viking river cruise july 8

[mycoda]

Hi We're booked on the viking europe for july 8, 2008 out of budapest. Would love to hear from anyone else going on this trip or anyone that has been. :p

[debbie p]

Where are you going from Budapest? We were on the Viking Spirit late April/early May that went from Amsterdam to Budapest.

[mycoda]

We are going from budapest on the Danube to Vienna then ending in Nuremburg. THis is our first river cruise. Did you enjoy your cruise with Viking? Would love to hear about your experience and did you overnight in Budapest? We are flying in the day before and will be doing a taxi to the port, hopefully finding it okay. Also what type of dress attire would be appropriate. It looks like it will be hot so we were thinking shorts but not sure if this is the right thing. :)

[letsgo39]

Shorts are really not worn in Europe unless you are participating in an athletic event. You would not be able to enter the Churches in shorts. I suggest you wear Capris instead.

[mycoda]

Thanks for the information, we have traveled Europe on our own but not in this particular part. Did you enjoy the river cruise with Viking?

[debbie p]

This too was our first river cruise and really enjoyed ourselves. Budapest was the end of our cruise, did not spend any add'l nights there off the boat.

All the major hotels are all along the water (Marriott, etc) nearby (wouldn't want to haul my luggage that far though) to where the boats dock. We were fortunate enough to arrive in Budapest at night, what a beautiful sight.

Really enjoy Budapest, probably one of my favorite (besides all the small villages in Germany we visited). We did the optional excursion of the Budapest 'cowboys' which wasn't worth the money at all. In Nuremberg, we did the optional "Nuremberg Trials" excursion they offer and was quite glad we did. Our guide left alot to be desired, but we were able to enjoy ourselves, in fact, she was the worst (and theonly bad) guide we had on the entire trip! Viking itself was fine. No dress up. My husband wore dockers and a 'nicer' shirt for dinner-I did notice as our two weeks went on-the more casual dinner dress became. No need for a sports coat whatsoever. Don't think any women really wore dresses at all. The cabins were fine-every space utilized by shelving, etc..Plenty of room under the beds for your luggage. I brought along some hangers from home-but the closet was so small, not enough room to hang all our clothes. Glad I had bought a travel iron (at Brookstone), just ironed what I needed. Middle of the trip they offered 20% off laundry-still expensive-but nice to have clean clothes (our trip was 2 weeks long). The bathroom is small-I wish they had somewhere to put your shampoo, etc. When taking a shower, we'd just put our stuff on the toilet seat/not a biggie really. There is an safe in your cabin-large enough to store our important stuff. Prior to going, I had read several complaints about the food, we found it to be fine. Soups were great, enjoyed them all. I do wish they would of offered a 'light dinner' in the lounge as they did lunch each day-those 2 hour long dinners were gruesome!

There is no evening entertainment to speak of, but not a problem for us-we either relaxed or if in town, able to walk into town. I think people forget they're not on a big cruise ship. The crew/staff was great/Viking works their staff short handed, not the crew's fault, Viking's fault. Keep that in mind if you don't get what you want at the snap of your fingers (as some on my trip thought they should). They have internet access/very expensive-I was able to use/write a group email twice before my hour's time ran out. One thing to remember, you lose your connection when in a lock-I found out the hard way! Also, internet connection is hard to come by in the smaller towns.

As far as money goes, you can get Euro's on board-we really didn't use that much money-used our credit cards for what we did purchase. In Budapest-the merchants accept Euro's, but a big 'scam' they have is they don't give change back! Make sure you are aware that the $1 and $2 are coins. I'd recommend capri's and not shorts. Bring sunscreen! You'll be spending lots of time up on the sundeck. Take a bottle of water along on your excursions-you can leave it on the bus-most folks have 'claims' on their seats on the busses. River cruising is a big deal in Europe, in one city there were 33 boats in at the same (Vienna, I think). Would I take another trip on Viking? In a heartbeat!

If you have any questions, email me-dpump@aol.com

[mycoda]

Thanks so much for all the information. It has been a little difficult to find much about this cruise. I hadn't thought of sunscreen, that will be a help, sunburn would certainly ruin a trip. Do you have any further cruises booked? We are looking at a northern europe for next summer.

[debbie p]

You're welcome! No further cruises booked..........next March we're headed t Maui for 10 days of sitting on the beach and enjoying the sun, sand and sunsets.

[mycoda]

Hope you have a wonderful trip sounds great. Thanks again for the information.

[bildef]

Thanks so much for all the information. It has been a little difficult to find much about this cruise. I hadn't thought of sunscreen, that will be a help, sunburn would certainly ruin a trip. Do you have any further cruises booked? We are looking at a northern europe for next summer.

If you will go to the second page of this forum you will find a thread by Venturagirl entitled Viking Grand European Rivers 6/25/06. She posted a very comprehensive 21 page report on her trip last year. We are going on the 7/8 sailing from Amsterdam to Budapest. Plan to fly into Amsterdam a few days early, then stay an extra day in Budapest before catching the train to Prague.

 

We have been with Viking to Russia and to China and were very pleased. All reports are that this will be a good one.