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The market on St. Stephen's Square, also on the Pest side, specializes in crafts made by skilled local artisans. If you're after something more local, you can also hop the river to the Buda side of the city to visit the Obuda Christmas Market. Nuremberg is a tour stop on many Danube River cruises and some itineraries that include the Rhine River. Instead, tours depart from the nearest port on the Rhine-Main-Danube Canal nearby. Fares include Wi-Fi, wellness activities, daily entertainment and cultural performances, all meals, drinks at lunch and dinner plus a daily cocktail hour, excursions in each destination and access to knowledgeable guides.
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For some river cruises, the embarkation port is just that, a place to get on the ship and leave. If you arrive the day your cruise begins, you could miss out on exploring the city. On my seven-night river cruise, I visited six ports and enjoyed a half day of scenic sailing through the Wachau Valley, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Budapest, Hungary: Best European Christmas Markets for Local Eats
The cruise continues into the Netherlands at Maastricht, where you can explore the city and its Christmas market, or head to Aachen, Germany, for festive fun. Alternatively, you can visit Valkenburg's underground Christmas market, located inside a cave. The last stop of the cruise is Antwerp, Belgium, where you can enjoy a concert, a beer tasting and time to enjoy the city at your leisure. The last day in Germany is spent in Cologne, where you can visit the beautiful Christmas markets that dot the city landscape, as well as lace up some skates to glide around an open-air ice rink. The cruise ends in Amsterdam, where you can choose to visit the Rijksmuseum, the Rembrandt House Museum or the Van Gogh Museum, along with taking a scenic canal cruise through the city.
Viking River Cruises
So where are the best Christmas markets in Europe and how can you get to them on a river cruise? The best Christmas markets in Europe draw revelers by the thousand to enjoy the aroma of gingerbread and mulled wine alongside charming stalls selling traditional toys, local crafts, specialty foods and more. AmaWaterways' Gems of Southeast Europe departs on multiple dates between late November and late December in 2024 (2025 dates run mid-November to mid-December). Riverside Luxury Cruises' Christmas Atmosphere Along the Danube cruises depart in early and mid-December 2024. In Vienna, you can choose to visit one of the city's 100+ museums or visit the iconic Opera House before heading to the Christmas market for a glass of mulled wine and shopping. For those interested in wine, Krems is a must-see destination known for some of the best wines in the country.
Day 7
These shorter cruises are great if you'd like to spend a few days in Paris before stepping onto the cruise ship and sailing to three other beautiful towns. And since you're on a river cruise, you can experience multiple cities and countries while someone else does the navigation for you, and you only have to unpack once. River cruises include a lot of perks, including docking right at the edge of most of the towns you visit. This means that in many destinations, you can walk from the ship to the middle of town in mere minutes.
Be sure to get the town's specialty, a steaming bowl of moules frites (mussels with fries), for Christmas lunch. After three days of touring smaller towns, you'll return to Paris, where the Eiffel Tower is visible from the banks of the Seine. On my Viking cruise, we were told that some markets are starting to sell mass-produced goods from China.
Christmas markets are open from midmorning until between 8 and 10 p.m., but there's not enough to do at each market to fill that entire time. I usually spent about an hour at the smaller markets in places like Passau and Linz and about two to three hours at the larger markets in Vienna and Budapest. In each port, you'll want to be sure there are more activities and attractions to fill the rest of your time in port. If you're thinking about booking a Christmas market river cruise but don't know where to start, we've got you covered. Here, we've answered the most popular questions about Christmas market river cruises and shared our top tips and tricks to get the most out of the trip.
Already a classic river cruise destination, the Hungarian capital Budapest -- divided into Buda and Pest by the Danube River -- is particularly beautiful during the Christmas market season. The two largest Christmas markets take place on the Pest side, and both could double as a foodie tour of Hungary with the amount of local eats on offer. Be sure to try a sugar-coated chimney cake, a traditional Hungarian pastry, or a warm honey cookie with a glass of mulled wine. Avalon Waterways offers a more affordable way to see the Christmas markets, with cruises starting at $2,167 for six days of traveling from Budapest to Vienna. CroisiEurope cruises are also more affordable and offer closed-loop cruises where you start and end in the same destination, which is not something that most other river cruise lines offer for Christmas market cruises. After you find a few river cruises that fit your travel dates, dig into each destination and what it has to offer.
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Day six brings the cruise to Strasbourg, France, where you can tour the La Petite France District and wander through the warm glow of the Christmas market. The cruise then heads back to Germany to visit the Black Forest, where you can learn about local traditions and German winemaking. What really makes Adventures by Disney stand out is the Adventure Guides, Disney-trained leaders who are experts in each destination. Each Adventure Guide travels with the group throughout the cruise so your family really gets to know them, and they get to know you. This allows them to make personalized recommendations about activities and meals. As you walk through each town they share the history, culture and legends of the destination.
Evenings brought out the more elevated fashion; women donned cute sweaters and dresses, while men dressed in jeans and nicer tops or sweaters. Each year the town of Gengenbach, near Strasbourg, turns its town hall into a giant advent calendar. Twenty-four windows are decorated with a Christmas scene, with a new one revealed each night until Christmas Eve. Excursions to Gengenbach are offered on Basel to Amsterdam festive market sailings. Nearly every Danube River cruise stops in Budapest, often as a port of embarkation or disembarkation.
7 Cruise Lines Offering Festive Christmas Cruises in 2023 - Travel + Leisure
7 Cruise Lines Offering Festive Christmas Cruises in 2023.
Posted: Wed, 15 Nov 2023 08:00:00 GMT [source]
Gratuity is not included for hotel stays and meals during the land portion of your trip. All your meals, one excursion per destination, gratuities, Wi-Fi, butler service and transfers are also included in your cruise fare. Alcoholic drinks are only included with the Premium All-Inclusive Package, which can be selected at booking. If you're looking for a short sailing to tack onto the beginning or end of a trip, Riverside Luxury Cruises offers four-night Danube River sailings that start in Vienna, Austria, and end in Passau, Germany. The majority of the trip is spent in Austria, with port days in Vienna, Krems, Melk and Linz before a final day in Passau.
Many of the best river cruise brands and guided group tour companies offer Christmas markets river cruises throughout Europe. On my Viking river cruise, each day's included tour was a walking tour of the city to point out historic landmarks and show people how to get to the Christmas markets. Always try to arrive at least a day early for any river cruise, especially if you're flying overseas.
Popular souvenirs include Alsatian beer steins or plush white storks -- a local symbol of good luck. The city is famous for Schuco tin cars and Fleishmann train sets, and its holiday market is a great place to find nostalgic toys. Nuremberg's other claim to fame is its pork sausages -- much smaller than typical German sausages or wurst -- which are sold in portions of six to a dozen. In Budapest, you'll spend two days exploring the city at places like Castle Hill and the Grand Market Hall before shopping and dining at the Christmas market in front of St. Stephen's Basilica. Then in Bratislava, Slovakia, the group will attend an organ concert and shopping at the Old Town Christmas market.
Day four brings the group to Mannheim, Germany, where you can enjoy a funicular ride to Heidelberg Castle or tour the town of Baden-Baden where the Christmas market is not to be missed. Here are my favorite sweet and savory treats from each Christmas market I visited on my Viking cruise. My favorite Christmas market was the one at City Hall in Vienna, which happens to be one of the most popular in Europe.
Numerous destinations on river cruises across Europe could hold the title of best European Christmas market, from Germany to Hungary and beyond. These markets typically run from mid-November right up until Christmas, and Europe's river cruises allow you to visit several holiday markets in Europe often in the space of a week or less. In every stop on your Christmas Markets cruise along the Rhine or Danube, you'll enjoy all the magic of your destination's holiday markets, each of which has taken on a distinctive character of its own over the centuries. You'll discover those local traditions… like the hot mulled wine known as glühwein, served in collectible mugs unique to each market… that have caught on to become an indispensable part of the holiday celebration. And on our Rhine Christmas Markets cruise, you'll experience some special holiday magic on an exclusive visit to the Thurn und Taxis family's Palace of St. Emmeram in Regensburg.
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