Amsterdam to Budapest May 2019
I know this is a little early, but this is our first river cruise and our first time to Europe.
My husband and I are 60 and live in California. We are spending 2 nights before in Amsterdam and 2 nights after in Budapest. We're very interested in suggestions of places to go and things to do. We've found a cooking class in Budapest that sounds like fun and we found passes we can purchase that will allow entrance into museums, public transport, etc. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
We're also interested to find out who else is planning on going on this cruise. We're so excited and nervous and looking forward to meeting new people.
My husband and I are 60 and live in California. We are spending 2 nights before in Amsterdam and 2 nights after in Budapest. We're very interested in suggestions of places to go and things to do. We've found a cooking class in Budapest that sounds like fun and we found passes we can purchase that will allow entrance into museums, public transport, etc. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
We're also interested to find out who else is planning on going on this cruise. We're so excited and nervous and looking forward to meeting new people.
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In Amsterdam, we arrived fairly early in the day thinking we'd have 2 1/2 days to tour. In reality the first day didn't accomplish a whole lot. We got into our hotel room right away (possibly because we had alerted the hotel ahead of time). Spent the afternoon tracking down an ATM, some lunch, strolling around the streets near the hotel, like the flower market. Back to the hotel for a swim in the pool and a nap (jet lag arg!). More strolling around to see the area and find a store to replace my hairbrush that I'd forgotten, then early bed time. Lesson learned, don't over estimate how much you'll accomplish the first day.
The next day we did tour the Amsterdam History museum which was interesting. It's mostly the history of the city plus additional artwork.
One of the sights we hope to see next year is the Zaanse Schans - traditional Dutch village. According to their website, it's a 20 minute train ride from central station for about 6 euros. We also plan to see the Van Gogh Museum but possibly on the same day the tour goes to the Rikjsmuseum since they are very close together.
I highly recommend Rick Steves pocket guide to Amsterdam for your visit. It's a small, easy to carry guide with good recommendations on sites and self guided walking tours.
PS - Watch out for bicylists. They are every where, they are fast and they hate tourists wandering in the bike lanes.
And Budapest! We were there in 2016 at the beginning of our Blue Danube cruise. Don't miss "Shoes on the Danube," which Tauck doesn't cover and the big Central Market, which your tour might or might not cover. Also, go inside that amazing Parliament building.
Katharine (also from California)
The Van Gogh very easily consumed 3 hours. We would suggest buying your tickets online prior to the trip. Happy we did as the ticket lines were easily 1.5 hours on the day of our visit.
While in Budapest you will find the Dohany Street Synagogue,one of the largest in the world, is a fascinating visit. We found Budapest to be a wonderful city with exciting small restaraunts. A very nice music festival in Elizabeth Park across from our hotel, the Ritz Carlton, and lots of action in districts which were easily walkable.
We hope to see the tulips too. Looking forward to meeting you and others on the trip!
I wish we could, but this trip is already costing us more than we've ever spent and the longest we've ever been on a trip. However, I doubt it will be our last trip to Europe.
This is our first river cruise AND our first trip to Europe. I'm retired, but my husband still works and we still have a mortgage. An inheritance is paying for this trip. Once we sell the house and my husband retires I know we'll travel more and, if we enjoy this cruise, will do others.
Makes it hard to plan. If you plan on all 80's for sure you'll get some low 70s and 60s. We leave 2 weeks later than you and I plan a mix of capris/tops and but also some items that can be layered up for cooler/wetter temps. For sure an evening wrap or sweater for up on the sun deck as it's always cooler there.
Just booked our airfare this morning. For a change the Tauck price was significantly lower than what Delta was showing on their website. Nice to book my comfort plus seats but still not have to pay til next Mar.
What's the best way to find a private tour guide? Maybe we can get together for dinner before the cruise?
Thank you, I did find that link, but will definitely Google temps for May and see what they look like.
Tauck is also booking our flight, but we haven't gotten any information yet. Do I have to make the final payment first?
The only time I've had to pay up front was before Tauck could book Delta Economy Comfort directly. Then I had to pay the economy seat price, get a confirmation # then call Delta myself to upgrade. No longer necessary.
I called and spoke directly to the air department. We talked thru the options and we decided on flights and seats. Within minutes of my call they emailed me an update to my reservation summary - a PDF file which shows the addition of the airfare and tax with a revised final figure for the tour. After the first 4 pages of info (which you've probably already seen in your original tour reservation) there was be several more pages with flight details - dates, airlines, #, seat assignments, etc.
If you haven't already been emailed or snail mailed that updated reservation summary, call Tauck.
On weather - the night before the trip I also do a 10 day weather forecast to get a better idea what it looks like.
On tour guides, you can trip Viator and see what tours they have. They are a tour aggregator (work with multiple tour operators) and can have a wide variety from small group bus trips to private tours. Just double check the refund policy for the one you're interested in as they vary widely. Hotel concierges are also good sources to arrange tours.
I realized that our paperwork said Airfare by request so I called and we now have our plane booked. Thank you!!
Claudia- be careful with Delta. I mentioned this in another post, but it looks like Delta may be taking the Amazon ever-changing-price model to a new level. Using constructive dates, I track prices for a few months before the 330 day window opens then buy our tickets at the first opportunity. Delta ticket prices, for the exact same flight itinerary on the same day of the week (different dates as the 330 window moves) often vary widely, more than could be explained away by using different dates. In the month since the booking window opened and we purchased our tickets, the price for tickets on the exact same dates now and same itinerary has continued to fluctuate like it did before- from the low we paid it has gone up by as much as $2000 to $3000 per person for business Class, before going back down for a few days!!! (and then back up)!! I booked on 10 July, and when I checked just now, the exact same flights are going for $1886 more per person and only 3 - 4 (approx) out of 36 Business Class seats have been booked! This pricing game may have been going on for awhile, but I never noticed it before.
Elizabeth, have you also taken out the Tauck insurance? I recommend it but it has to be taken out at time of booking so I hope they mentioned the option to you. It is good and better than other tour companies offer. We have never had to claim on it but I know Alan S has.
If you are unsure of anything, do not hesitate to call Tauck for clarification.
The day I called Tauck I wasn't 100% ready to book but they quoted me $1,700 each for Economy Comfort flights to Budapest and back from Amsterdam. Same moment on Delta's website it was $2000. They were also some of the best timing we've ever achieved - not leaving too early this end, enough layover time but not too much and not arriving home late at night.
Could I have done better to wait? Possibly but that seemed fairly reasonable for a May/Jun trip and the ability to pick the seats we wanted now. I suspect Business Class is where I might have seen a bigger payoff to wait. I kept hoping they'd add the new Premium Select to flights to either Amsterdam or Paris but that doesn't seem to have happened.
My only real worry now is that the flights don't change in any significant way timing wise and Danube water levels. Neither of which I have any control over.
A flight change is always a danger. Most of the changes we have had so far have had no effect- a few minutes early or late here or there. Only once did we encounter a situation where a change made it impossible to make a connection. Before calling Delta I scoped out options so I could offer an alternative itinerary and save time on the phone. As it turned out the option I selected (two totally new outbound legs) was better (timing and aircraft) than my original itinerary. Since the change was caused by their schedule modification, we didn't have to pay a change fee nor were we required to pay the difference for the more expensive flights- it was a real win-win.
One potential gotcha is that Delta does not send email alerts about changes until a few weeks before departure, so, if I didn't regularly check our reservations, things could have turned out differently. Also, if they make a plane change, you might need to re-select seats. I check our reservations every week or so and more often the closer we get to departure.
I'm actually hoping for a change to our outbound flight next year from Atlanta to Jo'burg- I want them to replace the scheduled Boeing 777-200LR with older business seats arranged in a herringbone (feet to the aisle) for one of the newly refurbished 777-200LR's with the new Delta One Suites! : ) They just finished refurbishing the first of 18 777-200LR/ER's last month and while all are supposed to be converted by the end of 2019, we fly in May 2019, so there is only a slight chance we will luck out. You would think Delta would schedule refurb planes on their longest flights first, but, so far the ATL to JNB route (their longest, almost 1000 mi. longer than 2nd place!!!) is not listed on any upgrade schedule published so far. The new Delta One Suites are also starting to show up on reconfigured and new delivery A350's. FYI, Comfort+ goes away and will be replaced by "Premium" seats on these planes.
Delta is weird about updates. Last year they sent me several email alerts of minor sked changes that had zero impact on our trip, then 2 weeks before departure didn't inform us that the flight home from SLC was canceled (and it was the last flight of the day). Thankfully, Tauck air dept did call us. By that point our choice was a reroute via Atlanta and take lousy seat assignments in economy or keep our Comfort seats to SLC and stay over night. We went with the later. The only saving grace was Delta didn't charge us a fee to make the flight change.
The only reason I can see that they didn't alert us is the flight that was canceled was a regional carrier vs an actual Delta flight.
Look at Trip Advisor. We've found some good tour guides with good recommendations.
Have you booked a hotel yet for your nights before the cruise? We are just now starting to make those types of plans.