent of Versailles.

For the evening we attended another optional tour (€75), an exclusive Mozart and Strauss concert. Now this was really worth it. It was only people from our ship, about 40 of us. It was a full 90 minutes with a ten piece orchestra with several waltz performances and opera performances included with the concert. The musicians, the dancers (4), and the opera singers (2) were excellent. I highly recommend this tour.

BTW, the prices quoted are per person.

Today we arrived in Weissenkirchen, a quaint small town. We took the tour to Melk Abbey. It is about a 20 minute bus ride. The tour guides are all employees of the Abbey. Before our scheduled tour we had time to walk through the gardens on our own. The first part of the tour was in a modernized section. Some exhibits were relics or of historical importance, but some were modern and didn't seem to fit. However, once we entered the library and then the church the viewing was spectacular. We even saw a couple monks and one posed for us.

Returning to the ship we had time to walk around the town before our ship sailed at 2:30. The rest of the afternoon was spent cruising up the Danube with the Cruise Director providing commentary along the way.

I have one update on the shower. I had thought that the rain shower was fixed in the ceiling, however there is actually about 3/8's of an inch clearance. This allows you to swivel the head a little. So you can point it inwards and not worry about splashing the floor if you turn it on with the shower door open.