We have never been on a cruise before, but had been in Budapest in the late 1980's. We were glad we went a day early and found a lovely hotel on our own. Budapest is very accessible, and if we had not gone early we would not have had the opportunity to visit the huge city market (closed on Sunday) or to visit the Castle Hill district. I was able to make hotel and dinner reservations from home via internet. Viking did charge us a surcharge to travel on the day before the normal travel date.

As for the cruise itself, we loved it. The crew was fantastic, and the tours were mostly well worth it. The only city I would have done differently was Vienna. Taking a bus tour on a weekday was a mistake. We would have seen much more if we had simply taken a guide book and taken the metro into town. Our guide for the afternoon tour was really wonderful, but we were there during the busy tourist season, and the guards at Shonbrunn Castle were trying to rush our large group. We would have done better to go on our own with the audio guide available at the castle. Then we might have also have had time to see more sights in Vienna. The evening musical concert, however, was well worth it! The performers were excellent. The other tours were all very worth doing. We also did the post trip extension in Prague, and that, too was fantastic. We stayed an the beautiful Art Nouveau Hotel which was in walking distance of all the old city. The waking city tour was excellent, but I would have skipped the "exclusive" tour of Lobkowiczký palác. The concert wasn't really worth it, lunch was mediocre at best, and we were on our own with an excellent audio guide for the palace tour. Had we gone on our own we would have had more time to explore St Vitus's cathedral as well as the other sights there.