Here We GO

And we're off to sail the rivers of Europe! 

 But first - a tasty Father's Day Sunday Brunch sendoff with Abbey and Whitsun at the Autumn.  Then on to Weymouth, for Father's Day again and a sort of early birthday for Gwen.  We got Randall a hat, but Gwen liked it a lot too.

A nice visit, and then the next day, we took off for the Logan Express at Framingham (Randall and Lily would be away when we got back, so leaving our car at their house wouldn't work).  First stop - a fast charger in Braintree for our EV, so we could leave it in the parking garage fully charged.  When we got there, all four chargers were out of service.  Good start to the trip!  But the other person who pulled up to charge knew of another one nearby; that one worked and we were on our way.

Of course, it wouldn't be a true adventure without one more problem.  Logan Express was not where the GPS said it was.  Long story short - the LE parking structure was being rebuilt, and it was operating out of a nearby parking structure.  We followed an LE bus to the right place, found our way to the fourth floor, where the LE parking was.  Unloaded our luggage (except for one crucial item...), and buttoned up the car for two and a half weeks.

There was an elevator, thankfully (especially thankful for the return trip), and we went down, got our round-trip tickets, and got right on the bus.  

I don't remember much about the airport or the flight; another miserable experience during which I swore I'd never travel again.  Then it was the next day, we were in Amsterdam, our red-shirted Viking guide was right there, we took a relatively short SUV ride with a couple from Pittsburg, and there we were, let out right at the gangplank.  We were ready to go.

Rivers are my favorite bodies of water.  They travel, but are rooted to the shore.  You can travel with them, never seeing the same thing twice.  They're alive in ways that lakes and even the ocean are not.  They travel through history, both making it and observing it.  They live in both time and space.  They can take you away.

We're embarking on a fifteen-day journey from Amsterdam to Budapest, on the rivers Rhine, Main and Danube, and some other bodies of water here and there.  There will be dams and canals, hills, mountains, windmills, castles, and medieval towns galore.  We'll be on a ship that is impossibly long and narrow, and somehow meets the needs of a hundred and eighty one passengers.  We'll dive into history and gape at the scenery.  

We've been on what seem to be called “ocean cruises,” of course, but this will be very different – a much more intimate experience.  Traveling through the United States on a train, you see lots of backyards, depots, industry and warehouses.  That's how we interact with the railroad.  This will be more like the Erie Canal, where towns have grown up facing the commerce and transport provided by the waterway.  I expect to see towns that are unimaginably old, and for all that time have been intimately and firmly connected to the river – towns that tell the story by the way they are built, organized and oriented.  Towns whose stories are ancient and fascinating, and inextricably entwined with the river's story.

So – here we go... from the sublime to the ridiculous.  And, eventually, back to the sublime. 

Here's our itinerary (as always, click to embiggen):

Tuesday, June 17

I'm not going to detail anything regarding the first twenty-four hours, except to say that flying sucks, beginning to end.  That's it.  From leaving Randall's house to the moment we hit the bed in the boat (not the first time we hit the bed – they had sent us to the wrong room and they had to move us), it was unpleasant.  But the plane trip was smooth – no turbulence at all – so there's that.

We finally crashed in the right room in the early afternoon and set the alarm for 3:30 local time (six hour difference; it was 9:30 am in NY), got up and ran off the ship to join a group that was doing a walking tour to Amsterdam.  Not of Amsterdam, because after about a mile of walking along the waterfront, from the ship to the Amsterdam Central Station, the tour was done. That's where Amsterdam begins – the front of the Central Station; you can stand there and see much of the city in a broad panorama.  We could have wandered, which is what we like to do, but we had done that during the last trip here, and anyway it was a mile back to the ship and we didn't know if we were actually still alive.  The walk back was more leisurely, and we enjoyed the architecture – Baroque-looking confections towered over by blocky brutalist towers.  Once again, we marveled at the bicycle infrastructure; dedicated two-way bike lanes paralleled every major road and were often more crowded.  We saw bikes, trikes, e-bikes, mopeds, bikes with boxes for delivery, bikes with big baskets for almost anything.  

The sun goes down here after 10:00.  We were sitting on the outside roof deck last night, after 10PM, watching the sun go down between some buildings in Amsterdam.  When I figure out the wireless protocols here, I'll look up the latitude, which is probably equivalent to somewhere in Canada.  (NOTE:  I got connected to the web, and looked it up.  The Netherlands (this is the proper name for the country; “Holland” is the name of the northernmost two provinces) is about at the same latitude as northern Newfoundland – further north than anywhere in the US.  The Gulf Stream – warm water that originates in the Gulf of Mexico – flows up off the US eastern seaboard, takes a right at Greenland, and flows back down past England and Europe – retaining enough heat to warm up the climate of these northern lands).

The ship is 405 feet long, which is one and a third football fields (see a ship like ours, left).  It's only about 33 feet wide.  They are as large as they can be and still fit in waterway locks and under bridges.  There are four decks, if you include the roof deck, which provides an almost unobstructed view in every direction.  The first, or bottom, deck is where the steerage cabins are, including ours, in the back (aft) half of the ship, and I assume there are crew cabins and lots of ship's workings forward of the stairwell in the middle of the ship.  Second floor is cabins aft, and dining room (and, I assume, the kitchen) forward.  Third floor is cabins aft and a lounge forward, with the open deck in the bow.  The roof deck is pretty much flat, with a whole lot of chairs, and no sun protection except for a tarp stretched over a section of lounge chairs. This section is almost always crowded, with few others taking advantage of the full June sun. 

Our ship

First deck cabins (including us) have a small window high on the wall (those tiny little double windows at the water line (above).  The floor of our cabin is below water level; this is evident if you look out the window..  Second and third floor cabins have balconies.  We laid up for a short while to pick up those who had done an optional shore trip, and we were right next to another Viking ship on which only the third floor cabins had balconies.  So if you're planning a trip, and balconies are important or not important, make sure you know the offerings on the ship you're considering.

As has been the case in the past, I hope to keep complaints to a minimum in this journal.  Complaining is not its purpose.  Just a couple here to set the context and describe the experience.

First, the room:  probably the smallest room I've lived in since I spent a half-dozen or so summers working at a Scout camp and living in a 9'x9' tent.  The room is about the size of the bed.  The bathroom, minus the shower, is maybe a tiny bit bigger than the bathroom on the airplane.  We're in steerage, as usual – the cheapest rooms – but I think the better rooms are the same size, but have balconies.  I'm assuming we'll spend no non-sleeping time in the room, which is fine.  [NOTE:  Just took a shower.  Great shower in all ways but size – and that's fine if you don't mind keeping your elbows pinned to your sides]

Second, dinner.  One seating, which is 7:00, which is much too late to sit down to dinner.  By the time you've ordered and the food comes, it's 7:30 or later.  Something we'll have to get used to; we have no choice.

Actually there's two things about dinner.  The ship has one restaurant, and everyone eats there at the same time.  It's big enough to hold the 181 passengers, but only just, and the ceiling is very low (compared with the two-storied spaces in the ocean cruise ships).  So the noise is considerable, meaning I can't hear what you're saying if you're more than two feet from me.

And so there's actually three things about dinner.  The third is:  the smallest tables are set for six, which means that not once during our trip will Abbey and I be able to enjoy a dinner alone together.  And, more to the point, I will always be required to socialize successfully with total strangers, in an environment where I can't hear much of what they say and where I have to shout to be heard.

So – dinner last night was exhausting.  I was drained when it was over.  We sat with some pleasant and interesting people, but the experience in general was very stressful and unpleasant.  There is an alternative, which would eliminate the noise issue:  at the very prow of the ship is a small deck containing a half-dozen or so tables;  dinner is served there, as well.  It's outdoors, so there's that, but we'll try it tonight and report back.  I'm assuming it's going to be popular, so we'll get there early – and with a 7:00 dinner, early will be easy.

By the way, dinner was excellent.  Lots of choices, including local and regional dishes (which is what we had), and everything was good.  Wine is served at dinner; I'm finding that red wine adds a robust taste to a meal, without clashing with it.  I suppose that's the whole point; I'm coming to it a little late.