First time river cruising

[cruising 2008]

We are not cruising until June 2014 and will be watching with interest how the cruise companies deal with the flooding.

I feel for everyone involved. The residence of towns flooded must be heartbroken with the damage done to their homes, towns and income. Cruisers confused about their travel plans and choices offered by the cruise companies. The cruise lines worried about their passengers and their finances We have saved up for a long time to go on our cruise and have the dates locked in for annual holidays at work if the floods happen again next year we would want a full refund. Postponing the trip by a few months would not be an option and doing the trip by bus is not what we are looking forward too, if we had wanted a bus trip that's what we would have booked in the first place.

[caviargal]

There is no way to predict what may be in June of 2014 and no guarantee of what the lines will do. This situation is extreme and many times the problems with flooding impact the river cruises but not the cities. In such a case, it is VERY unlikely you will be offered the option to cancel.

 

What lines are doing now is only relative to this exact situation. If you look at the history over the past years on this forum, you will see lines responded differently based on the situation they were encountering AT THAT TIME.

 

Many lines have in the past completed voyages by bus, and there was no offer of a refund. In 2010, in rising river conditions, our boat completed our trip while many other boats with higher drafts could not. We saw these boats dotting the ports, empty. And we followed the situation on TA and they were not offering refunds. They were completing the planned itinerary by bus and many passengers were not happy.

 

IMO there are no guarantees.