In April we cruised the Danube River celebrating our 47th wedding anniversary. We embarked in Passau, Germany. Along the Danube we visited Linz, Austria, where the Danube was Blue. We walked the Market Hall, the Mozarthaus, the Renaissance Landhaus tower and Hauptplatz, the city’s main square and New Cathedral. In Krems, Austria we visited the splendid Benedictine Abbey of Gottweig. We saw the Imperial Staircase, crowned by one of the largest and most spectacular ceiling frescoes in the world. The monastery overlooks the Wachau Valley and Danube River and ended with a wine tasting in the cellar. In Vienna, we marveled at the magnificent architecture, Hofburg Palace and admired the great, Gothic St. Stephen’s Cathedral. By happenstance we saw the Lipizzaner Stallions prancing in the street heading to their show palace. In the evening we participated in a high-spirited Austrian tradition to mark the bottling of the season’s vintage wine at a local vineyard and toasted the wine with friends and toe-tapping traditional live music. Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia you could see how the Nazi occupation left its marks on the city. It was Good Friday and visited a baroque Holy Savior Jesuit Church and the Gothic St. Martin’s Cathedral. Our final stop was Budapest. We were greeted at night with bright light of the cities, Buda and Pest and the beautiful Chain Bridge connecting the two. Pest is modern with monuments and statues and Buda is restoring the Castle District with a massive hilltop castle complex. We enjoyed fantastic views of the famous Chain Bridge from the heights of Buda Hill. I can’t say enough about the beautiful architectures, cultural experience, cathedrals, extraordinary food, and camaraderie. We will cruise with Viking again.