Christmas Market Cruise

I am sure this question has been asked before. What line would you recommend for a Christmas Market Cruises? I would like to Cruise the Danube. Avalon seems to be a popular choice. I am sailing AMA in April who also offer some nice looking itineraries.

After three Christmas markets on Uniworld with pre cruise stays. This year it was a do it yourself trip 4 days in Berlin and 3 days in Dresden. We have been to Berlin before and loved it! The Berlin markets were nice but in Dresden we hit the mother load for me this year. The markets in Dresden were beautiful with an outstanding selection of nutcrackers and smokers! I loved these market over the almost 20 prior stops. My husband has it tied with Rothenburg ob der Tauber!

Second seating

Dresden's Christmas Market dates back to 1434.

For Christmas Markets, itinerary will probably be more important than it might be for a "regular" (or first) cruise. We did Avalon and while we enjoyed it, we had no evenings in markets. I've read that AMA (and perhaps others) do schedule later stays and the Markets are so lovely lit up (we had a pre-stay in Nuremberg and post-stay in Basel arranged on our own - so we were able to see markets at night!). Look at daily itinerary descriptions on each line's website (not just the day by day overview) to get an idea of how long they plan to be docked (things can and do change, but this should give you a decent idea of the plans, at least ;-)

We did Viking Budapest to Nuremburg. We went early to Budapest on our own and were happy as it is a beautiful city, Viking does an overnight in Vienna and ends in Nuremburg but is docked far and shuttle buses are needed.Passua is a small, pretty city and the market and old town are right by the dock.

Thank you everyone. I do love Berlin too and hope to go back one day. Berlin is such a diverse city. I found it to be so fascinating. Yes I would love to see the markets at night when they are lit up. The photos are amazing. I will be cruising with AMA in April and if I like it we may do a Christmas Market Cruise with them. I was thinking of doing Budapest and Prague independently too. So much to think about.