After exploring Vienna and Budapest on our own, we boarded the River Beatrice on Saturday, July 31st. We were warmly greeted by the assistant captain (he helped with our bags!) and the concierge, upon arrival. We picked this ship because it was newer (2009) and we were quite happy with the result. What we liked about the ship: - Friendly staff. - Great Cruise Director, Gionji. - Great concierge, Tania. - Good food, especially breakfast & lunch. - Excellent guided tours. - Nice ports of call. What we found lacking: - No wine or beer for lunch. - Small portions for dinner. - No bottle water for guided tours. - No snacks (like nuts for evenings) other than cookies. - Number of and quality of bikes. Our impression of river-cruising in general: - Passengers not as old as we thought. - Interesting people - Great way to see Europe. - Need more things to do at night. - Longer stay at major ports like Vienna.Vienna was our favourite city, and we're glad that we spend an extra three days there. High lights were our trip to the wine district and the evning concert with Uniworld. Salzburg was also nice but very crowded. Great shopping. All in all, we enjoyed our stay at the River Beatrice and may return to river cruising if the itinerary is right.