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Pre cruise in Lucerne before going on Rhine cruise with Viking


stefanny28
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Thanks CyberKat for all the great restaurants suggestions.

I have a feeling that we won't have enough time with only 2 1/2 days. Did you skip the walking tour in order to do the Golden tour?

With the pre-cruise Lucerne package, we will only have day 2, if we skip the walking tour, to do the Golden tour so I pray that the weather will cooperate.

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Just a quick question: what about tipping in Switzerland, Germany, France and Amsterdam?

Is it customary to leave a 10-15% tip in the restaurant?

 

I read that gratuities onboard is around 12 euros/person/day. And we should tip the bus driver and local tour guide a 2 euros/person/ tour.

Is this the norm?

 

In Canada, restaurant workers expect a 15% tip on top of the taxes so uless service has been horrible, that's the norm.

 

Thanks

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Thanks CyberKat for all the great restaurants suggestions.

I have a feeling that we won't have enough time with only 2 1/2 days. Did you skip the walking tour in order to do the Golden tour?

With the pre-cruise Lucerne package, we will only have day 2, if we skip the walking tour, to do the Golden tour so I pray that the weather will cooperate.

 

 

 

We did Lucerne after our cruise. We left the ship around 9:30am and went to Lucerne by bus. I’m thinking it was about 45 minutes. We stopped at the Lion Monument for about a 1/2 hour then went to the hotel. They put all the luggage in a locked room and we headed off on the walking tour. We had the rest of that day and the whole next day on our own. On the 3rd day we left for the Zurich airport around 9:00 am. I would have liked another day, but it worked out well.

 

We were lucky, the weather was great!

 

 

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Just a quick question: what about tipping in Switzerland, Germany, France and Amsterdam?

Is it customary to leave a 10-15% tip in the restaurant?

 

I read that gratuities onboard is around 12 euros/person/day. And we should tip the bus driver and local tour guide a 2 euros/person/ tour.

Is this the norm?

 

In Canada, restaurant workers expect a 15% tip on top of the taxes so uless service has been horrible, that's the norm.

 

Thanks

 

 

 

We were told that in restaurants it’s customary to round up to the nearest dollar. We tend to tip generously because we have a lot of friends and family in the service industry. We tried to compromise and go along, but leave a bit more. The European wait staff seemed baffled [emoji15]. They do get a living wage and don’t rely on tips like in the US. We had a couple bring the money back, thinking we had made an error. As the saying goes, when in Rome [emoji16]

 

On the ship we tipped the standard Viking recommended on our credit card, and gave a few extra in cash. We tipped the guides and drivers a few Euros. Some were exceptional and we gave them a bit more. Our guide for Marksburg was pregnant and we were her last tour before her pregnancy leave, she did very nicely in the tip department [emoji16]

 

 

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We thought about the Pearls of Switzerland optional because it included some things we couldn't really have done on our own. But it was very expensive. And also that meant committing that whole day to that tour and not having time to walk around the old city - which we were able to do in the afternoon when we got back from Pilatus. Also booking ahead we would be stuck going even if it was bad weather. So for those reasons we just did the Pilatus day on our own. I think we paid around $110 US for the golden roundtrip pp -- which included the bus back to Luncerne after getting off the gondola. We were glad to have time in the afternoon to spend walking around Lucerne since we had such a short stay there.

 

One other thing, on our trip neither the walking tour provided by Viking nor the bus ride to Basel nor the ride to Lucerne from the airport stopped at the Lion Monument. To me it's a must-see so if you think so too make sure you ask if the bus to Basel will stop there or otherwise go on your own. It was not that long of a walk from our hotel.

 

Like CyberKat we also really liked the Rathaus Brauerie - they had awesome cheese sandwiches on pretzels and nice outdoor seating. I was shocked at how many people smoked in Lucerne (everyone) and didn't love having that in restaurants but other than that quibble it was all good.

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Hi Leslie;

 

That is a great plan. We'll wait for the day before and check the weather before we buy the Golden tour ticket.

In the worse case, we can always just do a cruise on the lake if the weather is no cooperating.

 

BTW, loved your photos. DH is happy that we are not the youngest ones doing a river cruise :-))) July is high season so we are hoping to meet a wide range of cruisers of different ages.

 

We'll go to Rathaus Brauerie for sure. Thise pretzels look so yummy.

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We ate at a couple of other places right near the Rathaus on the same street but I don't remember their names. I guess that means they didn't impress me that much. I don't think we had a bad meal while there but I only really remember the pretzel sandwiches from Rathaus. Sorry, that wasn't helpful.

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We did an Amsterdam to Basel on the Vidar with a post stay in Lucern. We took a Viking offered a full day tour called The Pearls of Switzerland. It was pricey but we had the boat tour to Mt Pilatus, cog rail up and Gondola down, then a mini van met us there and we went to a monastery, dairy farm, cheese factory where we made cheese and topped the day off with a fondue dinner. There were 10 people in our group some from a post cruise stay and some from a pre cruise stay. It was absolutely fabulous and well worth the $$ since we packed so much into the day and Viking made it so easy. Small group... it was like traveling with friends. It would be hard to go to such a dairy farm on your own because the farmer spoke german with limited English and our guide was like traveling with a friend. If it is available I would recommend you take the "Pearls". Also on the Vidar if he is still there Chef Karl Heinz was a joy! We were there in April 2017. Our Viking hotel was the Schweizerhof in a fabulous lakeview room...a great hotel!

 

Agree that the cost of the tour was worth it. Since we only had a few days in Switzerland, we wanted to see and learn as much as we could about the country and culture as we weren’t sure we’d ever get back and the Pearls of Swtzerland Tour accomplished that. I did a review of the tour in my cruise review in case you hadn’t seen it along with a link to some pictures.

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2398901

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Do you have any other restaurant suggestion for Lucerne?

 

We did a 2 night DIY pre-cruise stay before our Uniworld cruise this past spring. I agree that the Rathaus was excellent. However, our dinner at the Hotel des Balances Restaurant was outstanding.

 

https://www.balances.ch/restaurant-in-lucerne

 

Enjoy!

 

Robin

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Hi Robin;

 

I checked their menu... So yummy...

Did you book in advance or can I take a chance and just go there aorund dinner time?

 

BTW, what is the usual dinner time in Lucerne? Do people eat late like in Italy or Spain?

And just to be sure, tipping is usually rouding it to the closest dollar ( in this case, Swiss franc)?

 

Thanks

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Hi Robin;

 

I checked their menu... So yummy...

Did you book in advance or can I take a chance and just go there aorund dinner time?

 

BTW, what is the usual dinner time in Lucerne? Do people eat late like in Italy or Spain?

And just to be sure, tipping is usually rouding it to the closest dollar ( in this case, Swiss franc)?

 

Thanks

 

We were staying at the hotel, but booked in advance, as TripAdvisor indicated it filled up fast. We also did it because we ate there on a Friday night. We ate at 6. I chose an early time, because I knew we'd be tired after our long flight the night before. I would say 7 is peak dining time (or at least it was in late March).

 

I had the beef filet, and my husband, the burger. You can check out pictures in post #17 of my review

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2479562

 

Robin

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Hi Robin;

 

Loved your review.

The photos are so nice. Thanks for sharing. We'll definitely try all these mouth watering dishes.

 

Thanks. I had a good time reliving the cruise yesterday, during lunch:-)

 

(And am looking forward to our Rhone cruise in 3 1/2 months!)

 

Robin

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