Photos from October Budapest to Amsterdam Cruise on Amadagio

[TataTom]

I have posted on Webshots 400+ photos that I took on the Amadagio cruise from Budapest to Amsterdam the last two weeks in October of this year. Some of these shots are pretty good, some are just OK. If you are interested in seeing what we saw on the cruise, go to this website:

 

http://travel.webshots.com/album/556525880qJuAWh

[Fleuve51]

I looked at some of your pictures--they are wonderful.

My husband & I will be on the same boat --May 2007 going from Amsterdamm to Budapest.

Do you have any tips or advice that we should know about?

Thanks in advance for any help you can give us.

We have always done ocean cruises.

This will be our 1st river cruise.

Eileen

[Buckland]

Hi Tommy and Karon,

 

I had a look at your photos - ALL of them! They brought back some great memories. I see you got to Koblenz in the day time - we were there at night and had a tour of the town in our housecoats! I made a comment on one of the photos of the bridge at Remagen - hope you don't mind.

 

Buck

[TataTom]

Hi Eileen: Thanks for the nice compliment on my photos! Between Buck and me we can give you more tips than you can digest. We both enjoyed the cruise very much, and I think you will find that it will exceed all your expectations. Do you have any specific areas that you are wondering about? Ask us questions and we will answer. River cruises are different animals, and this one is going to be a great one for you.

 

Hi Buck: I hope you don't mind me volunteering you! I think both of us picked up a lot of information on our cruise, and we both like to share it. I knew that the bridge ends were the Remagen bridge, mostly because our cruise director pointed it out to us as we passed it. I was tempted to add more information to my photos when I uploaded them, but quickly realized it would be an enormous job. When I labeled my photos, anything that happened from leaving the previous stop to leaving the titled stop was included in the titled stop. E.g., river scenes on the way from Bratislavia to Passau would be in the Passau group. (Remember, we went backwards from your trip.)

[letsgo39]

Pictures were great. I also looked at ALL of them over the last 2 days. DH and I are taking the same trip next July on the Avalon Tranquility.I wonder now if we should have gone in the fall. The colors in your pictures are just beautiful.

Thanks for posting the pictures! I'm sure I will look at them many times over the next few months.:D

[npphotog]

Great photographs Tom. We did the same trip (started in Amsterdam) with Vantage last August. Brought back fond memories. Willard

[AliceS]

Thank you, thank you for posting the lovely photos. I enjoyed every one of them. Do you have any photos of the cabins or other rooms on the ship? I noticed one of the deck with the bikes ready to go. Looks like you had a great time and that you are a super photographer, or do you just have a really GOOD camera? Happy holidays everyone.

[Texasgal2]

I just returned from the Christmas Market cruise from Budapest to Prague on the Amadagio. I was quiet impressed with the experience. (That should say a lot!) There seems to be a new captain aboard, who really adds a lot of personality to the cruise. The rooms were clean, well kept and I don't think I'll ever get use to not being lulled to sleep by the gentle rocking of the boat down the river. I believe there are pictures of the rooms on their website for the poster who asked.

 

One thing they should change... the internet access should be high speed all over the ship. The hotspot is located in the back lounge, and has a very small reach. You could sign up for the room access, but you can't download or upload anything from there. Both were 50 euro's a week.

 

There were people that complained of the food portions not being "American" sized. Well, I ate every portion of food and gained 6 lbs!

Love your pics!

[Carhut]

I just enjoyed a slide show of your pictures and enjoyed them very much. You are a great photographer. I think I'll throw my camera away. I don't get pictures that look like yours. What kind of camera do you use? How do you get your pictures so bright? Mine in those churches were so dark. You also had some great blue skies for most of your outdoor pictures. Loved the trees in color, too. We did our cruises in the summer. Thanks loads for sharing.

Carole

[TataTom]

I am blushing with false pride...thank you for the compliments on my photos. My camera is a fairly new Pentax istDL, which cost about $500 at my local camera store. It is a single lens reflex and shutter lag is almost nonexistent, which is great. It is a wonderful camera. On a previous vacation in California earlier this year I used my wife's camera, a Nikon Coolpix and it almost drove me crazy waiting for the shutter to go off. Plus I could not see the screen in bright daylight. Hence the trip to the camera store. I was a photographer in the Navy over 50 years ago, but have not done any serious photo work since. I was using things I had learned a long time ago and most of them worked, thank goodness.

 

The blue skies are enhanced by using a polarizing filter. You attach the filter and then rotate it to the best position to reduce or eliminate reflections and darken the sky. I just leave it on when I am shooting outdoors. It quickly becomes automatic to optimize the filter while looking through the viewfinder.

 

The interior shots were taken by bracing the camera against a column or the top of a pew, or whatever was handy. As long as the camera was perfectly still, the long exposures did not cause blur. You have to have the camera set such that the flash does NOT go off. If the flash goes off inside a large building, it will not be strong enough to illuminate the photo so it turns out dark. Without the flash, the shutter will stay open long enough for a proper exposure. Even better is to use a tripod, but I did not want to carry one around with me on the trip.

 

Sorry, I did not take any photos of the rooms. They are very nice! And as for the food, wonderful is inadequate to describe it. Fantastic is closer. And there was no weight loss, I assure you!

[Carhut]

Thanks for the information, Tom. Yes, my camera is a Nikon Coolpix. Say no more. I like the point and shoot camera. I'll keep in mind what you told me about taking pictures inside. I used to not use the flash and I could lighten the pictures on the computer. Since I got a new computer, I can't figure a way to do it. The new program isn't like the old one that comes with the computer.

[TataTom]

Hi Carole:

I use Adobe Photoshop Elements to edit my photos. It is a great program but be warned that it has a steep learning curve. The retail price is around $100, but I got mine from eBay brand new for $50. It is almost breathtaking what you can do with this program to improve photos. For example, some of my shots, especially inside churches, I had to shoot upward a little bit, and so I had what is called "keystoning" where the walls seem to lean in toward the top of the photo. With Photoshop you can distort the picture to make these walls straight again.

 

If you are serious about having good photos, you need a good photo editing program. Photoshop is not the only one out there, there are several good ones. I chose Photoshop because my camera store recommended it to me.

[Carhut]

Thanks again, Tom. I will look into it. I take a lot of pictures on my trips but after seeing yours, I'm not too happy with most of mine. I need to learn how to improve on them.

Carole

[frac]

You might want to try 'Picasa2' a free download from google. It will do a pretty good job of lightening and darkening pictures, you also can adjust brightness and contrast. I took some pictures in a Montreal Cathedral and they turned out to be black. I lightened them up using picasa2 and they turned outgreat. I think the download site is picasa2.google.com. If not, just type picasa2 into google and there it is.

[Carhut]

Thanks loads. Will give it a try.

[TataTom]

Hi Larry and Pat:

Wow! I just downloaded Picasa2 and gave it a spin. This is a great program, and the price is right too. It cannot do the more sophisticated things that Photoshop can do, but it does a wonderful job of normal photo editing, improving and cropping. This was a great suggestion you made, and I think I will be using Picasa more often that Photoshop in the future. It is very easy to learn to use, and the photo organizing is much better than Photoshop.

 

Thanks!

[Carhut]

Frac - I have to tell you I just love Picasa2. Thanks for sharing that with us. It's just what I needed to fix my photos. Guess I won't throw my camera away just yet.

 

Carole

[AliceS]

I can't wait to try Picasa2, I have Adobe and really like it, but it is tough to learn. I went to class on our Celebrity TransAtlantic, but a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. I turn my grandkids purple, lose the wonderful creations that I make. Oh well. I like people like Tommy who take lovely photos that I can see from places that I visit. I knew that you had more than a good camera.

[frac]

Hi - Glad I could help. Now if I could only learn to take good night pictures withhout blurring them beyond help using a simple Fujifilm FinePix 2650 :-). Our pictures of the night arrival in Budapest were beyond repair. Oh well.

[AliceS]

If I had known about Picasa2, I would never have spent the money on Adobe. I like Adobe, but Picasa2 gives me everything that I need to fix my photos and have fun with them. Thanks so much. I plan to pass the word. We're turning this thread into a photo information center. That's OK.

[amd1234]

I enjoyed your photo's thanks for posting them. We will be taking the Danube Cruise( Prague to Budapest ) Amadeus Line ship Amalegro end of May first week in June. What was your favorite City? Also any hints on Budapest we might stay an extra night. Thanks:)

[TataTom]

Hi, amd1234:

 

Without a doubt our favorite city was Durnstien...small but very picturesque. Others that we enjoyed very much included Rothenburg, Passau, Regensberg, Koblenz, Melk, Miltonberg, Rudeshiem, Bamberg, Wurzburg and Wertheim. Not disappointing, but for us not as great were Budapest, Bratislavia, Cologne, Nuremburg and Amsterdam. If I had to choose one city that was a disappointment, it would probably be Cologne. It was crowded, noisy, and the cathedral was dirty and dark inside.

 

We did not stay an extra night in Budapest, so I cannot say what would be a good hotel. Budapest was certainly an interesting city, but it still had a lot of the Soviet look to it, massive monuments and uninteresting apartment housing.

 

Your cruise should be a great one!

[WIT]

amd1234:

 

My wife and I just completed the Amadeus Christmas Markets Cruise on the Amadagio, which started in Budapest, with boat stops or bus trips to Danube Bend, Linz, Passau, Vienna, Salzburg, Melk, Regensburg, Nuremburg, Cieske Krumlov, and finished in Prague. Prague was the most interesting city with Vienna and Salzburg next most interesting. It was our second trip to both Vienna and Salzburg, with a long day we spent in each. In Vienna, we ditched the group tour once at St. Stephen's Cathedral, made our way to Hotel Sacer's Mozart Cafe for expresso and the intensely chocolate 'sacertorte', then crossed the street to the famous Albertina Museum for the huge Picasso exposition. We stuck with the guide in Salzburg from Mirabella Gardens through St.Peters Church, and used our free time to have a wine & cheese snack at St. Peters Stiftskeller (open since 803!), and to shop the Christmas Market. We spend three nights in Prague and plan to go back.

 

Our tour group was 42 of the 120 on the Amadagio, with many of us arriving a day early in Budapest, so lots of us opted to bus tour the Danube Bend towns of Eszgtegom (Hungary's first capitol), Visogrod (a fortress), and Szentendre (a guild town). Hungarian for St.Andrew, Szentendre has a mile long cobbled street filled with craft and food shops. Seven streets branch from the central square, each ending with a Greek Orthodox church for each of the town's seven Greek Orthodox ethnic groups. Just one Roman Catholic church, though. Very interesting town.

 

Our group of 42 lodged in Budapest at the Hilton in the Castle district, right next to St.Mathias Church at Fishermens Bastion. The hotel is built right into part of the old Buda Castle and intrestingly blends modern and ancient.

We ate dinner at Apetito directly across from the hotel since the main Hilton dining room did not open til 7PM. It was wonderful food and service - we had duck breast and venison prepared traditionally & paired with local wines. We would have liked to have had an extra day in Pest to do the baths and explore. Looking back, we would have done without the Danube Bend and done more in Budapest.

 

Finally, consider a 1/2 day stop at Cieske Krumlov as you leave Prague. It is the best preserved medieval town in Europe, with many stunning photo opportunities. Got some of the bet deals of the trip in the shops there.

 

A note on bargaining for prices: After getting a price by whatever means you can, determine that the vendor takes the ususal credit cards. Once their willingness to take the card is verified, ask what price they will take if cash is paid. I usually got 5% off the price, but sometimes more. This worked for Czech garnets as well as t-shirts.

[cruiseph]

Loved your photos - your comments, along with the photos, have helped me decide that this should be my trip for this year. The autumn colors were lovely - my only question is how was the temperature? Would it have been more comfortable while cruising if you had taken an earlier cruise?

[TataTom]

Hi Cruiseph:

 

We had no problems with the temprerature on our cruise the last two weeks of October. We never needed more than a light jacket, and we only had rain two times, and one of those times it was very light and not a problem. Only in Amsterdam did we get rained on significantly. I've been told that we had an unusually warm and dry period, so you probably should look at some temperature records for several of the cities on the route. We did that before we left, and did not find anything to make us pack more than light coats.

 

Some of stops were pretty crowded, especially so if it was a weekend, and I would think that mid-summer it would be VERY crowded. We chose October to get away from the summer vacationers. The fall colors were a nice bonus!