iticlaudia

During Covid the hubby and I like everyone else in the world watched many, many travel shows.  One of my favorites (and I'm sure the ladies here would agree) was Men in Kilts.  When I saw this British Isle itinerary it immediately made me think of that show.  Of course, in the show they visit a distillery, which really is something the hubby would like to do.  With all these ports can anyone suggest a fabulous distillery we could visit on our own?   I've attached a picture of all the stops.

BTW please don't bust my bubble by telling me that there aren't men like Sam Heughan and Graham McTavish running around in kilts!  LOL!!  A girl can dream!  😂

2 hours ago, Fletcher said:

Tastings are not of 'Scotch' but whisky, usually single malt which is not Scotch.  Nor do you ever do a 'Scots cruise.' You do a Scottish cruise.  Golf courses are Scottish, not Scotch which is a sort of whisky. But not a single malt.  

I get it.....   The term whisky now a days is so overused for so many different versions of brown liquor that many use the term Scotch when talking about whisky from Scotland.  Even in the US folks will say they would like a whisky when referring to a Burbon which gets even under my skin.  Several years ago, our dear friends and neighbors (she Scottish, he English) hosted a Burns Dinner.  Their one request of all of their "Yank" friends was that we each bring a good whisky for a whisky tasting.  The hubby and I took on the challenge with seriousness knowing what our friends meant when asking for a good whiskey.  But the look on their faces when Jack Danials and a bottle of Crown Apple showed up from others was priceless!  

All that aside I do understand the complaint that when doing a cruise that is so country intensive that something like a tasting of whiskey isn't done.  Back in the Fall the hubby and I spent two weeks on the Danube.  The Wachau valley is well known for its apricots that they distill and white wine.  Two of our excursions included tastings of each. It's just a nice touch to understanding the products that come from an area and/or country one is visiting.  

Now that I know there might not be a distillery visit or tasting we will probably skip an excursion and do something of the sort on our own if possible.  I'll just ask once onboard and plan accordingly.  

6 hours ago, chrism23 said:

Did the Iceland to Scotland expedition cruise a year ago on the Wind.  I would love to do a cruise on the Endeavor, the ship looks absolutely gorgeous.  A few points that always come up.  You will do no wet landings.  All piers.  Unlike the Galapagos where every day seemed to have a wet landing.  So leave your watershoes  at home.  The Silversea crews are absolutely the best in getting passengers in and out of Zodiacs even in really rough seas.  Three expeditions with Zodiacs and haven't seen one bad mishap getting in and out.  

 

No parka is provided by SS for the Scotland expedition cruise.  Only Antarctica.  Also there is no entertainment.  Every day there is a briefing at the end of the day on what you did during the day and a preview of the next days agenda.  These were really helpful.  Do bring a good study pair of hiking boots and break them in before you sail,  And invest in good quality foul weather gear. that can be layered especially water proof parkas. pants, hats, leave the bathing suits at home too, I don't think I was by the pool once.  

 

Now for my big complaint about the Scots cruise. We did not stop at one distillery.   We sailed by a few,  After the cruise I wrote a real letter, paper and everything, to SS headquarters saying that they needed a stop and a tasting or two.  I said even better would be a Scotch tasting on board where on can compare scotches with a lecturer of some sort.

 

The other complaint is we didn't even see a golf course.  I thought that at least there should have been one golf excursion on one of the iconic Scotch courses.  

 

I tell my friends I spent 15 days sailing around Scotland and didn't have one scotch or hit one golf ball and they look at me like I am out of my mind.

 

What you will do is walk and walk and walk.  I probably saw 100,000 sheep and 1 million puffins.  But the scenery was jaw dropping.  

 

When choosing excursions, each is rated by degree of difficultly. These are somewhat erratic.  On the Scots cruise we left from Iceland, there on the second day we did a "moderate" excursion which was a hike that turned out to be up a 4000 foot volcano, I was fitter at the time and was gassed at the top, but everyone made it to the top.  (As it turned out this volcano was only a couple of peaks down from the one that was acting up a few months ago)

 

I love the smaller ships and the physical activity . I will try to take excursions whenever possble.

 

Thank you for all of this!   I will say I'm a bit baffled that there weren't any Scotch tastings!  That's a bit of a shock given the itinerary.   Golf courses I can understand since a round of golf takes at least 4 hours.  I have seen cruises that are intensive on the golf side but refuse to tell my husband anything about them!  I for sure won't mention to him about the lack of tastings for fear that he might want us to back out of the cruise leaving me puffinless!  LOL!!

Was there not at least a piano player in the evenings?  We are bar flies and like to just hang by a bar while listening to a piano, people watching and enjoy the evening.  

25 minutes ago, sammyboots said:

We booked a lowest cost guarantee and just received a three category upgrade to a superior balcony. We are two weeks away from our sailing and the cruise has been waitlisted in all categories so we were surprised to get a higher allocation. 

When I go to my bookings on the Silversea website it says booked, the cabin says WL but I've noticed that it allows me to book excursions, restaurant reservations and such.  Should I go ahead and choice all that or would you think that might jinx me?

I booked the lowest cost cabin on an April sailing and am waitlisted.  There are many more expensive cabins available.  Will others be upgraded creating openings of the lower cost cabins or do I just have to hope that someone will cancel?  At what point should I just give up hope of getting the cabin category I put a deposit on?

9 minutes ago, Fletcher said:

I meant this in the sense that I never felt much engagement with the cruise - from passengers or the cruise director or the concierge desk.  On expedition ships people book for specific reasons while on our 'classic' cruise it just seemed to be about eating, drinking and sitting on the pool deck.  A quite different vibe on these different types of cruise.  That said, we've just signed up for a 'classic' cruise on the Dawn later this year.  

There was a time that the hubby and I really enjoyed a "classic" cruise or fancy resort.  Once the kids were grown and out of the nest, we had more time to relax in the lounge chairs around our own pool Due to that our vacationing has changed.  Now a days we have done more by the seat of our pants type trips with hiking, walking, biking along with sightseeing.  Having not done a cruise in many years this past fall I booked us on our first river cruise.  We absolutely fell in love with the idea of an ultra-luxury cabin, food, drinks, etc. and yet a very active itinerary, in fact there was a day we biked 32 miles.  

I'm not a fan of days at sea.  We don't need or want a casino or fancy shows.  When I saw the British Isles cruise that included zodiac tours and kayaking along with some traditional sightseeing, I thought it might be a great fit for us.  Reading that there is a piano player onboard and all about the quality of food and drink I called my travel agent and booked (or should I say got waitlisted) for the cruise.  First time ever dealing with being waitlisted, so I have no idea how that works.  I did notice that this morning the category that I booked (the cheapest) is no longer showing waitlist on the Silversea website, hopefully that's a good sign and I'll hear something soon.  

BTW thanks for the info.  Your initial response to my question pretty much made up my mind to book.  

13 hours ago, sea bright said:

We did a cruise from Amsterdam to England and Ireland shortly after the Cloud was made an expedition ship. It was an odd cruise. Almost none of the ports required an expedition ship. Indeed, we had been to several on prior Cloud or Wind voyages when they were classic Silversea ships. By visiting these ports via an expedition ship, we experienced long zodiac rides in unpredictable weather to piers in small cities or large towns and then were  put on buses for shore excursions. If you dressed appropriately for the zodiac, you were too warmly dressed for the shore excursions.

We enjoyed several ports, especially Clare Island in Mayo, but probably could have done them more comfortably from the Shadow or Whisper. Also, the announcements (which are non-stop at times) could be heard in the cabin and the volume could not be adjusted.

 

This trip was some years pre-pandemic so presumably, at least some of these issues have been resolved. Our takeaway was that we would only do future expedition cruises to ports that really couldn't be seen any other way.

Having now been able to look at all the excursions and activities available I kind of see a bit of what you are saying.  There are for sure more excursions were there are towns and ports.  Activities seem to be in the more rural areas.  I think it the more rural bits of the itinerary that make it most interesting for me.  Zodiac, kayaking, hiking and biking tours seem to be available 7 of the 14 days.  

Hi all!  It's been a while since we have done a Silversea cruise but this weekend, I came across an itinerary that looks very interesting to me.  Having only done cruises in the Mediterranean and Caribbean this cruise is an "Expedition" cruise.  So of course, I came to the boards to try to find out as much info as possible, but it seems like most info is based on Artic/Antarctica cruises.  The cruise I'm looking at does Scotland and England.  Does that mean it's a regular cruise but just on an expedition ship?  The ship is the Endeavour which looks to be a good bit smaller than the Silver Spirit which our last Silversea sailing was on.  Is there any nightlife on the ship? Is the dress code the same as the other ships? Any insight and/or info would be greatly appreciated as I'm still trying to decide to book.   Thank you!!!

On Riverside Mozart.  We were to depart Passau on Monday at 11:00pm.  While at the hotel I received a call from the ship requesting we board early.  We departed Passau at 2:30pm leaving some behind that then caught up to us further down the river.  Docked in Linz late Monday night and now waiting to hear what the next move it.  A couple new excursions added to the schedule here in Linz.   The crew has been amazing!  It's mother nature and all we can do is go with the flow.  

7 hours ago, susan2305 said:

How was ItÉ

We loved it!  The ship is amazing, but the crew is what we loved most. In fact, I booked a short Christmas market cruise to celebrate my father's 80th leaving on Dec 11th.  Now we just have to deal with the weather that has caused so many cancellations to get to the ship.  

I did a CC review of the ship and would suggest it to anyone that loves luxury cruising.   Riverside is truly top notch!

6 hours ago, steamboats said:

@iticlaudia at least the airport website is showing arriving flights past noon.

 

I had an appointment yesterday afternoon and ended up walking almost 10 km. Although we had massive snow back in March 2006 (even a bit more than this time) I don´t remember such a mess. Back in 2006 public transportation was down for 3 days. They say it´s because back then the snow melted quickly but now we´re in deep freeze...

 

steamboats

We ended up cancelling. I'm sure my company which is American Airlines didn't want another crew and aircraft stuck in MUC since we already have two crews and aircraft stuck over there.  Lufthansa also operates a CLT-MUC flight that was delayed similar to us that also cancelled.  That kind of surprises me since MUC is a LH hub and I would think that LH wouldn't want two aircraft in CLT with crews.  All that kind of stuff costs the airlines a lot of money.  

What's really surprising to me is hearing what going on at the MUC airport from co-workers.  Yes, it's cold and there has been a lot of snow and ice but winter airport operations should be able to handle most of that after a day to reset.  Deicing seems to be a complete mess which might be due to poor planning and or lack of deicing liquids.  We had an aircraft that diverted to FRA on Saturday morning.  To take care of the diverted passenger and get other passengers out of MUC the company did something super rare which is to operate a flight from FRA to MUC and then to JFK because the crew wouldn't be legal to make it to CLT.   Once in MUC they couldn't get deiced.  Eventually they were number 30 for deicing and it was pushing the legalities of the crew, the agents were crying, passengers upset, and everyone was exhausted.  They finally departed past midnight only because the crew extended to the max duty hours.  

Hopefully things will clear up after today and maybe the airport will learn a lesson.  We had something similar happen in CLT several years ago and it almost caused a terrible event.  There were investigations and new rules were put in place for deicing and winter operations.  It's tough when an airport only gets big winter weather events every 10-20 years.  

Now I just need to figure out how to get us on a flight to Germany on Thursday or Friday then on a train to Passau to enjoy our cruise for my dad's 80th.  The cruise leaves on Monday but we wanted to spend a bit of time in Passau to get some rest first.  The weather looks to be very wet and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that water levels won't be so extreme that it will disrupt our cruise.  It's just a short cruise from Passau to Vienna.  Travel is always an adventure!  🙂

1 hour ago, steamboats said:

Great, Munich Airport is closed til noon tomorrow and DH's afternoon flight has been cancelled. This time it's ice rain which is announced during the night.

 

So more problems for those wanting to fly via Munich tomorrow.

 

steamboats 

I was driving to the airport when crew scheduling called me and told me our flight to MUC is delayed 5+ hours.  Right now, it shows us landing in MUC at 1pm.  I have doubts we will even depart tonight and that it might get delayed until tomorrow morning landing tomorrow night.  

Can't remember such a mess in Germany ever and I've been flying it for over 20 years.  

6 hours ago, steamboats said:

@iticlaudia sorry, no recommendations for Passau from my side. I've never been in a hotel there.

 

At least it stopped snowing. MUC is slowly resuming business. Trains and trams are still out of service but the first bus lines are running again (not on a regular business). So even no suburban train to go to the airport.

 

It's -7 C but it looks like the WGs are kidding... The forecast for tomorrow shows a low of -13 and a high of 0 and rain!!

 

So there might be some nice floodings when all this snow is melting quickly (plus icy roads).

 

steamboats 

What a mess.  I'll be sure to pack my boots for tomorrow since I'll be doing lots of walking between stores.  

The weather for the next week looks like a mix of rain and snow hopefully that doesn't create too much flooding for the rivers.  

5 minutes ago, steamboats said:

 

Yes, some TA flights had been diverted to FRA today as they we're already airborne.

 

It's still snowing but not as bad as before. But they said it should stop by 8 pm and it's 9:30 pm right now. We have app. 3.000 people stranded at MUC. They hope to be back to normal air traffic by Monday. But it all depends on the weather.

 

This is the worst snowfall I remember. We had half a meter of snow on March 5th, 2006, within 24 hours. Took us 3 days back then to get back to normal.

 

My DH is supposed to fly on Tuesday.

 

steamboats 

Winter travel is always interesting.  

The winters in Germany have really been very mild/dry in the last several years that this is a bit of a surprise.  But then it will be wonderful for the folks going skiing in the Alps.  🙂

I just hope that this last-minute trip I've planned for my father doesn't get complicated by the weather.  My plan is to land in MUC on Saturday the 9th and take the train to Passau.  Stay in Passau for a couple nights (still have to book a hotel) before boarding the boat.  It's a 4-night cruise that drops us off in Vienna on the 15th.  My father will fly to Stuttgart to go be with his brother for the holidays and the hubby and I will fly to MUC to head back home.  

Hope your DH doesn't have any issues on Tuesday.  Now a days the airlines are great at pre-planning and pre-canceling to get things back on track once the weather clears. Only issue is for those that have cancelled flight the loads are so high that rebooking can be difficult.  

Do you happen to have a favorite hotel and or restaurant in Passau?

 

1 minute ago, steamboats said:

@iticlaudia currently nothing's going anymore in Munich. The airport is closed at least until tomorrow morning 6am. No trains, no Public transportation. We had heavy snowfall for more than 24 h. We have app. half a meter of snow. Maybe in Monday air traffic is back to normal. Trains may take a while too.

 

Schwabing is all local artists (not all from Munich but also surroundings). 

 

Nutcrackers are more famous for the Erzgebirge. You may find some at the main market - Münchner Christkindlmarkt. There you find a lot of wood work especially nativity scene figures. So maybe also nutcrackers.

 

steamboats 

I'm scheduled to work the flight to MUC on Monday so I guess we shall see how that goes.  Given the fact I haven't had a canceled flight in years (even though I fly every week) I'm sure it will operate.   I know our flight that was to land today in Munich ended up landing in Frankfurt.  And of course, I read the news of the mess all the weather has created.  Even my uncle in Ludwigsburg says it's snowing there.  

I have a place in Mainz that I've bought from in the past.  I buy them for family and not for myself.  I collect the Hutschenreuther bells/balls and picked up the 2023 bell and ball already a few weeks ago.  It's just the nutcracker and candy...lot and lots of Kinder candy that I bring home for the grandchildren and our friend's grandchildren.  

On 11/19/2023 at 4:36 AM, steamboats said:

The first two markets in Munich opened up this week...

 

The Glühwein Festival opened up on Thursday. O.k., that might be a bit off the beaten track (but walkable from my home).

 

A bit easier to reach for most of you is the Christmas and Winter Market at Munich Airport which opened on Friday. They even have an ice skating rink.

 

Next week we have:

 

Tollwood Winterfestival opens  Nov 23rd on Theresienwiese (Oktoberfest grounds).

 

The Weihnachtsdorf in der Residenz (small, but one of my favorites - best egg nog, but first have a big bite at Mittelalter Markt as there´s a lot of rum involved!) also Nov 23rd.

 

Weihnachtsmarkt am Chinesischen Turm also opens Nov 23rd (for the first time after the pandemic,last year there were construction works going on - also a must for me because of the nice surroundings). 

 

The main market - Münchner Christkindlmarkt opens Nov 27th.

 

Also the Mittelalter Markt München opens Nov 27th (another of my favorites regarding food).

 

The Schwabinger Weihnachtsmarkt still sticks with the traditional opening day (Friday before the first of Advent) and opens Dec 1st (my favorite for more than 40 years now).

 

I think there are approximately 30 markets all over the city - way too many to list them all up on here. These are my favorites and the ones I usually visit (time depending).

 

I hopefully will try out the Regensburger Christkindlmarkt (depending on Deutsche Bahn and whether they go on strike or not) which opens Nov 27th.

 

@Canal archive your recipe reminded me to give my collegue a note to get me some hand made Elisenlebkuchen from Nuremberg.

 

steamboats

The market in Schwabing is probably my favorite.  It's more local and non-touristy.  

In fact, I'll be there on Tuesday.  I have a ton of stuff I need to buy and bring home on Wednesday.  🙂

Then on Friday the hubby, my father and I will be flying to MUC (hopefully) to do a short cruise on the Mozart for my father's 80th birthday.  The weather looks cold and yet beautiful..... love snow!  

BTW I'm going to try to find a beautiful Nutcracker on Tuesday if you have any suggestions in Munich where to buy.  My plan was to buy one in Mainz a week ago, but I ended up with Covid and didn't go to work.  Now I'm trying to do two trips of shopping in one.  I'll look like a pack mule coming home.  

It seems like all the posts I read about water issues are North of Passau, is that the case?  We are thinking about booking a Vienna to Passau roundtrip the first week of December, how are water levels then?  Interesting thing was when we were on the ship in September the Captain explained the ship needed 10cm of water going downstream and 50cm of water coming upstream.  That of course sounds crazy to us, but he has been on the ship for 20 years and I have no doubt he knows his ship.  

Most of the greenery in the markets and hotels in Europe are real.  Maybe get a RX for it before you go.  

7 minutes ago, Coral said:

I actually did the Mozart for the Christmas Markets in 2018 I believe. Amazing!

 

I did a river cruise in Russia once and the first few times, we hit the locks, I ran up stairs in the middle of the night to watch it. After the 5th one - it was like "no big deal"!!!! 🙂 Yes, it is loud!

 

The markets in Vienna are amazing. We also went to Salzburg for their markets and they also had an excursion to the Austrian Lake District and their markets.

 

I absolutely loved this trip. It ranks as one of my favorites (Christmas Markets, Mozart, itinerary, etc...).

The locks were so fascinating!  I'm an early riser and was up on the sun deck every morning.  We did several locks during the day in our first week.  Most of the locks in the second week were while we were sleeping.  

One of the most amazing lock encounters was with the AmaMagna.  When I got up early that morning I saw the Manga ahead of us.  Later in the morning we all watched as the two largest ships on the Danube shared a lock.  We were just a couple of feet apart.  The crazy thing is there was a couple we had met on our flight to Budapest that were on the Magna and we were both waving at each other like crazy.  It's really a small world.  

6 minutes ago, Coral said:

So glad to hear the Mozart's food is still amazing! I would love to sail on this ship again. I had an outside cabin and still loved it. Yea - everything tasted fresh and home made to me also!

We had a cabin with a french balcony, but to be honest we were so rarely in our cabin that it wouldn't matter to us which cabin we get the next time.  One thing we did figure out a couple nights in was ear plugs are a must for us to block out the noise of the moving ship and going through the locks.  

My husband has never been to the Christmas markets in Europe and if possible, I might try to get back on the Mozart so he can experience the markets that way.  If that happens, I'll make a better effort to take pictures of the food and menus.   

11 hours ago, Coral said:

I don't think the Vintage dining room ever happened during our cruise. The food was so good in the dining room, no one was really interested.

 

The Mozart was the most luxurious ship I have been on and the food we had was some of the best I have had at any restaurant. I hope yours was the same under Riverside.

The food was amazing!  It's obvious that they are still trying out some new items/ideas like the evening of Asian inspired food which was really good.  There are also local specialties included on the menus such as Wiener schnitzel, apricot fill dumplings and a couple Hungarian item I couldn't pronounce. The pasta I had was obviously freshly made on the ship.  I'm assuming the bread is baked daily on the ship and the butter that came with it was usually infused with truffle or herbs.  The wines served with dinner were local, plentiful and very tasty.

Even the cocktails were made special with slices of dried citrus, smoked rosemary and some infused syrups/spirits.  There was talk at the end of our two weeks of maybe a new page being added to the artisan cocktail menu featuring spicy cocktails (which I love!).

Looking back, I wish I taken pictures of the food and menus.  But we were on vacation so most of my pictures are of castles and the river.  

These are the maps and itineraries for both weeks.  

We were on the all-inclusive program which included most drinks and excursions.  There were some specialty sprits and wines that were extra cost.  Also, the Vintage dining room is extra, but being only the two of us we didn't do it.  There were a couple singles onboard that told us that the line is doing a special and presently not charging a single supplemental.  

English is the language used onboard by the staff.

The television in the cabin is mainly all in German similar to the same service used in German hotels.  

 

14 hours ago, CastleCritic said:

I would just start writing, I dont think Ive ever heard of someone deciding not to get off a ship before and just booking the next cruise.

 

you might want to say where you went.

We had plans for an additional week in Europe after the cruise staying in hotels in Vienna, Salzburg and Munich.  Having enjoyed the cruise so very much, the Saturday before debarkation I contacted my travel agent about extending.  The cruise line is new and wasn't booked fully which made it possible to not only book another week but also stay in our cabin.  Our hotels were booked with AmEx points which made that part super easy to cancel.  Flying home was a bit more interesting having to stay overnight in Frankfurt to be able to catch a flight in the morning, but that wasn't a big deal since I used my refunded points for the night stay.  

The Mozart being so wide can only do the Danube.  I'll post the maps and itineraries.  

Just got back a couple days ago from our first river cruise.  What started out as a 7-night cruise ended up being a 14-night cruise because we loved it so much and extended.  

I have posted a review on the ship but of course there is no way of putting everything into a single review.  Before booking our cruise, I was looking for information on the ship and the cruise line and finding very little.  Having spent two weeks on the ship I will happily answer any questions you may have concerning the ship, food, excursions, etc.   Please keep in mind that it was our first river cruise so I can't make comparisons to other ships or lines.  

We have been on the Riverside Mozart for the last week and decided to extend for an additional week.  The weather here has been amazing and very summer like hot.  Even have been able to sunbathe on the upper deck.  The river is definitely very different than it was last Sunday when we first boarded.  Water is much calmer without the debris that we saw at the beginning.