Along the Danube - Four Country Tour Tour Reviews — 61 to 90 of 560

The trip was exactly as promised and more. The chosen bike routes were very scenic, appropriate distances and gave us a great flavour of Austria, Slovakia and Hungary. The bikes were good quality and in excellent shape - top marks. The food was outstanding! Lots of food choices, special menus to highlight local foods and top quality ingredients. The Primadonna is a gorgeous boat, and our room was just as lovely as the advertising showed. One special highlight was using the boat to do a night tour of Budapest - the most beautiful city I have ever seen.

Most people on the trip were German, with a mixture of Dutch, French. There were only a few Americans and Canadians. The boat staff were mostly Serbian. That meant that there were inevitable language issues. For example, we paid 100 Euros to do a night bus tour of Vienna in English. But some German, Duthc and French travellers ended up on the bus too, so our tour guide ended up having to repeat all tour instructions in 4 languages, which was frustrating and inefficient. In the same vein, every evening we had briefings on the following days cycling trip. Our Serbian hotel manager did his best, but the information was often confusing, and the maps provided by Danau Tours were pretty average. This led to a number of wrong turns and navigation mix ups over the week.

In North America, we are used to having water provided free of charge when dining. So it felt cheap that we were asked to pay 7 Euros for a bottle of water at meals. Considering the cost of the trip, that didn't sit right. To be fair, we traveled around Europe after the trip, and we never encountered free water in restaurants, so it appears that is a European norm.

Lastly, although it is called a 4-country tour, you only cycle in 3 countries: Austria, Slovakia and Hungary. The only time you set foot in Germany is in Passau at the start and end of the week. So if you want to tour Germany, plan in time before or after the trip.

Budapest was the best city we visited during this tour. The room and food were great. The staff on the boat were very helpful and nice. The only thing I would recommend would be better bike route maps. The ones they give during the nightly presentation are not very accurate or detailed.

We had such a great time on our trip & thank Leslie for his leadership & organization to make it fantastic! We had a junior suite as we booked early & it was perfect! The food was very good, the ship very clean and all the staff were friendly & helpful.

The only 2 suggestions would be:
1 - the bike app needs to be upgraded or tweeked as people were having trouble downloading & our phones were dying to quick using the app. Also, everyone should get one for free.

2- please put water bottle holders on the bikes! I drink a lot of water & find it hard to put in blue holder & the water kept leaking (on my phone!)
Also, a nice touch would be souvenir water bottles from the boat owners :)

All in all, a super trip! Thank you

The biking! Be prepared for a quick visit to Budapest and Vienna. More time is needed at these stunning world class cities!

Replace tour director “Leslie” he talked to everyone as if they’re children

The actual trip was quite enjoyable. The boat was nice and the accommodations were good weight staff and food were excellent. I would not travel with this company again just because they are totally unequipped to handle a bike accident. I only received help by luck.

Experiencing the sights while riding a bike is magical. Forest, farms, charming small towns, stunning cities, and castles galore. Loved meeting new people. Loved being on the water and enjoying the scenery gliding by. And the food, wow!

The night cruise around the city of Budapest with everything lit up was glorious.

Our tours in Budapest on the bus was with an exceptional tour leader. She brought the city alive with all the history and beautiful locations we visited. Very passionate about her city. The walking tour in Bratislava was Wonderful. Daca gave a well thought out tour of the city center-absolutely the best.
Our biggest issue was the language, even when bike tours were explained in English we did not always understand certain words.

Our waiter Uros, gave us exemplary service. Very professional, friendly, helpful. Always looking out for us
All crew members were top notch

Being able to see the country side at a leisurely pace with our friends. Stopped to visit the goats and trail side coffee shops. One of the most memorable of any of our trips was the boat leaving Budapest at night. A sight we will never forget. Food on board was very good and service was great. The only issue we had was we were a large group of 18 that sat at 3 tables and we were asked to not change places but we missed out visiting with our other friends. We liked it so much we came home and booked another trip with Tripsite

The crew was extremely helpful and always available to help.

Fantastic active vacation with beautiful rides. Incredible delicious and healthy food. Fun activities on board and options for additional tours were good. Highly recommended.

The ride along the Danube was spectacular! Especially the last day from Krems to Pöchlarn. Some of us opted to go for city bike tours in Budapest and Vienna. I found Vienna to be especially crowded and wouldn't do that ride again. Nevertheless, our guide was very knowledgeable and interesting.

The beautiful scenes while biking along the Danube. We would of liked to have a longer trip in order to spend more time in the cities.

The beauty of the old towns, villages and cities we rode and cruised through was breathtaking. The fact that two weeks prior to our arrival the Danube flooded most of our routes and was already cleared was inspiring. The accommodations on the Vivienne were excellent and we were very well fed! The crew were excellent and very accommodating to our needs. The bikes met our needs and beyond (they survived riding through mud and flood waters).

The biking was scenic and beautiful. The best biking was in Budapest and then in Austria on the last day. It was an experience I will never forget.

While some of the routes were challenging at times because they weren’t marked well, the biking part of the trip was phenomenal.
The ship food was excellent!

The entry into Budapest with the sun setting on the Parliament building was a once in a lifetime experience.

We did a bike/barge tour several years ago in the Netherlands on a small 20 guest boat so we weren’t sure what to expect on a larger ship. We loved the ship and the larger group wasn’t a problem. We had some special dietary needs which the crew handled seamlessly. Our room was pleasant and comfortable. The crew had our bikes ready to go in the morning and reloaded on the ship after we completed out ride. The rides were beautiful. We enjoying cycling through villages, natural areas and the wine region. A lovely special trip!

Great trip! Despite flooding on the Danube that did not allow us to dock at some locations, we got to all advertised locations. The bike ride through the Austrian vineyards was absolutely stunning!

The bike rides and the night view of Budapest.

Please improve the GPS file for the last day of biking as the end doesn’t agree with the new ending at Marbach from Melk. We used the Danube river crossing at the power plant and damn from Melk to Marbach at Wehr Melk Damn.

Unfortunately, we did not travel far because of flooding although our cruise director tried to give us new options. The one thing you should do is maintain the bikes better. The chains were rusted and the tires very low. Some of the gears did not work. The food was fantastic.

Ended up being a Two-Country Tour due to high Danube water levels. It got a bit chaotic at times trying to understand where we were headed, when/where we would be riding, etc. While I think the onboard crew did a decent job of trying to adapt to the situation, I think boat operator should have had better contingency plans in place before ever leaving port. Watching/reading news reports the day the boat left Passau, water conditions were not unknown and it was predictable that the boat wouldn't make it to Budapest.

The bike rides we did get in were beautiful and the Danube area is definitely worth seeing. We were fortunate that most of the bike paths that had been affected by the flooding had been cleared and so only a few routes were detoured due to silt/debris on path. The bus rides we took to see a couple of the destinations we couldn't reach by water were longer than the time at the destination, but the time at the destinations was enjoyable.

Since we had anticipated it being the highlight of our trip, I wish we had made it to Budapest!!

The best part of the trip was seeing the different towns with their beautiful historic buildings. Unfortunately because of the prior week's rains which caused high water along the river, we weren't able to visit Budapest.

The lack of communication on the lack of planning for weather. There should have been plans in place for us to visit all 4 countries that we paid for, or compensation for missing Budapest.

The scenery was beautiful, very memorable. The staff was excellent, accommodating and professional. Thank you for that. The e-bikes were great, and definately made riding fun. Unfortunately, due to flooding on the Danube, we did not get to experience important parts of the trip. The staff did their best to make up for this, but we did miss out on anticipated stops and excursions.

Unfortunately, flooding on the Danube prevented our trip from proceeding past Vienna. Having said that our group still had a good time together. The staff was accommodating and we appreciated all their efforts during an unexpected trip. Communication regarding trip changes, transportation and day-to-day activities could have been much better. Our tour guide was lacking some finesse in these areas.

The Vivienne is a superb boat with comfortable rooms, excellent meals, amazing staff - from Captain Igor to hotel manager Margot to program director Leslie to restaurant manager Najeh to our wonderful server Nidhal and all the crew who carried bikes, took care of rooms, reception, bar and the like. Everything ran so smoothly. Party events were memorable and fun. The Danube cycling beautiful, as were the cities and towns we visited with so many historic sites. We would recommend this trip and this boat to everyone!

Rating this tour is challenging in a way due the the fact we were there during the worst weather condition's in that part of Europe in years. The Danube rising at unprecedented levels along with flooding. I'm sure you are well aware of all of this. The Vivienne crew and Leslie the tour director did an amazing job of keeping all of us on board safe and making every attempt to help us to continue to have the best possible experience we could given the horrendous conditions.
While we missed out on a lot of cycling and seeing and experiencing this part of Europe, we were very fortunate to be able to do what we could, given the conditions.
Again, Chapeau to Leslie and the crew of the Vivienne!

Budapest and Vienna were fabulous cities to see. I would suggest that more info, printed the day before on bike routes be given out to everyone. The info meetings were hard to get all of the details and minimal route information changes. Also, bike routes for each day should be based on temperature and wind direction with advisories about how much water to bring along, where to get more. The bike route that was suggested for Bratislava was terrible: prior information on the 30 mph wind gusts that we headed back towards the boat in and 90 degree temperatures made the trip difficult and dangerous: my husband almost suffered from heat stroke and we could not find any place on route to get water after making the return after the bridge crossing.

The most memorable part of the trip was leaving Budapest after dark and floating past the lighted buildings and monuments along the Danube. The biking along the River was beautiful and diverse; wine country from Krems to Marbach was very pretty. Most of the routes were along bike paths though some intermittently were on rural roads and through the cities of Vienna and Budapest. Some days biking were very warm, but there were a couple of cold days with temperatures less than 10 degrees C. Its a good idea to come prepared for cool and rainy days both biking and sightseeing; layers with a hooded raincoat was essential. My wife and I are fit bikers riding often in the Colorado mountains, but opted for eBikes on the boat cruise. No regrets on this decision, we road with minimal eAssistance most of the time, but when the winds, and sometimes rain, came up on long rides, or we wanted to catch sites off the main route we had the ability to extend our rides and still make the timing to meet the boat at the next city.