Best Cruise line for our travel style?

[Host Jazzbeau]

3 minutes ago, coevan said:

Is there a specific time they dine and is there a time window.

 

The time varies depending on the day's activity schedule but is generally close of the early seating time on an ocean cruise [which is NOT when we prefer to eat, but it worked...]  The galley on a river ship is tiny, so they have to operate with a system rather than deal with each table 'a la minute.'  

 

There are exactly as many seats in the dining room as the guest capacity of the ship, so there is a bit of a mad rush after the CD presentation to grab tables.  If you tarry, you may have to share with strangers [which has actually worked out well for us – on our first river cruise we sat in a 6-person furniture grouping for the CD talk, bonded with our four neighbors, and ended up dining with them throughout the cruise.]  There are a few tables for two.

 

The food on AMA is very good, and the wine pourers are incredibly generous [they are happy to top you up as you leave, so you have a free drink for the after-dinner entertainment].  Be sure to sign up for the Chef's Table [free, but the reservations fill up] – an amazing evening of very special food and wine pairings.

[Lois R]

I agree with Jazz's post 100%...a river cruise and ocean cruise are 180 degrees different.  Yes, everyone gets served

dinner within the same time frame. Serving 150 in a well run galley? That is what they do. It is not like bringing in food

for 2500 or 5500 these days......150 is really not that many people.  I recently took a river cruise and I think we had

125 on board...the food was FABULOUS

My cruises were on AMA and Uniworld and open dining essentially meant you can sit at whatever table you want...

you can share a table with others (Or Not) but everyone ate within 10-15 minutes of each other.....you didn't have

to be there at exactly 7 but most folks were seated by 7:15----many at 7, some at 7:20--7:30......but no later than

that really.

[coevan]

You folks have been great. We are going on a summer river cruise , just which cruise line. A silly as it sounds the interiors of Uniworld are ridiculously designed. 🙄

[sharkster77]

We sailed on a Viking river cruise that was sold out, and we never felt like we ever needed to stampede into the dining room to find a seat--there always seemed to be seats.  Then again, we enjoyed dining with different folks on different nights (we dined with two couples twice each, it turned out).

[Lois R]

1 hour ago, coevan said:

You folks have been great. We are going on a summer river cruise , just which cruise line. A silly as it sounds the interiors of Uniworld are ridiculously designed. 🙄

Not sure what you mean........there are only 3 or 4 decks.........there is the dining room----there is a lounge---

spa----upper deck where you can sit outside and cabins.  What is ridiculous about it? Or are you referring to the

décor?

[coevan]

looks my grand mother's house, and I'm 68, the most gaudy design I have ever seen. Not sure what I mean, have you looked on their website? 

[Host Jazzbeau]

It has been described as if Marie Antoinette exploded in the bedroom...

[Lois R]

Yes, I have looked at the photos on line----I am 61 and maybe we just look at things differently. As mentioned,

I would not decorate my home that way but as for cruising with a good line? They know what they are doing.

And some of the décor may be over the top, but some of it was lovely--on the boat I sailed anyway.

[Hoyaheel]

I believe Crystal river cruises are some of the only that offer truly open dining times (I'm sure that's still within a certain window, but then, so are ocean cruises) I've not been interested in Crystal (too inclusive and too $ for my preferences) but that is how THEY characterize themselves, based on the literature they send me ;-)

[Coral]

On our Crystal Cruise - dinner was anywhere from 7-10 pm (open dining time). You could show up anytime. Not sure how many showed up towards the end of the time frame. 

 

Crystal was amazing. It was much better than my Ama river cruise. It was pretty inclusive. I don't drink alcohol but I found the service, food and inclusiveness amazing. It ranks as one of my favorite trips.

[Lois R]

I have never cruised on Crystal--but I found AMA excellent and am cruising with them again in

April

 

Maybe one day I will try Crystal.

[Host Jazzbeau]

Crystal is clearly bringing much more of the ocean cruise ambience to their river cruises than any other line has ever attempted.  Given that all current-vintage river ships are the same size [135m long], Crystal has the fewest passengers = the most space per passenger.  They also have the most 'open' dining.  And at least so far they have been rotating Cruise Directors from their ocean ships to the river ships, and have a higher level of entertainment [still nothing like ocean ships – you can't with so few passengers] than other lines.  But they also only have 4 ships at this point and very limited itineraries.  

 

Until recently I was worried that this whole Crystal River expansion was a mistake by their ex-CEO, but they seem to have stabilized the operation and it looks like they will expand at a sustainable pace and become the new standard against which all other lines will be measured. But all those wonderful things also mean they must be the new high-$$$ standard against which all other lines will be discounted.

 

[I was going to say "against which all other lines will be discounted from," but I remembered the famous dictum that "a preposition is a word that you should never end a sentence with."  Of course, Winston Churchill also famously [maybe] said about that rule: "That is the sort of nonsense up with which I will not put."  So if it adds to your comprehension, please feel free to end my sentence above with 'from'.]

 

[gnome12]

48 minutes ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

[I was going to say "against which all other lines will be discounted from," but I remembered the famous dictum that "a preposition is a word that you should never end a sentence with."  Of course, Winston Churchill also famously [maybe] said about that rule: "That is the sort of nonsense up with which I will not put."  So if it adds to your comprehension, please feel free to end my sentence above with 'from'.]

 

“Against” or “from” at the beginning of the sentence, or, incorrectly, at the end, but never both! Egads!

[Host Jazzbeau]

12 minutes ago, gnome12 said:

“Against” or “from” at the beginning of the sentence, or, incorrectly, at the end, but never both! Egads!

 

If we are going full-on pedantic, it was a phrase not a sentence. 

[djh1959]

I have to say that we did our first river cruise on Scenic last October.  While we enjoyed it, we also learned that it is not really a holiday that we would repeat, and if we did we would try one of the European lines or Crystal.

 

We really did not like the 7:00pm dining.  We never eat that early and home and often didn't want to on board either, but there was simply no choice, it was made very clear that everyone was expected to eat together.

 

We had a junior suite on the top (Diamond) deck and were told that we could have room service, so our idea was to do that when we didn't feel like eating at 7:00pm.  The trouble was that there was literally nowhere to eat, other than a small glass coffee table or an even smaller plastic table on the balcony, so that idea didn't work either.  We had one room service breakfast which we ate sitting on the bed, not really ideal.

 

To us it felt more like what I imagine a bus tour must be like, except the hotel came along too.  By the end of the week, we just stopped doing the tours and did our own thing which is how we generally travel.  We preferred that but of course we wasted a lot of money as all the tours were included.

[4774Papa]

6 hours ago, djh1959 said:

I have to say that we did our first river cruise on Scenic last October.  While we enjoyed it, we also learned that it is not really a holiday that we would repeat, and if we did we would try one of the European lines or Crystal.

 

We really did not like the 7:00pm dining.  We never eat that early and home and often didn't want to on board either, but there was simply no choice, it was made very clear that everyone was expected to eat together.

 

We had a junior suite on the top (Diamond) deck and were told that we could have room service, so our idea was to do that when we didn't feel like eating at 7:00pm.  The trouble was that there was literally nowhere to eat, other than a small glass coffee table or an even smaller plastic table on the balcony, so that idea didn't work either.  We had one room service breakfast which we ate sitting on the bed, not really ideal.

 

To us it felt more like what I imagine a bus tour must be like, except the hotel came along too.  By the end of the week, we just stopped doing the tours and did our own thing which is how we generally travel.  We preferred that but of course we wasted a lot of money as all the tours were included.

Gate 1, which we have never used, but hear is it a good line, usually has optional tours, that might work for you.  If you want to decline all tours.  All four our river cruise, Russia, China, Rhone River and Douro River have had great ship tours.  In many cases, just staying in the port you would lose out on quite a bit.

[Coral]

10 hours ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

Crystal is clearly bringing much more of the ocean cruise ambience to their river cruises than any other line has ever attempted.  Given that all current-vintage river ships are the same size [135m long], Crystal has the fewest passengers = the most space per passenger.  They also have the most 'open' dining.  And at least so far they have been rotating Cruise Directors from their ocean ships to the river ships, and have a higher level of entertainment [still nothing like ocean ships – you can't with so few passengers] than other lines.  But they also only have 4 ships at this point and very limited itineraries.  

 

Until recently I was worried that this whole Crystal River expansion was a mistake by their ex-CEO, but they seem to have stabilized the operation and it looks like they will expand at a sustainable pace and become the new standard against which all other lines will be measured. But all those wonderful things also mean they must be the new high-$$$ standard against which all other lines will be discounted.

Honestly - I am not even sure who the CD was on our trip. We didn't have "nightly meetings" like other river cruises did. I do know who was in charge of tours and she was previously a fitness instructor on Crystal Ocean. She was excellent. I did miss the first day meeting of "Meet the Officers". This was probably stupid on my part.

 

I was surprised how well things flowed. It was flawless. My Ama cruise seemed to have last minute changes all the time and this seemed to run like an ocean cruise. We got a daily sheet and that was it. I would have thought they were doing river cruises for 10-20 years when I sailed them. They had their act together even with the changes in our itinerary - everything went on like it should have. Maybe my transport time was longer from the ports we did dock at but I wasn't inconvenienced at all. 

Edited February 9, 2020 by Coral

[Coral]

29 minutes ago, 4774Papa said:

Gate 1, which we have never used, but hear is it a good line, usually has optional tours, that might work for you.  If you want to decline all tours.  All four our river cruise, Russia, China, Rhone River and Douro River have had great ship tours.  In many cases, just staying in the port you would lose out on quite a bit.

I haven't used them either but their reviews are pretty darn good. Not sure if people are unsure going in and the exceptions were low or they just do a great job.

[Coral]

14 hours ago, Lois R said:

Yes, I have looked at the photos on line----I am 61 and maybe we just look at things differently. As mentioned,

I would not decorate my home that way but as for cruising with a good line? They know what they are doing.

And some of the décor may be over the top, but some of it was lovely--on the boat I sailed anyway.

I actually wonder how much their decor does turn some of their potential client base away. While I haven't sailed Uniworld, I can tell you the pictures of their ships don't impress me. Uniworld has an amazing reputation and the reviews are excellent. No question about that. I look at pictures of Crystal vs Uniworld, Crystal's decor is much more desirable to me. I wonder if the decor will give me a headache on Uniworld.

[Lois R]

34 minutes ago, Coral said:

I actually wonder how much their decor does turn some of their potential client base away. While I haven't sailed Uniworld, I can tell you the pictures of their ships don't impress me. Uniworld has an amazing reputation and the reviews are excellent. No question about that. I look at pictures of Crystal vs Uniworld, Crystal's decor is much more desirable to me. I wonder if the decor will give me a headache on Uniworld.

That is why it is nice to have so many choices!  If you are concerned about not feeling well due to the décor? I would

say nothing about my cruise gave me a headache.

 

You mentioned only getting a daily sheet on AMA and nothing else? We had chats every night and our cruise manager was excellent.

He gave talks every day to explain the area we would be sailing to the next day. It was informative

and I am guessing almost every guest attended it.   Looks like we had totally different experiences.

[Coral]

17 minutes ago, Lois R said:

That is why it is nice to have so many choices!  If you are concerned about not feeling well due to the décor? I would

say nothing about my cruise gave me a headache.

 

You mentioned only getting a daily sheet on AMA and nothing else? We had chats every night and our cruise manager was excellent.

He gave talks every day to explain the area we would be sailing to the next day. It was informative

and I am guessing almost every guest attended it.   Looks like we had totally different experiences.

I re-read what I said and it was wrong. I will see if I can correct it. It was right in my mind but I wrote it poorly.

 

On Crystal - we got a daily sheet and that was it for most of the cruise. It was run like an Ocean Cruise. We had one meeting halfway through about not docking in Bratislava.

 

On AMA - we did have daily meetings. Things were always changing - nothing was set in stone.

 

Edited February 9, 2020 by Coral

[Coral]

58 minutes ago, Coral said:

Honestly - I am not even sure who the CD was on our trip. We didn't have "nightly meetings" like other river cruises did. I do know who was in charge of tours and she was previously a fitness instructor on Crystal Ocean. She was excellent. I did miss the first day meeting of "Meet the Officers". This was probably stupid on my part.

 

I was surprised how well things flowed. It was flawless. My Ama cruise seemed to have last minute changes all the time and this (Crystal river cruise) seemed to run like an ocean cruise. (Crystal) We got a daily sheet and that was it (nothing else was necessary). I would have thought they were doing river cruises for 10-20 years when I sailed them. They had their act together even with the changes in our itinerary - everything went on like it should have. Maybe my transport time was longer from the ports we did dock at but I wasn't inconvenienced at all. 

Trying to correct this. See Red above.

 

Sorry for switching between lines and not better clarifying.

 

On the 10 night Crystal cruise, on the first day they had a Meet the Officers where they announced one port change (no excursions affected). I believe that was Vilshofen and we were spending another night in Passau. (no excursions affected) Half way through the cruise, there was one short meeting that basically said we could not dock in Bratislava. That we would return to Vienna early but tours to Bratislava would go on as planned (or we could do tours in Vienna).

Edited February 9, 2020 by Coral

[AllisonJames]

Coevan — the dining issues really concerned us (first river cruise coming up in June) and we did a ton of research and ultimately chose Crystal. For the dining flexibility, the fact that it is totally all-inclusive, and we love the decor of the boats. Agree with you about the look of Uniworld.  We heard very good things about it, but the decor of the boats gave me a headache just looking at them!  Just did not find it appealing.

[Coral]

6 minutes ago, AllisonJames said:

Coevan — the dining issues really concerned us (first river cruise coming up in June) and we did a ton of research and ultimately chose Crystal. For the dining flexibility, the fact that it is totally all-inclusive, and we love the decor of the boats. Agree with you about the look of Uniworld.  We heard very good things about it, but the decor of the boats gave me a headache just looking at them!  Just did not find it appealing.

Allison - all the reviews on Crystal river have been outstanding. I absolutely loved my trip with them. I hope you also love your trip.

[capriccio]

15 hours ago, coevan said:

looks my grand mother's house, and I'm 68, the most gaudy design I have ever seen. Not sure what I mean, have you looked on their website? 

 

Each Uniworld ship is individually decorated and the themes and colors vary significantly so if you find an itinerary you like, check out the specific ship(s) pictures.  We've been on 4 Uniworld ships and all were very different.  While the decor isn't one I would copy in my own house that's a good thing because there is no way I could afford some of the art work and design pieces!

 

Uniworld has open seating for dinner (between 7 pm and 9 pm IIRC).  We have seen people come in 'late' and be served with no issue but most do come straight from the lounge following the meeting during cocktail hour that describes the next day's activities.  Post dinner entertainment usually began around 9:30.