pontac

I've got it on my list of things to ask the 'butler' for. As @Host Jazzbeau says, after the end of the cruise one cannot access info on the app. That 'do it yourself' is part of what make Scenic 'Ultra Luxury' 😁

Once again I am reminded of the different wants of guests.* All I wanted was to hear the guide, I didn't use the rest of the app. So we would both be happy if they used the Quietvox for excursions and kept the Tailormade app. Didn't they use the app for end of cruise questionnaires? Funnily enough, Viking have used Quietvox at least since I first cruised with them in 2012 and have recently introduced an app in addition. *Considering all the many different wants and needs of cruisers, I think the cruise lines do a pretty good job of meeting them.

Not necessarily. Not only is one boat going along with the flow of the river and the other is going against it, but there are locks to go through that may affect timings. Hopefully someone who has recently been on that cruise can give times from Viking Daily - it may be worth checking the roll call forum for recent cruisers and asking them.

That's what we did on our most recent cruise. We like reading. As we are repeating cruises we are more frequently not taking excursions to places we've been before that involve a long coach ride or an early start You probably won't be alone. We never were. Others also don't take excursions. If you don't take an excursion that leaves early you can enjoy a leisurely breakfast. As to what to do on the boat when others have gone on an excursion, it depends on what the boat has, some have exercise rooms. It's detailed in the Viking Daily delivered to one's room the night before, e.g. But it is always wise to check with reception before leaving boat. On the above, if you want to do Speyer on your own - such as go to the amazing Technical museum - check with the guide when & where the coaches depart from and ensure you get to that point. (in this case it's the Technical museum car park)

Hooray! The latest Quietvoxes are very good. Scenic's Tailormade, even when using Scenic's own smartphone, was an unreliable way to listen to a guide. I wrote this in my trip report of my Scenic Bordeaux tour. Tour guides had to carry a large box to transmit their talk, this was unreliable, often cut out, and the range was not as long as Viking’s. Too often the device stopped working so part of the talk was missed, other times altogether and so the tour group had to stick closely to the guide to hear them. I go on my next Scenic cruise in June. Hooray that Quietvox will be used. Perhaps its too much to hope Scenic will copy some other of Viking's offerings.

It seems you did! 😁 The food on Viking suits me, though recently there has been too many dishes with cheese in them but you're obviously happy with AMA so why change?

We all have different tastes, luckily there are (now) many different cruise lines that can satisfy those tastes.

Oh do!! I like a good discussion. And I do sometime get things wrong.😁 According to Viking's website the Longships are 443 feet long, and have a max of 190 passengers, i.e. 95 couples. Scenic 'Space Ships' in Central Europe and Southern France are 135 metres long and have a max of 163/149 passengers. 135m = 443 ft. So the boats are the same length but Scenic have fewer passenger, But standard cabins are the same size, the space freed up by not having passenger cabins is taken with a hair salon, gym, and Salt Therapy Room (?). It gets complicated because both operate shorter boats on the Seine and Douro. I haven't looked at dimensions of other cruise lines boats, but on a non-scientific look while rafting the major players are all the same size. I have cruised with both Viking and Scenic and I am cruising twice more this year with Scenic, but my impression after one cruise with Scenic was that Viking's boats give more impression of room.

Some river cruises welcome children, others don't, so check the rules of any cruise line you are considering. Viking has a minimum passenger age of 18. What I like is flying to a country, being taken directly to the boat, unpacking once and at the end, packing and being taken directly to the airport for the journey home. I don't want a land element, and it sounds you are the same. Viking call them Long Ships - a Viking Long Ship is their logo. The Vikings of old roamed the oceans in their long ships bringing rape & pillage (or if you're Scandinavian - culture). Boats from the major cruise lines have different names but tend to have the same sized boats on a river, made as large as will fit in a lock and go under bridges.

You were cruising in Europe. What happens in the USA where people in service industries basically work for tips does not happen here. And I am amazed that you thought you'd get better service than other passengers because you prepaid gratuities.

As @Host Jazzbeau says, once you have the river cruising bug then you'll discover there aren't enough rivers. But, to answer your question, assuming the on-board experience is just what you want, then what do you want off the boat? In other words, what is important to you that you want to see or experience? Is it historic sites, ancient towns, art, food, beer, wine? Or attractive scenery observed from the boat? How long do you want to spend? Do you want to spend all the time on the cruise, or have hotel time at before or/and after the cruise? If you have no strong preferences, than pick any cruise as you'll enjoy it.

Same here, especially when they are heading into a cathedral (ABC) and at the end when they announce 'free time' we'll head back to the boat (when in walking distance).

Which cruise line?

It's a chore and takes much longer than expected, so I really appreciate your detailed report, @Australia08

If you're fit enough to get on and off a boat and turn a windlass you could rent a canal boat in England and drive yourself. We used to do this in our younger days, but in 2022 we got our son and his partner to crew a longer narrow boat that would take four in some comfort. I've just reread my report and it bought back good memories.

You won't get envelopes because gratuities are included on UK bookings.

There are included excursions on some extensions, but we've never booked an extension because - as you say - one can book a hotel cheaper ones-self. And anyway, we've either been to these cities, worked in them, and they're only a short inexpensive flight if we did want to visit them. Fair enough. You've tried Viking and don't like the experience. Different folks, different tastes. I'll be interested in reading your reports on these other lines.

OK, this is for an ocean cruise. I don't know about them because Mrs P. flatly refuses to consider cruising on the ocean. Getting a quote is more of a chore than for a river cruise, anyway I went through the rigmarole and got a price for two of £7980 which includes economy class flights to/from London Heathrow and on-board gratuities. Same date, same cabin, same cruise (West Indies to Iberia - San Juan to Barcelona)

I've not seen any trips to Asia where it's a long cruise that you can fly in, go straight to the boat, cruise for a couple of weeks and fly home. We don't want a lot of travelling - whether by air or road - connected with a relatively short cruise.

That, but also competition. Scenic include gratuities for everything - i.e. for coach drivers and guides as well. Why doesn't Viking? I'm assuming - and it's only an assumption - that the majority of their customers are from the USA who are used to and happy to pay tips. While it's easy to not deliver tip envelopes to UK cruisers its not so easy to manage driver/guide tips. Viking - and I expect the others - have different offerings in different markets. Our host has said he won't book Viking while they require full payment so long before travel. But plenty of Americans do, so I'm assuming Viking won't see the necessity to change until their US payment policy becomes a serious obstacle to them getting bookings.

Name a cruise and I'll tell you the UK price; but UK prices also include travel (air with option of trains when possible)

Reference to UK, as per start of my post. Gratuities & SSDP included in UK prices since pandemic, SSDP not included as standard in 2025 Cruises. The SSDP is still available to buy.

Excellent informative review, @reeves35, thanks

Presumably the land-based trips go close to the site of interest. With a river cruise if the site is not on a river bank then a coach is needed to get to it. Further away the site, longer the coach trip - which will be true for all river cruise lines. On Day 3 there's an included excursion the Strasbourg in the morning, but you could stay there longer and return in the afternoon as there were shuttle busses in the afternoon. To cover the long distance from Basel to Amsterdam in 7 days and to allow off-ship excursions a lot of cruising is done of necessity at night. On Day 5 -tomorrow if your cruise ends on 22 May - you'll cruise along the middle-Rhine in day time and see lots of castles and the Lorely rock. Grab a seat at the front of the bow for a good view, or the sun-deck. You want to see both sides of the river.

UK didn't use to include gratuities. We used to get the envelopes on our bed at the end of a cruise with option to pay recommended amount by card at reception, which we did. Much prefer gratuities included but aware that it may be withdrawn, as they have withdrawn Silver Sprits Drink Package from the 2025 cruises. Offerings by the different companies change from year to year.