notamermaid

Thank you for your post. Really appreciated. 1. Quite honestly, I expected an unhappy cruiser react to my praise of Avalon and complain 2. Pleasantly surprised that the good report is better than I expected should a satisfied customer answer me. Quite honestly, if you have to stay in a hotel instead of on the ship and miss at least 24 hours of sailing, a refund is the thing to offer. Rerouting of minor kind is not an issue. I checked the general understanding again of what would happen in Germany and it is the consensus that a customer must get a voucher in the very least but for any major change affecting the nature of the river cruise must be offered a refund the sum of which will vary vastly depending on what has been missing from the trip. notamermaid

Oh sh** We feared this may happen. Flash flooding on the Lech and Isar is not going to be good, not good anywhere. Stay safe. We have no warning on the Rhine at all as of now. Why can't we have this in moderation? One thunderstorm will only result in a spike in river levels that is gone in 36 hours. notamermaid

An update. Rain for the Danube catchment area? Let us have a look at the radar image. Tada! Not brilliant, but better than nothing. General direction is further towards the river as the day progresses. notamermaid

That is certainly nice. It ties in with the fact that we read few complaints on this board. I do wonder how they handle the Grand European right now. One ship swap is logistically okay to handle, two is a challenge. Could make for some unhappy customers. Well, the Rhine may be going up enough now, to reduce it to one ship swap, just the Danube one that is. notamermaid

Thanks Daisi. Nice clear message from Avalon. I see you can click on the info directly and clearly visible from the home page. Really customer friendly. notamermaid

I am sorry to read this. A disappointing experience. Hope you can enjoy Strasbourg a little despite the situation. notamermaid

Have you joined a roll call? Plenty of info there and you may find some one else has put their name down but prefers not to be on this main river cruising board. notamermaid

That's the spirit! It will not be a normal river cruise as planned if you are going soon, that is for sure, a bit of an adventure, but you are prepared. Have a great cruise. notamermaid

A bit more from CC on the situation: https://www.cruisecritic.co.uk/news/7073/ Important to take away from it: "the Hungarian government could shut down sailings into Budapest, Schreiner told Cruise Critic." This is a fact I learnt in 2018. Budapest may do this in extreme conditions. German authorities/captains/other experts stress again and again that in Germany this will not happen. notamermaid

Forgot to mention the forecast. River level at Kaub is supposed to go up to 38cm tonight, Friday into the 40's, Saturday 50 and possibly a bit more. Sunday 60. notamermaid

It is a little cooler, a little windier here and more humid. Haze and clouds dominate the sky. The anticipation level is rising. Will it rain more and where? There has been drizzle and what looked like a thunderstorm East of Basel. Clouds with what could be decent rain are forming over the Main and coming West/Northwest. Looks kind of promising. Maxau gauge: a rise to 349cm Kaub gauge: 37cm, slightly higher than yesterday Koblenz gauge: 30cm, fluctuating, no reaction to rain yet it seems Cologne gauge: 73cm, daily fluctuation, may the overall downward trend end today? Emmerich gauge: -4cm, will that be steady today and may we see the zero again tomorrow? To be honest, I am very skeptical of improvement for river cruising, but at least it is raining. Will see how the day progresses. notamermaid

Pfelling gauge as forecast has gone down to 220cm. Air temperature 26.2 Celsius. It is clouding over here in the Rhine valley. This may well be happening along the Danube as rain is forecast. Will this mean humid air turning into thunderstorms today? We will see how the afternoon progresses. It is raining in the Middle of Germany as I write, but not much, a band of rain North of the Danube. Not sure if much water goes to the Northern tributaries of the Danube today. Radar image shows the clouds being pulled over the Main river to the North and away from Bavaria. Remember that the river needs a lot of water and level to get to any decent level to give large river cruise ships a chance. From 220cm to decent is a long way. I would be surprised if the rain today and tomorrow did the trick. If at all, my money is on three ships up, three ships down and then back to no ships. Sorry folks, I am just very skeptical. notamermaid

Ayeeh, exclamation of surprise. I did not expect that. At least you are in Zons, meaning close enough to Cologne. This could be a long adventurous day and I hope you all can keep your spirits up. notamermaid

Indeed. To be honest I only discovered Zons because of Viking stopping there. I have been around the area, but did not know that Zons is nice! Some time it will go as an alternative port in my thread on places beyond the standard ports on the Rhine. I find it a pity that Zons is only an unloading stop for Viking. I wonder if they do any commentary or scenic drive on the coach when in the town on the way to Cologne. By the way, Zons has a ferry that is not running right now as the river level is too low. notamermaid

Because Viking appears to have the policy of not cancelling anything. To them it is: you start on a boat, you sail a mile, you finish on a boat. Trip completed. Anything in between is possible and if you are lucky they will give you a bit of money to appease you. You know, throw in a voucher and assume the customer will return and give Viking several thousand dollars again to give them a second chance and treat you the same if the same low water happens. Viking is a great product as long as all the rivers behave - and in my humble opinion when you are not on the Grand European - , when things go wrong the quality of the product goes downhill. It can do the same with other companies but it appears that many have better T&C for vouchers and may or do offer refunds. My advice: get together as a pack, the whole very lot of you passengers and form a disgruntled group now, either you get just facebook/Media coverage or a lawyer will find you interesting. Which could be a favourable thing. notamermaid

As we have talked about Engers (see a few posts and nice photos above) here is the info page on Engers dock. A different company and cheaper: https://river-dock.com/index.php?id=45&L=3 A bit more impressive than the Zons location, I dare to add. Although Zons itself has a bit more to offer overall as regards sights. notamermaid

I have read this several times now over months so seems part of the normal itinerary. This is Zons and its KD dock with German info. Not sure if Viking has a different dock there: https://www.riverdocking.com/de/anleger/zons/ Not cheap this docking... Zons is small and there seems to be no website in English. Here is some info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zons notamermaid

Oh that is good to read. At least they are getting to Cologne still. Fewer ships are sailing the stretch from Cologne to Koblenz now it seems. I was getting a bit worried about docking in Cologne but it is okay then. It is a long drive from Cologne to Mainz or Speyer though. And Cologne to Strasbourg is, well, spending the most scenic parts of the river on a bus. I mean that cuts out Bonn, the Siebengebirge, the Rhine Gorge and almost all the vineyards. notamermaid

@momofthre3 posted this earlier today: "Today we got a call that our August 21 Uniworld cruise was still on. Then several hours later it has officially been cancelled." September 11 is too far away to say anything specific. Even the forecast for the river is too tentative to post it here. We will need to see how things go after this rain. We may end up with a sightly higher level that can be sustained but no one is in doubt that we need to see more than just 36 hours of some rain to get us into September, i.e. get proper cruising back. We will keep looking at the river levels and hopefully more cruisers will be so helpful and post their experiences - thanks to everyone who has returned home or is sailing now - in the next weeks. Has Uniworld not communicated with you about potential problems yet? it is a bit early so I would not expect them too. Just asking. notamermaid

So, excursion boats. What are they like? Big and small, different companies, different age. I have been on a few different ones over the years and find them comfortable. But you need to know that you may share it with other travellers. One thing about which one you will get if your river cruise company has chartered one is that it will not be the Goethe. The historic paddle wheeler is resting in Rüdesheim awaiting higher river levels. Here is some footage of one and interviews (in German): https://www.ardmediathek.de/video/Y3JpZDovL3N3ci5kZS9hZXgvbzE3MDg3MzE A bit of info from the video: Trechtingshausen and Niederheimbach cannot be reached by boat (see all the sandbanks). The two captains find it stressful, higher concentration than normal is vital. The Rhine is narrow in the Rhine Gorge. Now there are even more ships and paddlers are an added danger. Along the river banks more people get close to the water, not a danger as such, but they could get too close to the navigation channel. The excursion boat Bingen, like the others, become more difficult to manoeuvre with less water under the hull. The older of the two captains thinks that the river being closed to shipping is just "steering up panic". The authorities/police do not issue a ban in low water. With having lost so much revenue during Covid all they want to do is sail safely without accident as, if there is any damage to the ship, spare parts are not that easy to get. They cannot afford to have one ship being out of service for long. If you like technical stuff, stop the video at 1:02. A nice shot of the radar screen. notamermaid

The last interview I watched on the river levels stressed that again. I thought they may prohibit the double width barges in the Middle Rhine Gorge but even those are sailing proven by the fact that one had an emergency stop in the early hours of today. Emmerich gauge has fallen to minus four centimetres. notamermaid

Hmm, I am not an ocean person but Greek Isles sounds better. On the Danube you may be bussed from Komarno to Budapest. Not too bad. But Mediterranean sounds good. Have only been to the Adriatic Sea. I am sure someone on this board has been to Greek Islands. notamermaid

Oh I have only given up on summer. My hopes are pinned on a short shopping trip to Kent before Christmas. But I will be sad about not seeing "the North" this year. Beyond Cambridge is where I feel happier than in the South. It has been a long time since I was in your neck of the woods. One of these days I will make it to Bath. I know, I know, just need to see the Baths and the Crescent once in my life, will not stay overnight there I think. I have turned into a small-town loving girl. As I have so much time on my hands, perhaps I will start that campaign that has been on my mind for years: lobbying for a Eurotunnel car connection straight from Calais to York so that I do not need to go through the Dartford Tunnel in a car. notamermaid

I have no idea. Reports from cruisers in the last few weeks here have confirmed low water levels but give a mixed, not fully up to date picture. Have a look a few pages back for some info and perhaps there is more among the roll calls. notamermaid

Sorry, I did not mean that to happen. The ships are stuck at Linz because that this the biggest harbour space available (winter harbour) for ships that are idle, i.e. not awaiting passengers and due to sail on an itinerary. They just gave up on sailing and must have cancelled at least one itinerary. Passau to Komarno should be okay (no guarantee of course). I read on Hungarian websites about problems around the bend before Budapest and sailing into the city. River cruisers in the last few weeks have confirmed that bus from Komarno to Budapest is a likely scenario. notamermaid