Testing the Waters with Dori: River Cruise State of Mind

With the utmost respect to Billy Joel, I’m taking some liberties with his song:

Some folks like to get away
Take a holiday from the neighborhood
Hop a flight to Miami Beach
Or to Hollywood
But I’m crossing the pond
bound for the Rhine and Main
I’m in a River Cruise state of mind

In actuality, I just returned from two weeks on the Danube (but I couldn’t get that to fit the rhyme), where I sailed on two ships, stayed on a third, and toured seven others.

To say my mind is full of the river cruise experience would be an understatement.

I spent my first two days onboard the MS William Wordsworth, one of Riviera Travel’s vessels, sailing from Budapest to Vienna, via Bratislava. (Repeat visitors to Bratislava looking for something new to do might want to try out a meal at the UFO restaurant. The view can’t be beat.)

Though I had stayed on the MS Geoffrey Chaucer at last year’s ASTA River Cruise Expo, this was my first time sailing with them and enjoying (let me emphasize enjoying) meals onboard. Sadly, one full day wasn’t enough time to get a feel for the overall experience, but it definitely left me with a desire to experience more.

[Shoutout to Ensemble’s Mark Stubbert, KHM’s Bill Coyle and Anita Pagliasso, and All-Travel’s Eric Maryonov for all the great over-dinner conversations.]

In Vienna, I switched over to Avalon Impression, where I spent the next four days at the ASTA River Cruise Expo. If you read my column regularly, you’ll know this is one of my absolute favorite conferences of the year. Even the cold temperatures and rainy days couldn’t dampen the enthusiasm of getting to tour so many ships – though I don’t envy the ships’ crew who must have had to make multiple trips to deliver all the umbrellas to the right ships!

This year’s version of the conference included much more education, and I took the time to get to know the Uniworld product a little bit better with the line’s executive vice president of sales for North America Michelle Palma. (Stay tuned for an interview with Palma coming soon.)

It was also the first time I got to explore a “real” Uniworld ship. (Last year’s Expo featured the S.S. Victoria, which Uniworld is chartering from Riverside.) As Palma joked with the advisors, last year Uniworld brought a non-Uniworld ship, so this year they brought their most baroque – the S.S. Maria Theresa. And, boy, is it something, right down to the velvet covered screening room and tailed tuxedo-clad butlers. Not sure it’s the right environment for me (I don’t mind a butler, but the formality of the tails is a bit too much for this down-to-earth woman), but the all-inclusiveness of the fares and the sumptuous surroundings is much loved by many river cruisers.

One of my most interesting conversations of the conference was a meeting with Viking’s new trade ambassador where we talked about why the belief that Viking is trade unfriendly still persists despite having several trade-friendly practices (no NCFs, doesn’t sell through Costco). I had to admit, it’s something I’ve heard before, but realized I’ve never really asked advisors why that is. (I’d love to hear from you where you fall on this? Is Viking trade friendly? If not, why? Email me at dsaltzman@travelmarketreport.com.)

On the fourth day of the River Cruise Expo, I had to leave early to train back to Budapest (it was a planes, trains, and river ships kinda trip) for Travel Market Report’s second annual Travel Market Place on the River hybrid FAM/conference onboard AmaViola, where some 90 travel advisors got to experience the AmaWaterways product and learn about how to be a better photographer, use AI for marketing, and work with their local and trade media.

The one-week cruise took me back to Bratislava and Vienna (where I did a truly challenging hike in the Vienna foothills – highly recommended), as well as Melk and Salzburg (via Linz). The latter were both new ports of call for me, and sadly I didn’t have the chance to do any ‘Sound of Music”-style spinning in Salzburg. But I did get some Mozart balls – aka Mozartkugel –because when in Salzburg.

Ten thousand-steps plus in every port, interesting and illuminating conversations with local guides, indulgent meals – and desserts – for lunch and dinner (Ama, I love your soups!), and friendly company – if that doesn’t sum up river cruising in nutshell…

For those advisors who haven’t tried it yet, what are you waiting for?!

I promise, it’s all that you’ve heard about and more.