Avalon Tapestry - Romantic Rhine

[kathy2d2]

We are booked on the Avalon Tapestry 9/30/07-10/7/07 - Would love to hear from anyone else taking the same cruise.

 

Booked the whole trip with Affordable Travel thanks to recommendations from this site (saved around 400.00). We will have one extra day in Amsterdam and an extra day in Zurich. Not sure which hotels Avalon uses, does anyone know which hotels Avalon tours use in Amsterdam and Zurich? I'm sure I'll find out soon anyway, although they said I would not have my documents until about 2 weeks prior to the cruise.

 

I have a few questions right off the bat -- does Tapestry have any sort of laundry services and if so is it expensive? Also, how is the food (say, compared to the big cruise ships). I assume (and hpe) the food is better, since there are fewer passengers. We are looking forward to some good German food, will there be time to have a meal away from the boat? The travel brochure doesn't really say what time the boat docks, or how long they stay at the various places, so if any of you can provide that information I would appreciate.

 

Kathy

[VAGuy]

We did this cruise in November of 2006.

 

1. There was no laundry service on the Tapestry.

 

2.The food is fine although I doubt one would call it haute cuisine. Breakfast is buffet style and has just about everything you could think of for a typical American style breakfast including individually prepared omlettes. Lunch was also buffet style with two or three entrees. Dinner was a choice of a fish, meat or chicken. You get a menu in your cabin the night before and make your selection which you turn in at the desk in the AM. This is used as a guide for the Chef, and you can change at dinner if you forget your choice. Desserts were very nice and also the wine flowed freely at dinner (again not the greatest, but acceptable). One of the lunches was all German fare. Special dietary needs can be handled but you should notif the dining room manager upon boarding.

 

3. Cologne is probably your best bet to eat off the boat since the ship docks close to the city center and you could probably do a lunch. You will receive a daily itinerary the night before so you can plan accordingly.

 

4. I have not done an ocean cruise so I cannot make a comparison. However, there is only one dining room so you don't get to choose which dining room to use.

 

5. Unfortunately, I cannot remember the name of the hotel Avalon used in Zurich. These cruise companies tend to use more than one hotel so the hotel on our trip might not be same as the hotel on yours. The hotel will be identified in your travel documents.

 

I hope this information helps. If you have other questions, please ask. We thoroughly enjoyed our cruise and trust you will too.;)

[zxcvbnm]

My wife & I just got back home from this trip, July 1 - July 8. It was our first river cruise and it was really excellent; I think you'll have a great time! I more or less agree with VAGUY, but here is my take on your questions.

 

1. There is now a full-service laundry service, & it's rather expensive. They pick your clothes up in the morning when the room is cleaned, and return them 6-24 hrs later. From memory, it's trousers; 8 euros. shirt; 5 euros. underwear/socks; 3 euros, something like that. We didn't use it, but other folks we talked to did and they were happy with it. We bought a small bottle of hand-wash detergent in Amsterdam and washed a few small items through and hung them in the bathroom to dry. Worked for us.

2. The food is great! Some highlights; very good cream soups at lunch, and a great dessert table at lunch. At dinner, the fish entree was always very tasty. Dinner took two hours from start to finish, so make sure you sit with folks you can talk to. The cheap wine which flows very freely makes this fairly easy. One comparatively low point; the coffee at breakfast is not particularly good. The best meat entree I had was sauerbraten with potato dumplings one lunchtime.

3. There were at least three days you could choose to eat lunch on shore; Cologne, Strasbourg, and Breisach. In the last two cases, it would mean NOT taking the optional afternoon excursion, and just staying in those towns for additional sightseeing. Strasbourg is absolutely beautiful and has some good museums & certainly repays spending an additional 3-5 hours.

4. The biggest single complaint we (& others) had with the cruise is suggested by your last question; you don't really know the timetable until the night before. Most of the city guided tours were excellent, both the German and French guides were quite superb. But one included trip was terrible - the morning trip to the Black Forest when docked at Breisach. You take a one-and-a-half hour EACH WAY bus trip to a shop where you can buy cuckoo clocks. The drive is moderately pretty, like Vermont or the Catskills maybe. The road is very slow and twisty so you could get nauseous. If I had to do it again, Id make a late start that day and walk around Breisach which is a beautiful little city with a nich cathedral, great bars, and at least one museum.

5. My sense is that the extra nights in Amsterdam, Basel or Zurich are at excessively expensive hotels. Just book it yourself! In Amsterdam, we stayed at the Hotel Aalders, which was only 100-150 euros a night (depending on size of room.) It's a really comfortable traditional European hotel, with faultless modern facilities and a really good (included) breakfast. It's also easy walking distance from the hotel where you meet up with Avalon for bus transfer to the cruise.

 

Enjoy the cruise!!

[kathy2d2]

Thanks so much for the replies - you have been very helpful. We will probably forego the Black Forest tour - thanks for the input.

 

What about tipping the tour guides - we always tip here in the states, but I'm not sure what the practice is in Europe - is it included in the price of the tour? If not, what is a fair amount??

[hobse]

kathy2d2,

 

I can provide some additional info from our trip:

 

Avalon used the Hotel Intercontinental Zurich pre cruise last year (you can call them and they should be able to tell you who they are using now).

 

Food: as with most everything, you cannot compare the food to an ocean cruise (but then again, I think that depends on what ocean line it is). You don't have the 24 hour food everywhere options, there are 3 meals, in the dining room, and coffee/cake at 3 pm in the lounge. Other than that, you could sometime get nuts at the bar. In our opinion, the food was just okay, some good some not so good, and basic.

 

Docking times: as mentioned, this can change due to river conditions, etc. and they leave the itinerary for you on the bed at turndown the night before. However, as a guide, the following were the times listed on our daily schedule:

 

Day 1, Embarkation day: Check in is at 4 pm. If you arrive earlier they will hold your luggage.

Day 2, Strasbourg: 8:15 am start with city tour and canal cruise; free time and optional excursions; all aboard 10:45 pm

Day 3, Speyer/Heidelberg: 8:30 am start with city tour; bus/tour to Heidelberg; meet ship in Mainz overnight

Day 4, Mainz/Rudesheim: 8:30 am start with city tour; 11:45 am sail for Rudesheim; Rudesheim tour 2 pm; overnight in Rudesheim

Day 5, Coblenz: 9 am depart Rudesheim for Coblenz; 2 pm city tour; 5 pm depart for Cologne, arrive approximately 10:30 pm

Day 6, Cologne: 8:30 am start with city tour; 12 noon depart for Amsterdam; sail overnight

Day 7, Amsterdam: 8:15 am start with canal cruise; free time and optional excursions

[SorrentoCruiser]

I've booked the cruise, but not our flight yet. Just wondering for those who have done this one, if you flew into Amsterdam and out of Zurich ( or vise versa if you go the other way) or if you flew in and out of one city and commuted some other way?

 

Flying round trip is much cheaper than 2 one ways. Just wondering if the savings are worth the hassle?

[hobse]

SorrentoCruiser,

 

Our cruise was Zurich (Basel) - Amsterdam. We flew in to Zurich a day early and took the train to Basel to spend the time there. We flew out of Amsterdam.

[zxcvbnm]

Hi SorrentoCruiser,

 

We just returned from cruising from Amsterdam to Basel. We booked a flight ourselves, roundtrip to Amsterdam. We simply took a train back from Basel to Amsterdam. Trains are quite frequent, and (of course) very comfortable and reliable. It's a short taxi ride from where the boat docks in Basel to the Basel Bad Hbf (Basel's German railway station.) You can pay the taxi driver in either euros or Swiss francs, your choice. You'd then need to stay an additional night in Amsterdam, as the train journey takes 6-8 hours. We paid at the Basel station for the train tickets, but I believe it would have been much cheaper if we had booked in advance. DB have a very good website with full schedules, and I believe, the ability to book a ticket.

 

We saw some of the places from the train that we'd seen on the cruise; Cologne, Mannheim and Dusseldorf, for instance. The train doesn't travel along the Rhine but you see plenty of interesting countryside.

[cmthomas]

Sorrento, the type of airfare that you are asking about is called "open jaw" and is much cheaper than two one-way tickets. You may wish to check it out on http://matrix.itasoftware.com/cvg/dispatch/prego but you can't book there. It will give you all of the information about all of the airlines and their published prices.

 

I would also recommend checking with http://www.cheapseats.com. We have gotten some very good prices from them. We are flying into Budapest and home from Istanbul in October on a United/Lufthansa combination of an open jaw. We bought our tickets from "cheapseats" on the exact same flights as offered by the airlines and saved $300 per person - and you DO get FF miles!

 

Hope this helps.

 

Clarence:)

[gregsnap]

We are on the Tapestry (Amsterdam - Basel ) in Oct of this year. I need to know what time the ship docks in Basel and what is the earliest they let you disembark? I need to buy early train tickets to Milan. I also need to know how far the train station is from the Avalon Dock? I assume I can get taxis that early in the AM... Can someone help? Thanks...

[SorrentoCruiser]

Thanks for all the good tips. I'm keeping an eye on several discount airfare sites and have signed up to get alerts if they go on sale. I've still got 8 1/2 months, plenty of time to shop around.

[jtimmerm]

Kathy,

 

We are a group of three couples, booked on your cruise. Two couples are from Chicago, one from Sweden. We will arrive in Zurich two days prior to departure and will take a train to Basel. The reviews of the cruise and ship sound great.

 

Now a general question for previous cruisers. I read that internet access is available on the ship. Does anyone know the charges? Are connections available only in a computer lab on the ship, or is there wifi in public spaces?

 

Can't wait until September!

 

Jim

[letsgo39]

WE just finished our river cruise on the Avalon Tranquility Budapest to Amsterdam.

There is internet access but I never saw anyone in the computer room at all during the whole trip. The service is very expensive and not reliable at all.

Everyone just waited for a port and found an internet cafe. They are everywhere and your CD will know where to find them in each port.

[zxcvbnm]

Just to amplify the comments by letsgo39 about internet access; we found internet cafes in all the towns, very convenient and cheap. The cheapest was 50 cents for half an hour, the highest was 2.00 euros for half an hour. A word of caution in relation to some of the cheaper places; make sure you erase your history/cache/passwords etc before you leave, then restart the computer. If you are blocked from doing that, then you can be confident that the machines are set up with a secure image that will prevent any private information from being retained. In one place, I opened the browser, then went to my email provider... and was aghast when it opened up at someone else's inbox!!

[cruiserus]

Kathy,

 

We are a group of three couples, booked on your cruise. Two couples are from Chicago, one from Sweden. We will arrive in Zurich two days prior to departure and will take a train to Basel. The reviews of the cruise and ship sound great.

 

Now a general question for previous cruisers. I read that internet access is available on the ship. Does anyone know the charges? Are connections available only in a computer lab on the ship, or is there wifi in public spaces?

 

Can't wait until September!

 

Jim

 

Just back from the Tapestry this week. The internet charge onboard was a Euro per minute. Way too expensive! We used internet cafes found in the different cities we visited. Prices were cheap.

[GEM1]

My wife and I are on this cruise. We leave Australia in 6 days time for Paris and a couple of coach tours on the way.

[CantonTraveler]

Hi Kathy,

 

Just saw your post. We are on the same cruise and also going a day early to Zurich. The hotel is going to be the Crown Plaza Zurich. Perhaps we could meet for a drink in the bar to say hello to fellow travel mates?

 

Our only other cruise was a Grand Circle rivercruise on the Seine. Really enjoyed it. Seems to be similar the this one in scope. Sounds like fun. Probably be a little cool this time of the year. We're bringing fall jackets, for sure!

 

My wife and I are looking forward to meeting you.

 

Tom

[kathy2d2]

Canton Traveler,

Not sure if we can post a personal email addresses at this site, but try and contact me at kathyrdavis@yahoo.com. My husband and I would love to get together with you and your wife for a drink the evening before the cruise.

Kathy