After 40 ocean cruises I was looking forward to this experience. We spent several days precruise after flying from Los Angeles. We packed light for us but had to check our luggage anyway on Delta. We began in Brussels, went to Bruges and Ghent and then to Amsterdam for another 2 nights in a hotel before embarking. We covered all the major sights and then some. We embarked at 3pm as suggested and went right to our cabin to unpack. We had cabin D105 downstairs (very narrow stairway). The room was quite nice with a large comfortable bed, good closet area, 2 chairs, shower with a rainshower, a TV with movies and a computer which worked best when in port.

At dinner we met some people from California whom we ate with several more times. Dinner was a menu but breakfast and lunch were buffets. We made a reservation for the Chefs Table which I recommend you do right away as large groups traveling together had reserved for several nights. The meals were pretty good, some very good, could have had a better lunch selection. We enjoyed the CD, Peter Whitehead. He had a great sense of humor and was very knowledgeable. The ship itself was beautiful, we enjoyed dunking in the shallow pool on 2 occasions, there was lots of room on the deck during sailing periods, the lounge was lovely. Included wine was just okay and the bar service was spotty.

We had a busy itinerary with very good guides. However there were times we were far from the sights and had to walk long distances just to get on the buses. The entertainment was weak at best. The castles were just a 1/2 day of sailing but we had pretty great weather until Basel. We got off there to catch a plane to Berlin. Not sure I would do another river cruise as I found it to be very expensive and exhausting. Pack for every weather. I had 4 pairs of pants, 2 capri types and 1 shorts with as many tops as I could squeeze in and 3 pairs of shoes. I had a Scottevest, light coverup, a sweater and a packable puffy warm jacket and a scarf. I wanted to burn my clothes about halfway through. We washed stuff out constantly.