BillNancyG

I feel completely confident that it will be what we wanted, now that the (potential) risk is identified and I see it is not a big deal. 

Oooooh that map is spectacular! Thank you! I'll be poring over that for a while. 

I understand now - and I see that Regensburg to Passau is just an hour and 15 minutes (according to Google). i had no idea it was so near! And I LOVE maps - very helpful.  That short of a journey is not a big deal. 

Again, thanks so much. 

14 hours ago, CastleCritic said:

This would almost definitely NOT be an every day thing

ok, I'm settling down now, thanks to helpful replies! River cruises are so different than what we're used to... but that's why we chose to take a river cruise! Right? 😄 We've had itinerary changes on other cruises, like a transatlantic, but in those cases we were able to stay put. But - I'm increasingly sure it will work out! 

Thanks for your reply. We are on the Egil starting Sept 9 2023 from Regensburg to Budapest (ending Sept 16), Regensburg then Passau Germany, Krems and Vienna Austria, then Budapest, You say: 

          - Budapest to Regensburg a ship swap would normally not make sense.

That's a relief! I don't understand the dynamics enough to know why that's the case, but I'm hopeful. 

We have extra days in Prague but that isn't on the river, so not an issue. 

We are experienced travelers and we can roll with surprises and even laugh - but if it is a strong likelihood exists of this being a miserable trip, I'll just cancel and try another year, if we're still able. I did sign into the roll call pages but with such small numbers of passengers, I am not expecting to find connections, which is fine. 

Again, thank you! 

Sorry if this has been covered but I have concerns about water levels of the Danube in September. This is a dream trip for a 35th anniversary and we REALLY want it to go well! We've done a number of cruises on ocean or large seas (ie Mediterranean, Baltic) but our first river cruise. 

Of course, we can't precisely know how things will be in September. But I have til May 8 to cancel if we don't want to risk it. So, some questions: 

If the ship (Viking Egil) hits a low spot - I understand we may need to get off and take a bus, to be picked up by another ship? I assume we would get ... same rooms? Is the new ship the same layout? IF not - what happens?  They transport our stuff? If others have experienced this inconvenience - how much of a pain or disappointment was it? 

If the river is low, is it possible (likely?) to happen repeatedly? Is it possible we'd end up 'seeing' some of Europe by bus? - not my dream vacation.

Any experience on having any compensation from Viking for a lousy experience? (A percentage discount on another trip is not appealing...)

I'm just not sure what else to ask, but we are both excited and anxious. We are in a place in life that I don't know if we have another 'big trip' in us... I want this to be really peaceful and joyful.