We had 7 young adults 18-30. Strange but they loved it the most and would love their grandparents to plan another. There was also a family with two teens on our boat. We went in the summer. Our kids and the cousins enjoyed interacting with the crew who were mainly from Eastern Europe.
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I think one factor would be where/when ship docked at town. The ability to have extra local color is something my kids would like.
We went Amsterdam —> Basel, which was advantage for travel logistics and 2 nights prior in a city we wanted to see. But… it meant we were going against current, supposedly less time in ports. Also do to the many ships and low-ish water level, we did not dock right at town as much as I had expected. However there was one late afternoon / evening where we were able to wander around Rüdesheim - that was lovely.
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One thing I’m very glad we did was upgrade our seats so we were always economy plus with my folks. That extra bit of room and being near the front of the plane was very helpful and worth it for us.
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The Viking River cruise I did last year was from Amsterdam to Budapest covering both the Rhine and Danube Rivers. Often times, our favorite dinner tablemates were 87-92 years old. They were remarkable mentally and physically.
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Everywhere we docked we could walk into town. The only place we docked where we had to reach shore by crossing numerous boats was in Budapest.
Our trip had a mix of ages. There also was a group from Backroads on our cruise. They biked each day.
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The ability to walk into town is nice. We did have some in-town docks (sometimes needing to walk across another ship, no biggie as long as lol you don’t try to go to “your” stateroom on the first ship). But usually our schedule dictated departure too early for evening activities on shore. Much would depend on the itinerary and direction.
For folks willing to sort through A LOT of info about river cruising, there are various Facebook groups. A large one where I learned a lot is FB group “Viking Rhine River Cruises”
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We were on the Danube and had plenty of evening time in towns. Interesting how each itinerary is different.
One thing one of my kids loved is how punctual the cruise was. If they said they were sailing at 10 pm that meant pulling away from the dock at 10. Also how the excursions also always left on time. If you showed up a few minutes late the group had already left.
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I am so glad I found this. We have ventured into Family river cruising, with itineraries and activities for families with kids and teens. We did the Danube in 2019, and the Siene in 2023. This year for D24’s high school graduation trip we are doing the Rhine (it was the trip she picked).
For family cruising, we have found that we prefer Tauck. While they do traditional river cruises as well, the family ones are often multigenerational and so much fun for kids.
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We have our first river cruise planned for this September and I am really looking forward to it. DH isn’t a fan of ocean cruising, but thinks he’ll like river cruising. We are taking the kids on this one on Viking (Paris to Normandy), but if DH likes it, we plan to do more river cruising with just the two of us.
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#2 river cruise in April–Holland and Belgium in tulip season. Did the Rhine in 2019. Love love love river cruises. There is a list of things in Viking brochures that lists what river cruises are NOT—everything on that list would annoy the heck out of on an ocean liner (photographers, paying for wifi and beer/wine at meals, sales pitches masquerading as lectures, being frisked-almost when you return from port, etc)
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I’m a little late jumping on this thread but just thought to look for tips etc as we just booked a Viking Grand European Cruise in 2025. I’ve been wanting to do this for a long, long time. Husband should be retired by then or may be by the time he gets back from the cruise! I did recently check the Cruise Critic board for river cruises so thanks for whomever mentioned that upthread.
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Exciting!
Are you spending any days before or after the cruise?
It’s a very social event. You will meet lots of people if you want.
We liked every optional excursion we’ve done. I think that the guides for the most part are very good.
Is Rothenburg offered on this itinerary? It’s a lovely town and we enjoyed the drive along the romantic road and our day there
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We did this exact itinerary last September. Thoroughly enjoyed it.
Yes, we are going to pre-cruise in Amsterdam for 2 days, I don’t recall what their official tours are but we will definitely be doing the Anne Frank house and possibly the Van Gogh museum. I don’t believe Rothenburg is on this cruise, but we have been there before and yes, it is absolutely lovely - walking through that village and we did drive the romantic road - what is the other small town we went to that was like Rothenburg? That’s going to drive me crazy, I should remember all this! Dinklesbuhl, or something like that.
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Fantastic - I was going to go for September but decided to push back to October to catch the foliage and lower price. I’m a little nervous about the whole water level issue but decided that we can’t do anything about it anyway and Viking seems to do their best to accommodate so we’ll go with the flow (or not!)
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The great thing about Viking (at least for our Rhine Getaway route) they send a pair of ships each day, one from each port. If there are issues of water too high or too low, you swap with other ship. We sailed late Sept and did not have a problem. But there was some minor revision on stopping points due to low water. Later in the fall there were issues with high water.
A great resource is the FB group - VIking Rhine River Cruises. Per feedback from guests impacted by water level, Viking crew handles the issues really well.
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Thanks so much, I’ve already signed up for that and the Cruise Critic boards as well. My travel agent has already had a webinar for the cruise and lot of the participants are for 2024 - we are not until next year for our 40th. Super excited even though it’s 20 months away!
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Twenty months away is OK. Anticipation is part of the fun of travel.
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Wow, just reading a Cruise Critic roll call from a cruise we were going to go on and cancelled (Celebrity, Singapore to Hong Kong). Visa mess with Vietnam, so confusing, people misled by Celebrity (they had even told me not to worry about the visa, we could get it onboard, which apparently hasn’t been possible). Many people not able to get off in Vietnam (which is about seven days of the cruise), losing deposits for shore excursions.
I was bummed at the amount of money we lost on our cruise deposit for cancelling, but I can’t even imagine if we were stuck on the cruise boat unable to get off for a week because of the visa issue. Many people applied for the visa online ahead of time and the Vietnamese messed up the dates, point of entry, and supposedly if it’s incorrect, they won’t let you off. Or back on! This is the great thing about going to Europe. None of this mess!!!
Several cruise lines getting lots of bad press due to problems with itineraries, including some bucket list cruises to Antarctica. Sorry you lost money on your deposit—can you make claim with your CC for cancellation?
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