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German Waterways information


Cat4158
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Hi.

I'm doing some research for my father who has just reserved the German Waterways cruise. The ship stops at Kiel, Wismar, Bremen and Hamburg.

Has anyone done this route and is willing to share information about the ports. Most importantly, as my dad is 87, how manageable are they without booking shore excursions? Where does the ship dock in relation to the centres?

Also, as this a first time cruise with Fred Olsen, how easy is it to book shore excursions once on boards?

Thanks in anticipation.

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We docked a Wismar in May 2016 for Fred's maiden call (maiden mystery cruise on Braemar - you should find cruise reviews of it, including by me). Have not been to the other ports, though we will have three nights in Hamburg at the end of the summer before a mini cruise back to the UK. It sounds quite difficult to get to the dock, but that is for a much bigger ship and I do not know where Fred tends to dock in Hamburg.

 

Wismar is a lovely old Hanseatic city and we had a very pleasant day there. There was not a shuttle bus and for able bodied people I would say it was easily walkable, though an 87 year old is another matter entirely. It was a very compact city centre, so taxi's where required may well just do the job. The walk from the dock is slightly uphill and I think there were sets in at least part of the centre, which may not make easy walking for an 87 year old. I find Google Earth invaluable when researching ports and regularly 'go for walks' on street view when I want to find out about places, though I think the central square may be pedestrianised. You should also be able to find a tourist board information site.

 

Overall the 'Ports of Call' section of these boards are what is designed to research port details and could get replies from many more people who use ships by other cruise lines.

 

For the many less visited ports, which we visit, I also use the Trip Advisor forums and you may even find a "Tom's port guide" for your ports which are very detailed:-

 

http://www.tomsportguides.com/

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Thanks so much for your help. I have already looked on the 'ports of call, section but couldn't find much. I really appreciate the time and effort for these replies and I'll follow up all your suggestions.

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Thanks so much for your help. Looks as if Bremen might be a problem for my dad if there's no shuttle bus.

Does anyone know anything about Wismar!

 

We are just back from "German Waterways" (not exact same itinerary) - there were shuttle buses laid on from Braemar for Bremen.

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We are just back from "German Waterways" (not exact same itinerary) - there were shuttle buses laid on from Braemar for Bremen.

Well, that's not fair! Maybe there were so many protests on our cruise in June about no shuttle buses that it forced them to do something about it!

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Fred's official line is that if a port is more than one Km from the docking location, they provide shuttle buses (only free if freedom fare or on suite dreams package), but not sure where they measure that to. Perhaps to the edge of the area which will be of interest to passengers.

 

Frequency of shuttles is another matter and they do not provide times of shuttles, so if they are not frequent you can have a long wait, especially later in the day when most passengers have returned to the ship. We have waited almost an hour for a shuttle in Dublin in the evening (about 6 - 7 pm) when shuttles to a large Princess ship were going regularly. With the bigger ships the shuttles fill much quicker though, of course.

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Well the centre of Bremen is considerably more than one km from the dock! I am wondering if there was some sort of error on our cruise when no shuttles were provided. Maybe somebody forgot to book them? Or all the buses were booked out for some event and Fred couldn't get hold of any. The official line was that the port authorities didn't allow a shuttle service, which seems to be untrue!

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When we were in Bremen in May 2016 Fred supplied shuttle buses. But they only ran from the port gate to the tram stop which was just across the shopping mall car park. The ship were selling all day tram tickets on board and the driver of the shuttle was activating them for that days travel. So BEWARE when Fred says they are running a shuttle.

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Are we talking about berthing at the same location each time ?

 

Braemar docked at a grain terminal adjacent to a large shopping mall when we visited Bremen last Monday - some distance from the city.

 

Roundtrip shuttle buses were laid on from the gates to the city centre at £5 per person - no charge if on a Freedom Fare deal.

 

I assumed this was standard operating procedure - but after reading comments above, this appears not to be the case ?

 

We had a similar shuttle service in Flensburg, but not in Hamburg as there was an underground station nearby, nor in Travemunde where the ship conveniently docked alongside the town's front street.

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Sounds like we were all at the same place, grain terminal by shopping mall. However three different transfer options! (We had to walk to tram. No shuttle buses) Anyone's guess what will happen next time Fred calls at Bremen!

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