The water level in the Danube is low, so we expected we might have have to switch ships midway along. We called Viking a few days before our trip, and Viking claimed there was as yet no determination. Well when we arrived on the boat, they had determined we would change boats, just as they had the previous 2, and just as they have already determined they will on the next 2 trips. I think they were less than candid with me.

Given that we have no choice, I was prepared to tolerate the inconvenience of a ship change, but I was not at all prepared for the other inconveniences Viking visited upon us. To accomplish the ship change, we lost a whole day of our itinerary and spent 7 hours either riding on a bus, and waiting 2 hours at a restop beside the autobahn. The day before, we spent amost 3 hours bussing back and forth to Passau instead of docking there as scheduled. We bussed into Neurumburg, so 2 more hours on the bus.

Because of the ship change, we missed our day in Krems, our scenic cruise through the Wachau Valley was mostly after dark, and we missed our overnight in Vienna. Read more