Questions for Crystal Cruisers

[Babcia7]

For those of you who've had the experience of taking a river cruise with Crystal, I have a couple of questions.  I've already pre-booked most of our excursions, but is it possible to add an excursion once we're on board the ship (we'll be going on the Crystal Bach)?  Also, a couple of you have mentioned that excursions were added after your cruise was underway.  Can you share what they were? I've checked in with the Priority Planning over the months, and there have been some additions and changes in excursions, so I'll continue to take a look periodically.

Crystal also states that each ship has an "excursion yacht". Does anyone know what sort of excursions are offered on this yacht?  We'll be going on the Rhine and Moselle, but if any of you have had any experience on the yachts, I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts.  We have some ship board credit to use, so an outing on the yacht might be an option!  

[Coral]

Yes it is possible to add excursions on the ship but they maybe full also. If they are full, you can check back as people will drop tours also, especially towards the end of the trip. They probably will contact you if you tell them you want a tour and it is full. A lot of people ended up not going on a lot of tours they had planned on.

 

On my Crystal trip, they only added 1 additional all day excursion that I could tell. We did the Danube and the tour was to the Lake District in Austria (not that helpful for your itinerary).

 

Excursion yacht - we had a November cruise and this wasn't offered or they assumed no one would want to do it. Sorry. If you have extra OBC - you can also "create your own private excursion" with a driver. Some friends did that.

 

Sorry I couldn't answer more.

Edited April 10, 2019 by Coral

[Babcia7]

Thanks for your helpful reply, Coral! 

[tfred]

i think the excursion boat is on the Mozart - it is larger.  We were on Debussy and it wasn't there

 

Book the excursions you want now, as they will fill up.  The ones we were on were smaller, so i can see where you would be boxed out.  The E-Bike tour in AMS was sold out before the cruise started.  I would recommend it highly. We found the excursions to be excellent - generally run by university students with passion to explain the topic 

 

some folks may bail out during the cruise, but i wouldn't count on those being the one you want to go on

 

 

[Coral]

I agree - sign up for what you want now.

 

On our last day - we had 90 people signed up to go to an Art Museum in Vienna and we had exclusive access to it for part of the time. Half of us bailed as we wanted to spend more time at Christmas Markets that day (they were closed earlier in the week when we were there). I cancelled with the front desk but not everyone did and they had arranged for buses and guides for all 90 people. So if you are going to cancel - make sure you tell the front desk as soon as you know so others can go or they can adjust staffing.

 

I was very pleased with all of my tours also.

[Texas Tillie]

I've been on the Mozart twice and will board the Bach for a back to back in less than 2 weeks. As mentioned above, I think that "excursion" boat is only on the Mozart. Knew people who booked it for a trip along the Danube at Budapest with a special bottle of champagne from the ship's collection. I would also suggest booking excursions before you leave for the boat, but you can book once on board too, availability provided.

[Babcia7]

Thanks for all the advice!  Texas Tillie, I'll be interested to hear what you think of the Bach.  Have a wonderful time! What cruises are you going on?

[Coral]

1 hour ago, Texas Tillie said:

I've been on the Mozart twice and will board the Bach for a back to back in less than 2 weeks. As mentioned above, I think that "excursion" boat is only on the Mozart. Knew people who booked it for a trip along the Danube at Budapest with a special bottle of champagne from the ship's collection. I would also suggest booking excursions before you leave for the boat, but you can book once on board too, availability provided.

Have a great time! Please report back. I am curious about your thoughts on comparisons. I am looking for my next river cruise and I think one of the 4 new ones will be it because they go to different places. I am guessing I would equally love the other 4 ships.

[Texas Tillie]

I'm on a 10 day Amsterdam to Basel starting April 24 and then the 7 day Basel to Amsterdam that follows. Although some of the stops repeat, there are enough excursions to have different things to do at each stop. I'm a little concerned about the size of the small river boats vs. the Mozart, but I'm sure it will be fine!

[Coral]

51 minutes ago, Texas Tillie said:

I'm on a 10 day Amsterdam to Basel starting April 24 and then the 7 day Basel to Amsterdam that follows. Although some of the stops repeat, there are enough excursions to have different things to do at each stop. I'm a little concerned about the size of the small river boats vs. the Mozart, but I'm sure it will be fine!

I was off the Mozart most of the time doing excursions, I think I would be ok on the small ships also. Though staff told me they preferred the Mozart because of more public space (I don't think they were saying that because that was the ship we were on) but they are on the ship a lot more than we are.

 

The Mozart will always be special.