Uniworld - Danube Discovery & Prague Sep 7 Sailing: Live updates to come

I am counting down the minutes/hours/days until we board our plane to Vienna to start our journey on the River Ambassador. I've mentioned this in a couple other Danube/Uniworld threads, but I thought I'd start a new one for folks interested in this specific itinerary.

We're two 30-somethings on our third trip to Europe, and we'll be joined by my parents (61 & 74) who have also been to Europe a few times. After the cruise, we're spending a full week in Prague—two nights with Uniworld and four nights on our own.

I'll be spending most of my time on blog posts at http://www.grosstravelchronicles.blogspot.com, but will try to pop onto Cruise Critic a few times to see if there are questions here that don't show up in the blog comments.

For now, feel free to critique my packing list :)

If anyone else has been on this itinerary, I'd love to read your tips & tricks!

Following along. I'm doing a Viking Danube cruise next April with 3 nights in Prague to start.

Your packing list looks great. I've been watching lots of packing videos.:D. I'm usually a good packer. My family of 5 just did 15 nights in Orlando with 1 checked bag, 2 carry-ons and daypack for all 5 of us. But we had easy access to laundry and a rental car. I'm a bit more concerned about my river cruise since I won't want to do or pay for laundry and I'm going somewhere new (just me with a friend-leaving husband & kids at home). A few things on my anywhere list that i did not see on yours were-small first aid kit, small flashlight, notebook, pen, hat and compact umbrella?

Good ideas! I might pull together a tiny first-aid kit (in like a mint tin or something), and I plan on bringing a journal and pen in my purse. My iPhone is my flashlight, and the ship provides umbrellas. I'll work with just my raincoat when we leave Uniworld.

Might have to think about the hat. For me, a hat is a baseball hat or a visor, which equals sweaty, messy hair.

I'd recommend bringing a very small umbrella you can fit in a pocket or day pack. Uniworld does have umbrellas, but they are the big ones that don't collapse. If you are out touring and away from the ship, you don't want to be carrying one of those "just in case".

For a first aid kit, I'd recommend just taking a few bandaids -- even if you have shoes you're used to, walking all day on cobblestones may rub your feet the wrong way. You really don't need much more than that, maybe your preference of pain reliever? I've got to admit, we've never taken sunscreen on a river cruise. My daily moisturizer has sunscreen in it and that seems to be enough. But then, I also wear hats...

I recommend checking the 10 day forecasts on weather.com before you leave. You seem to be taking a lot of shorts. Unless it's supposed to be over the 80's when you're there, slacks will be more versitile as you can also wear them for dinner -- but then you know what you're most comfortable in -- and I realize you plan to do the go-active excursions. Just check the weather first, this time of year it could go either way and shorts could be fine.

I probably wouldn't take as many dresses as you are... it looks like you've got 3 dresses + 2 nicer skirts, I presume all for dinners? Could any of these dresses or skirts transition to day wear if it were warm or are they nicer? You'll be fine wearing them, but I will say most of the women will be wearing black pants and a different top most evenings. If you needed to cut down the amount of things you bring, an extra pair of black pants could work.

I will admit I overpacked my first river cruise... I wore everything, but the next trip I didn't even bring a dress.

I notice you say you plan to make a quick change at the airport when you arrive. I know you've been wearing the same clothes for hours sitting on the plane, but it seems like more effort than I'd make.

We live in Wisconsin, so shorts weather (at least for my husband) is 65 and up, which it looks like we'll see most days at least until we get to Prague.

Also probably related to living in Wisconsin and being very fair-skinned, I burn if I'm in the sun for more than 30-minutes. Sunscreen is a must until late October :)

We'll see how the stuff fits in the suitcase at the end of the week. I know I could go with black pants instead of some of the dresses, but I've actually started to prefer dresses/skirts to pants, so if it fits I hope to bring them. They're also all made of material that pretty much refuses to wrinkle, which isn't true for my black pants.

Will definitely be checking the weather forecast, and I've scoured the historical weather sites to get average weather data we can expect.

Thanks for the feedback!

We will be getting on the River Ambassador on September 21 in Vienna for travel up to Nuremberg, then proceeding on to Prague (and Munich for the Octoberfest!). So I will be following every word of your post. (We will be in cabin 103)

This will be our first river cruise after a bunch of ocean cruises. We are pretty active 60 year olds so I will be real interested in your excursion choices.

Have a safe journey over and enjoy!

JPH - We'll be in cabin 129, so they should be pretty similar, if not exactly the same.

I imagine you booked pretty early to get one of the seven category 3 cabins? We booked in May 2013.

We've de-stressed about this trip by realizing that if worse came to worse and it was cancelled because of high water or any type of malfunction, we'd just go to Oktoberfest instead :) I'm really looking forward to seeing what kind of regional beers they have onboard, considering they advertise that they have a beer sommelier.

My mom is a very active 61 (she's clocked some 15-mile bike rides to get ready for the bike excursion) so I'll be sure to share her perspective as well.

Have a great trip! Looking forward to hearing all about it, as we've tried to do the Danube and been foiled twice... One time was June 2013, when the worst flood in 500 years hit, so our cruise was canceled before it even started!

But we went to Bavaria anyway and made it up as we went along - so no worries, your backup plan would be great too. There is so much to do in the area. I hope you find the Bavarian breakfast you've been craving, and all the Weissbier you want. Gute Fahrt!

JPH - We'll be in cabin 129, so they should be pretty similar, if not exactly the same.

 

I imagine you booked pretty early to get one of the seven category 3 cabins? We booked in May 2013.

 

We've de-stressed about this trip by realizing that if worse came to worse and it was cancelled because of high water or any type of malfunction, we'd just go to Oktoberfest instead :) I'm really looking forward to seeing what kind of regional beers they have onboard, considering they advertise that they have a beer sommelier.

 

My mom is a very active 61 (she's clocked some 15-mile bike rides to get ready for the bike excursion) so I'll be sure to share her perspective as well.

Hi Liz - yes we booked pretty early - February of 2013. I like to have something to look forward to and I hate getting shut out. (Just booked an Alaska cruise for July of 2015)

As I said, I will be following along this week as we finish our planning. Enjoy! And safe travels

You'll have a wonderful time! We've cruised the Rhine and the Douro with Uniworld and loved both experiences...top notch for sure. I'm going on the Rhine again in December with a friend...and doing Bucharest to Budapest in Nov. '15. River cruising is such fun! I look forward to reading how you like it. Have fun!

Just home from enchanted Danube- it was amazing. I think it was you who asked about river cruising for the "younger" set? We had a great time (2 early 30s friends) and quickly found a few couples we got along with well for dinner and drinks every day. I found the included yours a bit frustrating as far as the pace of walking (slow) and level of hand holding (high) but if it got to be too much I went off on my own! Have an amazing time!!

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Thanks for reporting back! Yes, I was curious about the younger cruisers - I'll turn 32 on this trip. Glad to hear everything was excellent for your vacation; I look forward to reading a trip report if you share one. I have no problem ditching a tour if it's slow, so we'll see how it goes.

We're all packed and the car will be here to pick us up for the airport in three hours. :D

First post is up! It details our time in Vienna. We're docking in Weissenkirchen right now.

http://grosstravelchronicles.blogspot.nl/2014/09/arrival-in-europe-two-days-in-vienna.html?m=1

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First post is up! It details our time in Vienna. We're docking in Weissenkirchen right now.

 

http://grosstravelchronicles.blogspot.nl/2014/09/arrival-in-europe-two-days-in-vienna.html?m=1

 

 

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Really great blog. Thank you! Looking forward to the next instalment!

Next post is up!!

http://grosstravelchronicles.blogspot.nl/2014/09/weissenkirchen-and-wachau-valley.html?m=1

If anyone is curious, we I am the youngest person on this cruise by at least 15, if not 20 years.

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Enjoying the blog. Thanks for taking the time!!

FuelScience

Another post! I'm now caught up .... to yesterday. I need to write up today's trip to the Bavarian Forest, and then we have Regensburg tomorrow and Nuremberg on Saturday, and then our cruise will be over on Sunday. BUT, we'll still have a week left in Prague.

http://grosstravelchronicles.blogspot.nl/2014/09/a-very-active-day-in-passau.html

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Great blog posts. Very interested as we will be aboard River Ambassador in a couple of weeks (Prague-Nuremberg-Basel). Thanks.

Should we expect to be able to use our Ipad and Iphone (wifi access to internet) while aboard ship?

Yes, you can connect to the wifi with your mobile device. It works best in the lounge, dining room, and in the center of the sun deck. Towards the ends of the ship (like where our cabin is-129) you may not be able to connect to wifi.

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thanks so much for your blog. We leave in 9 days. Would be interested in weather reports. Should I be bringing more shorts? I thought it would be closer to the 60's than the 80's.

There have been two sunny days, and two rainy days so far. So, layers are key, as well as rain gear. Yesterday I wore a skirt and short sleeves in the afternoon, and applied sunblock. Today I wore jeans, a long-sleeve shirt, and a rain jacket. Tomorrow will supposedly be 60 and partly cloudy.

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Next post: The Bavarian Forest

http://grosstravelchronicles.blogspot.nl/2014/09/the-bavarian-forest.html

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I've fallen behind on the blog, but will catch up eventuallly. We disembarked the River Ambassador this morning, and are now in the beautiful Boscolo hotel in Prague. We loved the cruise portion of our ship, and have already requested a booking for another—Cambodia & Vietnam over the holidays in 2015.

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No one here is going to complain!! We all appreciate you taking the time to post from your trip. We all hope that you had a wonderful cruise, and from the looks of your blog, it looks like you did.

Kick back and enjoy Prague. You can tell us all about it after you get home.

FuelScience

I'm home, and I've been up for hours thanks to the time change. We loved this vacation, and I've already submitted my Cruise Critic review for the River Ambassador. I'm working on individual reviews on Trip Advisor as well.

I've gotten one more blog post up, about our day in Regensburg: http://grosstravelchronicles.blogspot.com/2014/09/regensburg-lives-up-to-its-name.html

More daily wrap-ups will come, and then I plan to write a series of posts specific to food, service, and some of the DIY travel we did in Prague. I'm hoping to provide as much information as Ukalady did about her Viking cruise :)

If anyone has any questions about cruising the Danube with Uniworld (or their Prague extension) I'm well-rested and happy to answer them.