As a student of viticulture, this cruise took me from one wine region to another with guided tours of wineries with several wine varietals. We even had a guest wine make on board who brought his own wines for us to taste. The beauty of our stops were magnificent. The highlight of the cruise was coming across an unplanned event, a Wine Festival in the beautiful town of Cochem Germany. We had the chance to watch the parade as we climbed the hill to the local castle with our guide who was a retired policeman and knew all of the short cuts.

The wineries chosen to tour usually had the owner of the winery as our guide which allowed us to ask questions about how, when and aging of each of the varietals we had the honor of tasting.

On board the ship, the wine poured freely, there was no reason to purchase wine in town!