Globus Danube River Tours - Shipboard Attire

[Guest]

[quote="nanray"]Many thanks to nursesue for checking on why I was not able to post messages or replies – just two days before she left for her trip! I know she is having a wonderful time.

I am still having trouble with the board and have changed my username from Nan to nanray. Let's see if this goes through.

Agnes – Yes, I would very much like to know anything you would care to tell me about Prague or the optionals. What did you do in Prague? We are especially interested in Jewish history, and I want to see the cemetery and Terezin. Did you do the Salzburg tour? The Vienna concert? What about your free time in Budapest? I’ve heard there’s a cemetery of Holocaust victims there, as well as a Communist Statue Park. I’ll be grateful for anything you, or anyone else, can tell me about his trip.[/quote][url][quote][color=red][/color][size=18][/size][/quote][/url]

[E&M]

When I saw the title of this discussion, Shipboard Attire, I thought I would find that subject addressed. Since we are taking a Globus river cruise from Amsterdam to Budapest this May, we can use the input. Unfortunately, what I found was a lot of chatter about everything and anything else.

Has anyone out there taken one of these river cruises and what is/was the dress on board? Our plans are to pack light, taking casual clothing (man's jeans/chinos, polo & short sleeve shirts, woman's casual skirts & tops/blouses, etc.). . Also one man's jacket (no tie) and one woman's dress for the formal captain's dinner. Is this appropriate?

Your input would be appreciated.

[Gill]

[quote="E&M"]When I saw the title of this discussion, Shipboard Attire, I thought I would find that subject addressed. Since we are taking a Globus river cruise from Amsterdam to Budapest this May, we can use the input. Unfortunately, what I found was a lot of chatter about everything and anything else.

Has anyone out there taken one of these river cruises and what is/was the dress on board? Our plans are to pack light, taking casual clothing (man's jeans/chinos, polo & short sleeve shirts, woman's casual skirts & tops/blouses, etc.). . Also one man's jacket (no tie) and one woman's dress for the formal captain's dinner. Is this appropriate?

Your input would be appreciated.[/quote] [size=18][/size]

I just read your query and will be looking for answers also. I can say that we have been on many land tours in Europe and my choice is to travel with only pants. I take one pair of dressy black pants with dressy tops for the special dinners and that's it-I never bother with any dresses or skirts just slacks.

[agnesd]

Any attire is acceptable. I took a pair of black dressy pants outfit (Citiknits are great). . My husband took a sports jacket, but that was nice but not necessary. Wore it the last night and Vienna opera. We went on the Legendary Danube last July. Ask away, Anything I can tell you would just be reliving this wonderful cruise.

[Theo Coronis]

re Attire on River Cruises.

On a cruise last November, we found most of the passengers were mature aged and were quite comfortable wearing casual clothes to all meals and excursions. That does not preclude anyone from "dressing up" but it would have looked out of place in our group of 140.

The only time one felt the need to be a little more dressy was on one occasion on the entire cruise when 10 people were invited to join the
Captain in the dining room for dinner.

Whilst these ships are quite luxurious, they cannot be compared with the big ocean liners where it may be even obligatory to dress for dinner. The theme seems to be "do your own thing" and set your own pace.

Have a great tour!

[nanray]

Perhaps I should have started a new thread once the subject strayed from shipboard attire. However, I have learned so much, especially from Agnes, by the way this thread has flowed. Hopefully others have also found the information helpful.

I just emailed my travel agent and asked whether my husband should take a jacket for the dressier occasions - she says not unless he wants to.

[ally]

john dory is a fish . ..its expensive here in aus but we see it a lot..ur lucky to have had it on the menu.. ..sounds like a nice menu..dont know about ostrich ,i guess itd taste like our emu.. ..kinda ok if u dont think about it.. . tasted camel once.. .. .. . hmmm thats kinda dirty tasting..kangaroo is ok . .. ..just dont think about it and spread the sauce~!. .. .. .

im gonna miss my aussie lamb chops.. .. . u gotta have lamb if u go to aus.. .
xx

[Guest]

[quote="Nan"]We're jeans and T shirts type people who are planning a Danube cruise next May. We want to be comfortable, and we know we have to pack light, but all of the people in the travel brochures are dressed like they're going to a wedding or a funeral. How do people dress at dinner -- should my husband wear a coat and tie, and should I wear dresses? Are nice slacks and a blouse OK for me at dinner? What should we wear at breakfast and lunch? And just sitting around the ship -- does anybody wear jeans? Coolmax shirts? Any advice will be appreciated.[/quote]

[nanray]

Agnes (& anybody else who helped me over the past year) I've posted my trip report. Nan

[Guest]

Thanks for posting your trip report. I didn't realize that you were the same person that had had the discussion about shipboard attire, etc.

It's so neat to hear from people after they get back.

Debbie

[mbl]

We just completed Globus' "Magnificent Europe" river cruise from Amsterdam to Budapest on the "Symphony" and offer anyone interested in a similar cruise the following: When we arrived at Schipol Airport we discovered that Globus has absolutely nothing to do with this cruise and had no staff on it. They subbed the whole thing out to Amadeus Waterways who pretty well botched the "meet and greet" at the airport leaving us to find their bus pickup area ourselves.

As a point of interest, the Symphony was built in the Netherlands; is owned by Lueftner Cruises, an Austrian Company; flies the German flag; and is under essentially permanent charter to Amadeus Waterways, an American company headquartered in Los Angeles. Our tour was booked by Globus through its Avalon Waterways subsidiary. Wonder how much of a slice of our money each of these entities got.

From the airport we were bussed to an out-of-the-way luxury hotel, the Okura. There we were met by a very inexperienced staff member that didn't know how to handle the people, available courtesy "refreshing rooms", baggage, etc. He was supposedly assisted by two other staff members who spent most of their time gabbing with each other instead of helping us. There wasn't even any courtesy tea and coffee, a minimum amenity that should have been supplied. We were instead directed to the hotel's coffee shop where "we could buy anything we wanted". .

The hotel's location precluded exploring Amsterdam on foot for many people because of its location far from the center of town. This was most inconsiderate of the tour operator since many of us arrived at about 9 AM and the ship was not to be ready until 4 PM. My wife and I are walkers so we left the hotel and walked to the center of town anyway -- must have covered 5 miles or more.

Once on the Symphony, everything changed. The staff was friendly, knowledgeable, efficient, and most courteous. The meals were excellent, plenty of variety and well-prepared. Red and white wines (bottomless glasses) were served with dinner every night on a three-day rotation -- you got the same wines every three days. This didn't bother us since they were generally good an went well with the dinners. Our Amadeus Cruise Director, Wade Korzan, was one of the best we ever had -- knowledgeable, considerate and well-organized.

Ship-board dress was casual, jeans and shirts. There was only one "formal" Captain's Dinner and that came about half-way through the cruise. It was requested that men wear jackets and ties, but this was not mandatory. People wore what they had and there were a lot of slacks and shirts visible. The farewell dinner was NOT formal at all. The only other night people got dressed up was for the optional concert in Vienna.

One negative was the inconsistent quality of the local guides. A few of those that we had were good, knowledgeable, understandable, considerate of their patrons, etc. Others were plain awful -- hard to understand and/or treated people poorly and/or talked too much about insignificant trivia that you couldn't wait to forget. When we got one of these on a walking tour we and other similarly-minded people usually left to explore on our own after making sure we knew the way back to the ship.

The departure was handled very efficiently and unlike other cruises we have been on, you didn't have to leave your cabin until 9 AM on the day of departure. My wife and I had booked three nights at a small Frommers-recommended hotel on the Buda side of the Danube in the Castle Hill district, the Astra Vendaghaz, and we went there directly from the ship. The hotel was great -- small, very quiet, refurbished 300 year old structure located 2 short blocks from the Danube, near restaurants and a concert hall where we attended a folklore evening, 2 1/2 short blocks to a transportation hub where you could catch trams, busses, underground and HEV railroad trains. Our room was spacious with a 10' ceiling and lots of storage space. One day we took the train to the small picturesque town of Szentendre on the Danube Bend section of the river --definitely worthwhile.

If we were to do this over, we would do it in the Budapest to Amsterdam direction because our last three stops were at three capital cities and were much more hectic than the rest of the stops. Doing these first would allow us to relax during the more liesurely pace of the rest of the trip. Overall, the pace of the trip was good and the sights fascinating. It was well worth taking and we enjoyed it immensely.

Hope this helps people contemplating this cruise.

[Guest]

Thanks for the report.

Debbie