European 3-cruise review: Hurtigruten, Viking River, HAL Med/TA

[Krazy Kruizers]

Absolutely Fantastic!!

I love all your details.

[boards]

Thank you for the very nice review. We have been on the Maasdam and have had H314 as our cabin. We liked it very much. We were fortunate enough that on our next cruise on the Maasdam to have had a Vista cabin and really enjoyed it too. We totally agree with all your comments about the Maasdam services, food and the crew.

[RMLincoln]

Maureen,

Thank you so much! Your review is wonderful! We have been considering the cruises you have taken and you helped us a lot.

Why did you choose Viking River Cruises over the other lines?

Thanks again!

Bill :)

 

Thanks you CB. We chose Viking mostly on timing/itinerary and then price. But mostly itinerary because we wanted to do the long trip and stop in Vienna, not knowing if we would have another chance. Viking has a lot of ships on a lot of rivers and a lot of dates to choose from. Another consideration is that there are many other river cruise lines but we wanted one that was English-language oriented - many are too European for us.

 

I have cousins who have been cruising on Uniworld for many years and love that line but it didn't mesh with your complex itinerary.

 

I should mention that November is a lower price for a reason.. the weather is not the best. But that's what worked for us and all together we had a truly amazing trip. Happy planning. m--

[john2003]

A very interesting review. We were on the Prinsendam last June to the Ice Cap and saw the Hurtigruten shops quite often. We certainly preferred having the longer port stays but if course the Hurtigruten goes into more places.

The Viking River review is certainly food for thought. After many HAL and a few Oceania cruises I had very different expectation of Viking. We have yet to do a river cruise.

 

 

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[erewhon]

Maureen,

 

Thank you for reviewing your Maasdam cruise.

Have enjoyed reading your reports, you have had a wonderful holiday.

 

We hope Richard's knee has fully recovered.

[RMLincoln]

Maureen,

 

Thank you for reviewing your Maasdam cruise.

Have enjoyed reading your reports, you have had a wonderful holiday.

 

We hope Richard's knee has fully recovered.

 

Thank you for your kind thoughts J. We are glad to be home, hoping for more snow to abate the upcoming May-June-July fire season. Richard's knee is mostly recovered but he does find it gets "tired" easily so he's bicycling to strengthen it. He actually did a huge amount before it started bothering him at all: he climbed to the top of the Cologne Cathedral tower (535 steps) plus many castles and fortresses, then all the Metro stops ups and down in Rome etc. Just need the time now for some recovery and renewal. Happy New Year to you both. m--

[Barrheadlass]

I'm fascinated by your Hurtigruten experience. Thanks for your detailed review.

 

Any idea if there are rooms or rates for solo passengers?

 

I too took a Hurtigruten cruise, just last month. I know I received some emails from Hurtigruten that mentioned deals for solo travelers. I suggest checking their website.

 

Ps sorry, I wrote this before I saw posting you did re your research!

Edited January 9, 2015 by Barrheadlass

[RMLincoln]

Greetings BHL! Thank for your input.... I haven't seen any email offers but we booked through a TA. I hope your Hurtigruten cruise was everything you wanted it to be. I remember when we were planning together, sharing questions. Have you reviewed it somewhere? I'd love to hear your views. m--

[bobbisailsolo]

Great review of the Hurtigruten cruise. I have booked for Mar 2, 2016 on this same ship. Really looking forward to it. I booked a obstructed view cabin on deck seven. Just wanted a little natural light, and to be a bit higher up. One question about water... Do they serve tap water? What is the cost for a soda? Is there a package that would cover water and soda? Im not much for wine and beer...

Bobbi.

btw, they've sent me a list of shore excursions. in both us dollars and euro. With the stronger dollar, it seems more sensible to pay in euro, and the us dollar prices are significantly higher... if you booked on board, were you able to get the tours you wanted, and did they charge you in euro?

[RMLincoln]

Great review of the Hurtigruten cruise. I have booked for Mar 2, 2016 on this same ship. Really looking forward to it. I booked a obstructed view cabin on deck seven. Just wanted a little natural light, and to be a bit higher up. One question about water... Do they serve tap water? What is the cost for a soda? Is there a package that would cover water and soda? Im not much for wine and beer...

Bobbi.

btw, they've sent me a list of shore excursions. in both us dollars and euro. With the stronger dollar, it seems more sensible to pay in euro, and the us dollar prices are significantly higher... if you booked on board, were you able to get the tours you wanted, and did they charge you in euro?

 

Hello bss! Congratulations on your booking. Deck 7 sounds good, higher and further away from the cargo happenings, so may be quieter.

 

The water issue is a sore spot...there is a thread and some discussion on the hurtigruten forum, plus lots of other information there that I think you would benefit from.

 

At breakfast there is a self-serve juice machine which has a lever for water, so you can get water at breakfast - we usually got one glass of juice and one glass of water each.. plus the wonderful hot chocolate!! There is no juice machine at lunch but we went to the coffee/tea station and got cups of tea-water (hot). At dinner there is no way to get water without buying it unless you buy one bottle early on and sneak in and out of the dining room, refilling it each day. 25nok for a half liter bottle. So when we went that was about $4. They have a water plan for about $75 (for the 11 night cruise) which will provide you a half liter bottle of water at both lunch and dinner - I think the plan gets a discount equal to 3 free bottles.

 

I do not recall about a soda plan but I know they have a coffee/tea plan and a wine plan. You can bring sodas on board and drink them "in your cabin" but if you have an opaque cup who would know? The signs around the ship say absolutely no personal alcoholic beverages to be consumed in public rooms.

 

We purchased shore excursions on board, in noks, not euros. They were charged to our ship card; our credit card company converted to noks at a good rate plus our 1% foreign transaction fee, but still good, usually much better than "in house" conversion rates. The tours were easily available but our ship was no where near full, only about 200 - 250 people. It was late October, so shoulder season.

 

I read on the Hurtigruten forum that you could get ice at the cafeteria but I never tried; otherwise we didn't see ice, no ice buckets in the rooms, no ice machine down the hall.

 

Happy planning, m--

Edited February 8, 2015 by RMLincoln

[sammiedawg]

I've reread this terrific series of reviews and my congrats to RMLincoln for a great comparison. I posted upthread about our Viking cruise last June. Viking is bombarding us with expensive glossy mailings, almost on a daily basis. We don't have anything else booked with them and the offers, brochures, weekly "account statements" keep coming!

[RMLincoln]

I've reread this terrific series of reviews and my congrats to RMLincoln for a great comparison. I posted upthread about our Viking cruise last June. Viking is bombarding us with expensive glossy mailings, almost on a daily basis. We don't have anything else booked with them and the offers, brochures, weekly "account statements" keep coming!

 

Thank you for taking the time to read the long reviews and for your kind words. We too have been buried in Viking mailings but it's unlikely we'll be booking anything with them this year, we are making other plans. I have great memories of each of these cruises, each being so very different, so I'm glad we got to do them.

 

My take-away lesson in retrospect is that different is good! And as I have often stated on these boards, "It's hard to have a bad day on a cruise ship." And I'm learning that that goes for any type of cruise or ship!

 

m--

[NBliving]

RMLincoln,

Really enjoyed your Viking review. We are taking a 7 day Viking river cruise in late November and your review answered some of my questions about the experience! Thank you for the time you put in to writing these!