Viking Jarl Review
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I must preface this review with the fact that this was my first river cruise. I have taken several ocean cruises, and therefore; my review will be somewhat biased because of the comparisons. My husband and I decided to take this type of cruise because we had heard many good things about cruising on a small ship on the river. It seemed that it would be a unique experience and an intimate way to explore Europe.
We were required to pay in full almost a year prior to our sailing date. After many months, information from the Viking office began to be received via e-mail. We were traveling with two other couples. We all wanted to extend our trip in Prague and continued to wait for information to arrive regarding booking that extension. By the time anything was published, the Prague extension was completely booked and our only option was Berlin. We were the only six people to extend in Berlin. We made several phone calls to Viking regarding excursions and were assured that a Viking representative would be at our disposal during our extra days once we arrived. That was not true. On the last day of our extension a representative finally appeared, totally unprepared. He had no transportation arranged for us to get to our destination so walked for hours in the rain and cold before we arrived at the destination. He bought our entrance tickets, told us how to catch a public bus back to the hotel (which was incorrect), and said good-bye. We paid a good amount of money for this extension and were disappointed at the disorganization on Viking's end of things. Our hotel was nice and had an amazing breakfast, but our money was not well spent. The actual Viking guide came in on the day that all the other Viking guests arrived. The icing on the cake was later on the ship while talking with other passengers, we discovered that those who booked full balcony cabins were offered the extensions when they initially booked the cruise. The six of us had only booked French balcony cabins. It makes a difference.
When the confirmation information finally began arriving regarding our travel arrangements, the two other couples were ticketed immediately and were able to upgrade their airline seats. We tried to upgrade ours as well and were told that our tickets had not been issued so Delta could not upgrade our seats. I called Viking and inquired why our tickets had not been issued, especially since we had paid for them months in advance. All we got was that they had a wide window in which to issue the tickets and we could have a "early" issue if we wanted to pay a fee and risk huge monetary penalties if there were any changes to the tickets at all. I asked for an e-mail to be sent notifying us when the tickets were issued so we could pursue our upgraded seats for a 10 hour flight. "They said they would not do that. After weeks of continual checking the tickets were finally issued and the better upgrades were already sold.
Cabin Review
French Balcony
The cabin in our "french" balcony section was EXTREMELY small. I know they have only a limited amount of space to work with, but if you are at all claustrophobic, I wouldn't recommend this type of cruising. I was very thankful we had the balcony door to open for the fresh air. Although it was just a sliding door with no access to an actual balcony, it did make the cabin seem a little less constricting.
Port Reviews
Nuremberg
We discoverd Nuremberg via the included motor coach tour. As with the other larger cities we visited, there was construction everywhere. It was an interesting mix of the old and the new. The guide did a good job of relaying the histroy of the city, particularly regarding WWII. I am thankful to have been able to see for myself where history was made. It brought a deep sadness realizing, up close, the ugliness of it all.
Regensburg
We stopped at a small village during our motor coach ride. There we saw a brief movie depicting the story of this small village. The Wall was not only errected in Berlin, but throughout Europe dividing east from west. There is still a section of the wall standing in this small village. Families were separated for many years and unable to see on another even though only the wall stood as the barrier. Very poignant. Visitng Wittenberg was like stepping into a history book. We had a city tour and actually went into the church where Martin Luther is buried and he posted his 95 theses. We also toured his home where he and his family lived and he taught many students. It wa magical. We were given free time to eat lunch and explore. Unfortunalely, the free time was only long enough to do one or the other. We attempted to have lunch in two different German restaurants and very rudely told NO, they were full. Ironically, we finally had a very good lunch in an Italian restaurant.
Durnstein (Krems)
We took the included walking tour in Krems. The guide was informative and we were able to explore the exterior of an amazing castle. The tour ended in a very large town square. It was a holiday and many of the shops were closed, but we took advantage of visiting a little cafe where I had the best apple struedel I have ever tasted. We were able to enrter the large church that crowned the square and see the annimated clock work on the outside of the church steeple before we left. Loved it.