crm911

There is a crew-operated laundry on board. There is a small clothesline in the shower for hand-washed things. Depending on your timing and luck, you may get on-ship credit that can cover laundry. We did not.

Re Budapest, if you are doing the Evergreen-organised Prague extension, you leave at 8 am on the second day, so you basically have a day. Luckily, this is the only day (AMS-BUD direction) when most of the day is organised for you.

People who joined the ship in BUD (to start a BUD-AMS cruise) told us they flew a few days earlier and stayed at their own expense to look around. The issue of tour extensions is a difficult one to resolve because you get one free flight per extension, e.g. Paris + Prague = 2 free flights. If cost is no objective, you would fly yourself and see the rest of Europe at your pace before taking just the cruise.

Thank you so much for the information.

I am getting a little nervous about being in lower deck in case there is noise from crew etc,early morning.

You're welcome. I didn't hear a complaint from people I met from the lower deck and when we went for the engine room tour, you could hardly hear the engines before the door was opened. There are no cabins above the front or rear engines. Apart from housekeeping people, the rest of the crew go up from a staircase within their area and they come out one or two levels up, as per their work routine. By the time you hear pax walking past, it'll be time for you to be up anyway. We heard nothing from our room. You should check out the engine room video on my site, at least for the walking part to the rear engines.

You are more likely to hear people above your cabin if they decide to move stuff at night. We were on the top deck and could hear joggers on the Sun Deck - they were asked not to jog too early.

Jazzbeau,

Since you might need it in the future, Google "web proxy australia" without the quotes and a few come up. I don't vouch for any of them but the first one worked for me.

I think I'm the one with the big review mentioned here - link in my signature and also answered Janecambridge's question about dress here: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showpost.php?p=43940710&postcount=19.

Short answer from the Evergreen pre-trip booklet "classy but not formal". In a dining room with 160 people, perhaps 2 wore jackets.

... But when I go to the APT website (from a US ISP) I can never see any dates, so I can't verify this....

I don't know if you can view this page for AMS-BUD: http://www.aptouring.com.au/trip-finder/trip-departures-dates-prices?id=FR9F0snyH0elmN-5UrP8lQ&itineraryid=2EhfpYDAkEmW0cwWXSS1iA

e.g. Sept 2014 - 13, 14, 26, 27, 28; October 2014 - 11, 12, 25; November 2014 - 8

... its hard to figure out the supposed cuts to the Scenic all-inclusive levels that are keeping the Emerald prices down -- it still looks quite complete.

I have been looking at other brands to compare what we "missed" on the Evergreen cruise. Superficially, they stop mostly at the same places but the websites don't give you the benefit of assessing which one is better.

For example, in Vienna, we paid to see the concert at the Kursalon. The Scenic pax go to "the majestic Palais Liechtenstein" but I don't know if that room is less packed and has better air conditioning.

Evergreen pax go to Bratislava and do the family visit there; Scenic pax spend two days in Vienna and one option on the second day is Bratislava, but they do the family visit in Miltenberg.

The Scenic ships have "Six dining venues, including River Café and Table La Rive" - I don't know how they count their dining venues, but on the Emerald Sky I'd count just two - the Reflections restaurant and the Horizon Lounge for light meals upstairs. Yes, there was a barbecue on the Sun Deck once and you get popcorn while watching a movie, but that's not dining in my book.

There is a hint of better quality in the Scenic descriptions, e.g. we were given a walking tour of Cologne near the cathedral, while they choose between Dusseldorf and Cologne, then have a medieval banquet in some castle. We had dinner on the ship.

The two days in Vienna (also done by APT brands, which skip Cologne), is a better choice for those who want to see Vienna better on the second day. If I had my druthers, I would not mind missing Bratislava.

I suspect that someone who does an Evergreen + optional tours ends up paying close to the Scenic price. We did all but one option. In some places, Scenic has three or four choices, so they have to pay for a bus for each destination even if they have just two pax on board.

What was the dress code for evenings and special dinners?

There is just one sentence in the "My Tour Information Booklet" about clothes. You get this before you leave - it is a whole paragraph about clothes and shoes for the whole trip, but one sentence about the special meals. -"The Captain's Welcome and Farewell Dinners are dressy but not formal."

The timetable for those days merely refers to "Dinner" for both, but there was a "Welcome Cocktail". For the optional Viennese concert, silly me was one of 2-3 people who wore a business suit and tie! It was hot and stuffy in a room packed with at least 1000 people. Only one shipload arrived with the men in tuxedos. The same room had people in shorts, t-shirts and runners (not our ship but possibly independent tourists).

If you check out the video page I mentioned a few posts above, you can look up any day to see what people wore. I never saw a single tux on our ship. We passed other ships, e.g. some Tauck and Viking at meal times where they were definitely better dressed than our mob. Most people wore what you might wear to a friend's dinner party in Australia.

Sorry, I can't swim, so I did not try the pool. I don't think many people used it, but as it is small, you'd be doing turns every few strokes. Someone said that the coffee machine there was also very good, FWIW. My wife saw a movie there one night and they made popcorn for the guests.

Thank you for all the information.Can I ask,is there somewhere to go in the evening away from the singers if you want?

They weren't that bad! :D

Usually the entertainment occurs while you are moving and the entertainers get off at the next lock, but you can go to the Sun Deck if it is open. For the AMS-BUD direction, the ship was docked during the Hungarian Folk performance, so you could try your luck outside, but since there was a Danube by Night session immediately afterwards, I wouldn't recommend leaving the ship.

I saw one of the advertorial videos of a BUD-Nuremberg sailing on the same ship and it seemed that certain activities are timed in a different order. If you want to see videos of any day of this cruise, I have uploaded them at http://www.amsterdamtobudapest.com/video/ and they are in bite-sized pieces. Even the un-exciting bus rides are kept separate, so you can see glimpses of what I saw through my iPhone 5S - these are not professional videos and have minimal editing.

You have almost finished your cruise and I just found this thread today. :) Great blog, better than mine below. I am still processing the videos and adding them slowly.

We are 60 and 61 respectively and felt young on our recent AMS-BUD cruise (blog link below). The youngest was 37 and a handful in their 40s and 50s.

It is true that the majority is in the retiree age group but it's irrelevant because you go to take in the sights, which are very old. :)

Very much enjoyed reading your review, Ash! Wonderful photos and informative details. Thank you! Looking forward even more now to our Danube Delights cruise in October.

You're welcome. I am a very digital traveller. I was also checking in with Foursquare and Facebook on this trip. Have a great cruise!

If you meant Emerald Waterways (sold as Evergreen Tours in Australia), then check out the blog link in my signature for a cruise I did last month.

The differences can be subtle. When the Main Danube canal water level was low, our new ship having a shallower draft could go through, whereas several other companies had to bus their passengers to the other end and swap ships.

I have done only one river cruise, which was just perfect, one month ago, so I'm not batting for Viking or any cruise line, but keep in mind that Viking has perhaps the most ships, so of course there will be more reports about Viking. As Americans say, do the math.

As for "communications", I think the ships would know by now how long does a bus tour take "normally" as well as in an "extreme case". Perhaps they could have warned the pax that they would get two hours of the whole day on site, possibly in heavy rain. Let the pax decide whether to risk it, or stay on board to pack.

When the rivers are low, some ships can make it through and some can't. Ours did, but we saw others having to offload to a bus. Read lots of reviews before choosing a company.

I'll endorse the above post about signage. We had to take the train between terminals a month ago with a 90 minute gap and not finding the gate where we thought it was, we had to backtrack a fair distance and then go down one level. We barely made it. Keep your eyes peeled.

We did this cruise from Budapest to Amsterdam and had a 3 day bus cruise followed by 11 days on the ship. Be well aware though, that the top deck on the ship is closed for most of the cruise due to bridges, definitely a big detractor from the experience.

Helps to mention the dates and cruise line, else it serves as a pointer to what can happen to some. We completed AMS-BUD on Evergreen Tours/Emerald Waterways (Emerald Sky) with only 3-4 days without roof access and no bus "cruise". 21 June to 5 July 2014.

We just came back from an Amsterdam to Budapest cruise with Emerald Waterways (Evergreen Tours in Oz). My blog link below has a detailed account of the daily routine, which is similar to the other posts, but each company has slight variations. We usually ran parallel to 3-4 ships that often docked next to us, but some moved on and we stayed back, or vice versa.

We did not do many overnights in the same port and did a few where we were dropped off at a port and picked up at the next, e.g. Miltenberg-Wertheim, Kelheim-Regensburg, Passau-Linz, Melk-Durnstein. Other companies have a slightly different pattern.

The only stop where it was possible for us to skip lunch on the ship and stay in town was Vienna.

Evergreen Tours (Emerald Waterways) Emerald Sky will be going all the way to Budapest! It was pouring in Salzburg this morning, but sunny in the afternoon and also in Linz this evening.

Forecast for Melk tomorrow is a high of 28C and sunny.

Hi crm911, Did you have to change ships?

No, still on the Emerald Sky. We are now in Regensburg and I just met the engineer who said he couldn't do an engine room tour as he has his hands full to prepare the ship for the low waters ahead. By that I imagine he has to adjust the ballast water. The canal's high water mark was about 30-40 cm (my visual estimate) higher than the water level, so despite having locks, there is less water in it.

Non-stop rain all day so far in Regensburg, but we like it that way in the circumstances.

Just left Nuremberg, heading to Budapest. No change of ship, thank heavens. Light drizzle, on and off, but probably need a downpour to be useful.

We are approaching Nuremberg and the canal level is about 30-40 cm (1-1.5 ft) lower than the high water line, so it could make the difference for some ships.

Emerald Sky is under way right now on the canal to Nuremberg and the captain and cruise director did a fantastic job explaining the situation and how the draft of our ship can be varied between 1.8 m to 2.1 m with the use of ballast. We had bumped the bottom in some locks earlier, so the captain explained that was owing to the lack of water.

Regensburg is going to be the next decision point, but there is some prospect of rain, which is the best news in the circumstances. Fingers crossed.

I am on Evergreen's Emerald Sky in Bamberg sitting next to APT's AMAVerde, whose pax are packing up. They will stay a night here and tomorrow be bused to Nuremberg and transfer to the AMAbella. The latter's pax will be transferred to the former at the same time. My photo of the AMAVerde below before it docked.

No announcement from Emerald Sky about our fate. Being a fairly new ship, we hope it has a shallower draft.

We are on the Emerald Sky (Evergreen Tours) at Bamberg heading to Budapest. Berthed next to us is the APT ship AMAVerde.

The AMAVerde has been running parallel to us every day. A lady there asked us if we had been "evicted". She explained that they have been told to pack up their bags as they will be transferred by bus tomorrow to Nuremberg and transfer to the AMABella, whose passengers will do the reverse. The reason is a "lack of water" in Main (river) - Danube Canal. APT does not want to have a ship stuck in it. Our cruise line has not made any such announcement to us, so fingers crossed that we don't have to do the same.

Which attractions forbid photography or require you to deposit your cameras and phones?

Any comments on taking videos versus still images? As I am the main photographer in my family, I think I'll be taking the video camera and my iPhone 5S, but not sure if I should also take the DSLR with the 18-200 mm lens. If the attractions don't allow photography then I don't want to check in three things every time.