This was a wonderful trip but if I was being unkind I would say the Douro river cruise is a 5 star coach trip. This was my first river cruise and while I did not expect it to mirror an ocean cruise, there were aspects that would have made me reconsider booking had I known about them in advance. That being said it was a fantastic holiday and I am glad I went. The cabins, facilities, food and staff were all outstanding. The staff really do pamper you and cannot do enough for you. However, the daily schedule is quite intensive with early starts and the lack of opportunity for spontaneity will feel too organised for those that like to do their own thing. For example, breakfast finished at 9am. The ports of call were mostly very small places and were just a base for the ship - Pocinho was just a pier and a car park. If you wanted to see anything of interest the daily excursions by coach were the only option and were very well organised with excellent guides. After a couple of days of this I decided to just relax on the ship to avoid excursion burnout and get a lie in. I would have liked to just walk around each port by myself but there wasn't much to see. I would travel with Scenic again and would be interested to see if other itineraries are more suited to my preferred independent style of travel. Overall the value for money was excellent as our package included private car to/from UK airport, coach transfers to/from ship, all excursions and all food/drink. It was difficult to find anything to spend our money on!