{"id":792,"date":"2013-06-29T15:55:33","date_gmt":"2013-06-29T19:55:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/?page_id=792"},"modified":"2014-10-25T11:52:02","modified_gmt":"2014-10-25T15:52:02","slug":"rhine-moselle-cruise-2012","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/rhine-moselle-cruise-2012\/","title":{"rendered":"Rhine & Moselle Cruise 2012"},"content":{"rendered":"

Greetings All, \u00a0Well, we’ve taken another trip. \u00a0This time we traveled with Vantage Travel on the trip they call “Switzerland & The Heart Of The Rhine & Moselle” \u00a0It was a 16 day river cruise, from September 8th to the 24th 2012, with a lot of stops. \u00a0I’ve tried to capture a bit of the trip with the following pictures and narratives. \u00a0Hope you like ’em…<\/strong><\/p>\n

One note: I’m using a new web site development tool called “WordPress” so the appearance will be different from that of our previous trip reports. This Home Page is really Page 00. To navigate to another page, just return to the top and select another page.<\/strong><\/p>\n

First off, here is the map of our trip on the Rhine and Moselle Rivers. Our trip took us from Amsterdam, The Netherlands, \u00a0all the way to Basel, Switzerland.\u00a0<\/strong>We stopped at all of the destinations shown by the round symbols (We skipped the pre- and post- trips shown by the triangles).<\/strong><\/p>\n

Although, most of the time we were in Germany, we also visited Luxembourg, and a bit of France.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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We sailed a total of 662 miles on the Rhine and Moselle Rivers, passed through 26 locks (some twice going up and down the Moselle), and docked 14 times.<\/strong><\/p>\n

One note about Vantage Travel: \u00a0The trip itinery, the ship, the crew, the Program Managers, the dining service, and especially the food was First Class all the way. The word among travelers is “You pay more, but you get more.” \u00a0This is so true with Vantage Travel. There was only one extra cost “optional excursion” (This was a balloon ride for $500 apiece. 13 people signed up – not us.) Everything else was “included”. We even received cash to pay for a couple of lunches when we were not on board for that meal.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Also, we’ve taken other trips on big cruise ships where you’re an anonymous\u00a0passenger and there are huge quantities of food available almost all the time. On this Vantage ship most of the service personnel know our names and food is served in multi-courses with smaller portions of high quality “gourmet” food.<\/strong><\/p>\n

One Picture before we get started: This is Anja, our Belgian \u00a0“Orange Group” Program Manager. She was more than excellent. \u00a0She ushered our 30+ person Group around like we were a flock of ducklings. She narrated many of our bus rides with stories of local culture and geography. \u00a0She even threw in a couple of stories about her boyfriend and his reluctance to “pop the question”.<\/strong>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Here is a Page by Page, Day to Day,Town to Town “Table of Contents”:<\/strong><\/p>\n