Cruising evolution

[p598738]

A lot of the members (myself included) list their past cruises. In a lot of cases (included again), it looks like ocean cruisers became to river cruisers. I wonder what the board members have to say about that. Is it because we are looking for a different type of trip as we get older ? Is it an issue of travel sophistication ?? Comments please.

[Kindlychap]

Interesting question....

 

I'm booked on a Danube trip next month - chosen by my mother. I'm going to keep her company as much as anything.

 

My first cruise was on the Nile, way back when.

 

Since then, as you can see I have fallen in love with Queen Elizabeth 2. One of the things I do not expect to get on the Danube is the sense of being on a ship. I love that.

 

And, in my mind, you can't beat the North Atlantic. Trouble is, my wife hates it, and I can see transatlantics being solo trips very often - especially, as with the last, those in winter!

 

I can't see myself doing river cruising too much. I know (and love) the Rhine Gorge (Boppard to Assmanshausen in particular) but would feel frustrated spending the day sailing through it.

 

I'd be interested to hear if it is an age thing (I'm 40) or something lacking in modern cookie cutter ships.

 

Matthew

[sk8teacher]

After spending 26 years in the Navy, cruising was the the last thing I felt I wanted to do. But my wife, a farm girl from Michigan, hadn't done much traveling at all, and wanted to see other parts of the US. In addition, her Mother always wanted to go on a Mississippi River cruise, but unfortunately, passed away before she could go.

 

Our first cruise was on the Mississippi Queen, a seven day run from Memphis to New Orleans. A very enjoyable, relaxing cruise that made us decide that perhaps this was something we could do again.

 

Our second cruise was a combined seven day bus tour followed by a seven day Alaskan cruise on the Volendam. That pretty much sealed it for us and we decided that we really liked cruising.

 

Last fall we did a Southern Caribbean cruise which we really enjoyed. This year we have booked a seven day Tulip Festival river cruise Amsterdam R/T and a Western Caribbean cruise in November.

 

Our preference is river cruises however. We enjoy the smaller ships with less people, and without all of the "buy this buy that" hoopla found on ocean cruise ships. On ocean cruises we do not gamble, rarely go to the bars, and prefer to simply curl up with a good book in some isolated corner. Thus river cruises are more suited to our life style now.

 

Cheers,