Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2025 Alaska Revisited Edition – Day 4 (July 24): On Our Way To Denali

Where We Take Our Time Getting To Denali National Park, But Finally Actually Do Get There

And As Is Tradition – A Bathroom Situation

Our local guide, Jade, has mentioned several times that there are only two seasons in Alaska: Winter and Construction.

With that in mind, we left a little earlier than the day before to allow for random construction traffic. And indeed, we were stuck in construction traffic a couple of times.

The scenery was very dramatic along the way:

We had one stop before arriving in Denali – in Nenana, AK.

If you are new to my blog, there is always at least one incident during any given adventure when the bathroom break becomes an issue. And so….

It was only going to be for 10 minutes and then we’d have our promised bathroom break, but it turned out to be a whole presentation on the Nenana Ice Classic. Mind you, we had been on the road for a good couple of hours up until this point.

The Nenana Ice Classic is apparently something that Alaskans do in late winter to entertain themselves. This event has been an annual event for 100 years. Each year people from all over Alaska buy (basically) raffle tickets for a pool to guess when the ice will break completely and the river flows freely in the spring. Proceeds from this event go to assorted charities for the disadvantaged in Alaska.

Everything about this event is “old school” – printed raffle tickets, manual tracking of all the purchased tickets, manual notification to the winner, etc. – including using a 30 year old computer system.

The “tripod” is that black and white structure on the left.

The “tripod” (which is not a tripod, because it has 5 legs, but whatever) is secured into the river ice sometime in March. The tripod is connected (via rope? wire? string?) to two clocks (the primary and the backup).

As the ice thaws and the tripod begins drift, it tugs on the string. When the tripod pulls so hard on the string that the string breaks – the clock stops documenting the exact time the river is flowing freely. The winner is determined as to who had the closest time (on either side). The earliest recorded date was April 19 and the latest was May 30. The most common dates were the middle two weeks of May.

We bought two tickets for $3.00 each. I picked 05/05/2026 at 5:00 a.m.

Now it was well past the promised 10 minutes. There was an exodus towards the old train depo for the bathrooms. By the time I got there, the line for the ladie’s room was very long. Since each bathroom was single occupancy, and the men had long since cycled through their turn, at some point the women took over the men’s room to speed things up.

We continued on to lunch, and then on to Denali National Park.

More views from along the way. It just doesn’t get old.

Our motley crew. Our local guide, Jade, is on the far left with the lollipop. Our American Cruise Line rep (Andrew) is the last person on the right in the very back row

We stopped at the visitor center (I still call them ranger stations), where we got our national park passports stamped, and we watched two movies. The first one was just music showing pretty scenes of the park. What a good nap.

The second one was about the National Park dog teams – that was much more interesting. We managed to stay awake for the whole thing.

We were dropped off at our room at the Denali Bluffs lodge, just long enough to drop off stuff and get back on the bus to go to dinner, which was at a dinner theater called The Alaska Cabin Nite Dinner Theater. It was a lot of fun!

Tomorrow: Our 5 1/2 hour drive through Denali National Park.

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2025 – Alaska Revisited Edition: End of Day 2 + Day 3 (July 22 and 23)

Where We Start To Notice The Pattern Of Grizzlies On Display And We Get To See The “Sheldon Car”

Part 2 of Day 2

Yesterday’s lunch was literally nothing to write home about, but after lunch we wandered along the street and stumbled across the “2nd Street Gallery”: a mini mall with interesting shops and self-announced “musher museum”.

As is tradition, we couldn’t resist buying some art from a local artist – possibly these items will become trivets, though we’ll just figure that out when we get home.

We took the lift up to the second floor for the Musher’s Museum – except the museum was up another 7 steps that I declined to climb.

Andy went up and saw a couple of interesting things:

If you can read the sign that describes what this is, you’ve got sharp eyes

On the way out, I felt obligated to take this photo:

Hopefully not the only moose we see. Be great to see one that’s alive.

Unfortunately, Andy didn’t have his music with him, or he could have shown off his skills.

Also in this mini-mall was a Romanian/Moldovan restaurant. Considering out lunch experience was less than stellar, we decided to come back later to have dinner there.

At 3:00, we joined some of the people on our tour in the lobby for a meet and greet with our local tour guide, Jade, and the American Cruise Line representative, Andrew. They handed out our packets with info for the coming days, and explained how things will work for the next week. The goal is to replicate the ship environment while on land – after today, all our meals would be taken care of (a question we had). Everything sounded promising!

Around 6:00, we walked back across the street for dinner at the Romanian/Moldovan restuarant. Andy ordered a traditional Moldovan dish called Mamaliga and I had a beef rib with potatoes, carrots and pickles. They were both excellent and made up for the lackluster lunch.

Day 3

Today was “Getting To Know Fairbanks” day. Our original concerns about being shown the local Home Depot and McDonald’s blessedly did not happen (though apparently Fairbanks’ Home Depot and McDonald’s are the most northern in the US).

First we went to the Museum of the North, which had excellent exhibits of Alaska’s history, going back to pre-historic times.

This is Otto, the second display of a brown/grizzly bear.

This is a settee made of dall sheep horn, caribou antler, and fake leather. I’m not sure if this looks comfortable or not. I’d be concerned about being poked by an antler.

Upstairs was an art gallery. One piece was a highly entertaining outhouse.

No guarantee of privacy even with the door closed.

We also watched an interesting 30 minute video on the Aurora Borealis. Apparently the Aurora season doesn’t start until mid-August when there’s enough actual darkness to see it.

Our next stop was lunch. Jade (our local guide) kept saying that they were taking us to the best restaurants that Fairbanks had to offer in an attempt to duplicate the ship experience, but somehow I got the impression that maybe this restaurant might not live up to that standard.

Andy enjoyed his roast beef dip sandwich, but my garden salad with chicken was fairly tasteless. The chocolate mousse pie was fabulous, though.

Next up was a close up and personal visit with the Alaska pipeline. This originally didn’t sound particularly interesting, but it turned out to be more impressive than I thought it would.

Apparently this is the traditional pose, akin to holding up the Tower of Pisa:

This section of the pipeline is above ground to avoid melting the permafrost.

This flower is called a fireweed. It has all of a two week season in the Alaskan summer, and we lucked out to be able to see it.

One more stop before heading back to the hotel was an antique car museum. Once again, it was more interesting than we thought it would be. All but 3 of the cars in the museum actually run and are driven upon occasion. All of these cars are impressive – some of the cars from the 1930s are HUGE (e.g. the Packard). My favorite car, though, was the “Sheldon Car”.

We know for a fact that we can’t possibly be related. Though we wondered whether changed his last name to Sheldon from something unusual as is the case with Andy’s dad.

A car built by Robert (Bobby) Sheldon at the turn of the 20th Century – he had never seen a car and had no idea what he was doing.

This guy was a big deal in the Alaska car community.

There was one car that people were allowed to and encouraged to climb into:

This was our last stop for the day. Dinner was at a restaurant about 15 minutes from the hotel. We both had the halibut, which was very good.

On the way back to the hotel for the night, we received our final instructions for packing up and leaving our luggage outside our door by 7:30 tomorrow morning.

Theoretically, we’ll have wifi in our Denali lodging, but as is tradition with national parks, cell service will probably be close to existent.

Tomorrow, the real adventure begins! Who knows – maybe we’ll be lucky and catch a glimpse of Denali in all its glory!

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2025: Alaska Revisited Edition – Day 1 and Some Of Day 2 (July 21/22 2025)

Where We Mostly Sat At Airports Or On Airplanes For 22 Hours

As is tradition, the first day of the current tradition is endless travel. To add to the fun this time, Alaska Air experienced a major IT network outage on July 20, grounding all of their planes for 3 hours.

And it probably would have made sense to check to see the status of our first flight on July 21, but we didn’t. So we got up at 4:30 a.m. to arrive at the airport by 7:45 a.m. for our 9:00 a.m. flight, to find out that our 9:00 a.m. flight was now 11:30.

Which turned out to be 12:15 p.m. The flight itself was a bit bumpy from all the storms in the atmosphere covering the eastern half of the US. It smoothed out a bit once we were over the western US. The pilot did their best to make up some of the time – the flight was 5 hours instead of 6 hours.

Fortunately, I had booked the two flights with an intentional 5 1/2 hour layover, so the 3 hour delay had no impact on our connecting flight at SeaTAC. When we walked off the plane, the Alaska Air app said our gate was D3. We had deplaned at gate N13. So we found our way to D3 – left-right-right-left-take a train-left-right-left – where we sat for a bit until we noticed the change to the departure time and the gate: now the flight was delayed an hour and the gate was N14, literally right where we had been when we landed!

So back we went. The N gates were a complete zoo. Nary an empty seat to be found and extremely noisy. We could not hear the announcements from the gate. Which is how we missed the start boarding announcement.

The second flight was a bit smoother than the first and we landed shortly after 10:00 p.m. Alaska Time.

An airport employee called our hotel to bring its shuttle to pick us up – something that the hotel’s website nor the cruise line mentioned.

We had booked a room for one night in this hotel, because it’s the same one where the land/cruise adventure will begin. This was the view from our window:

Our view of Fairbanks, AK. Notice how bright the sky was at 11:00 p.m.

In the morning (July 22), we checked out of the room and checked back in to the room assigned to us with the group. We have zero instructions as to what we’re supposed to do to find the group. Fortunately, the front desk staff was a little familiar with this drill. They suggested checking the common area around 3:00 p.m., which apparently is the typical time they are there.

The rest of today is a blank. Soon we’ll go to lunch and maybe we’ll check out the stores across the street.

Tomorrow: The Adventure Begins {whatever that means}

The official greeter at Fairbanks International Airport

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2025: “Alaska Revisited” Edition

As Is Tradition – Testing The WordPress Interface Before We leave

No We Haven’t Left Yet – That’s Monday, July 21

We were in Alaska in 2009 – our first “real” cruise on Holland America, cruising the Inside Passage. It was a great vacation that got us hooked on cruising, but it was too short (7 days). This year’s adventure is Alaska Revisited – we’re going back on a land/cruise combo, on a much smaller ship.

We’re trying out American Cruise Line for the first time. Technically this is a river cruise, not an ocean cruise. Maximum number of passengers is 160. Because it’s so small, the ship will be able to cruise into small inlets where the big ships can’t fit.

Approximate itinerary – the actual itinerary switches a couple of the ports

Sitka, Juneau, and Glacier Bay National Park are duplicates from 2009. I’m sure the glacier in Glacier Bay National Park hasn’t changed one bit since 2009!

We have some time in Fairbanks. Denali and Kenai Fjords National Parks are the land portion of this adventure. Then we fly to Juneau where we board the ship.

One of the challenges is figuring out the clothing layers to bring that are as flexible as possible – some places will be rather cold, and others will be just a little chilly, and good bet others will be borderline hot, because that is our luck.

Of course fun flights are involved, with stops in Seattle in both directions. We’re arriving (hopefully) one day before the scheduled start to give us a little breathing room just in case G0d forbid dumb things happen.

Unlike Viking, who picks us up at the airport and gives us cool luggage tags, American Cruise Line has us on our own to get from the airport to the hotel. Luckily, Alaska is still in the US, which means we *should* be able to figure it out – in English and US currency, for a change!

Stay tuned for more adventure!

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2024 Part 3: Frozen Edition (Grand Finale)

Days 9 (12/24/2024) and 10 (12/25/2024)

Where We Have A Lazy Day In Linz And Then Freeze On A Short And A Bit Uninformative City Walk On Day 9

Followed By A Wonderful But Frozen Day In Salzberg

Day 9 Linz (December 25)

December 25 was a lazy day for us; other people went into Linz to attend church services at one of the two old churches. Spoiler alert: the services were in German, so the people who did attend didn’t necessarily get a whole lot out of it.

We had originally booked a private walking tour of Linz, because there was nothing offered by Viking. But just a few days before we sailed, suddenly there was an included (“free”) walking tour, so we decided to do that instead.

The challenge was: the tour started at 3:00 p.m., and it starts to get dark at about 3:30 with sunset at 4:15 p.m. The high for the day was around 35, and would soon start to plummet as the sun went down.

Ok the other challenge was getting off the ship: there was another ship between us and the dock, and it wasn’t a Viking ship. Therefore, we had to first climb up to Deck 4/sun deck via a flight of 13 outside steps (the elevator is only between Decks 2 and 3), and THEN walk across to the other ship and walk down 19 steps, and THEN walk down a steep ramp to the street. This was not fun at all.

But we did it, and met our tour guide on the pier. I don’t think we ever got his name. He was a little odd – his English was ok, but he spoke quickly and maybe a little mumbly. Even with the ear pieces he wasn’t 100% intelligible.

We were in the “leisure” group, so we were walking slowly. That was great, but we were also seeing not much of anything, mostly office buildings. I suspected that we were missing out on the actual interesting stuff because we were the “leisure” group. It looked like Linz was falling into the same situation as Bratislava: a 2-hour late-afternoon tour that did not do the city justice.

We stopped in the town square with the remnants of the Christmas Market:

In front of the Cafe Glockenshpiel, we were served mulled/heated wine in souvenir mugs – while standing outside. I had really hoped we’d be inside while doing this, but alas, no. The warm wine did little to defrost my toes; since I don’t like wine anyway, it basically went to waste. Janet had a better idea – to ask for the keepsake mug without the wine.

We now had “free time”, but considering everything was closed, it was getting dark, and we were all completely frozen, most people just headed back.

Side note: Tom sent me his photos of the Holocaust memorials that he saw in the not-leisure tour. In this photo you see a square delineated on the pavement. It’s the footprint of a house once owned by Jews who were murdered in the holocaust.

This is a memorial to the Linz Jews who were murdered.

Continuing on our way back to the ship, our tour guide did tell us that Linz was known for steel (manufacturing) and art:

Steel artwork along the road to the ship

Of course, we had to retrace our steps to get back onto the ship. It was even harder to climb the 19 steps up and 13 steps down while totally frozen.

We warmed up for a bit, and then it was time to get ready for dinner. Since it was also the first night of Hanukkah as well as Christmas Day, we wore our Hanukkah shirts/sweaters. Mine blinks! I had brought along a tiny electric hanukkiah. A couple of our new ship friends asked to be included when we lit it.

To our delight, our ship’s chef remembered our request for latkes for tonight’s dinner. We had asked about it back on Monday, and had no clue whether he’d actually do it or not. He did! and they were great latkes! We shared the 3 huge latkes between the 5 of us.

Day 10 Passau/Salzburg (December 26)

The Salzburg excursion originally was an optional (not-free) tour, that I don’t even remember seeing listed when we were signing up for excursions. For this cruise, Viking decided to convert the optional tour to an included tour (people will be refunded), because the Christmas market in Salzburg was still open.

It was a 2-hour drive through freezing fog:

The countryside and small towns were still scenic:

And then there were the Alps:

There was no “leisure” option for the 2 1/2 hour walk through Salzburg. Amazingly enough, this became a challenge for us to keep up.

First we walked through the Miriable gardens, where scenes from the Sound of Music were shot:

Down the street was the house where Mozart lived with his family until he moved to Vienna at the age of 25. This house was partially destroyed during WWII; it was carefully reconstructed after the war. The photo next to it is the house where Mozart was born. No surprise that Salzburg promotes itself basically as “Mozart-Central”.

If you look carefully, you can see the pale white vertical line just to the right of the door. To the left of that line is original house; to the right is reconstructed.

Salzburg also lays claim Christian Doppler (of the “Doppler Effect”)

Salzburg is just an incredibly scenic city. You could easily spend several days here to see everything.

Church with Christmas Market that we didn’t get to visit after all

Stumbling Stones commemorating Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust

The tour ended at the restaurant where we had lunch. The restaurant was located in the monastery, and reputed to be the oldest restaurant in Europe.

Of course, this meant that there was a full flight of stairs to climb, which was mighty painful after a couple of hours of toddling on cobblestones.

We were treated to a short review of Sound of Music songs – pretty much the same performance we saw on the ship the other night, even with a couple of same people.

After lunch, we had about an hour before our meeting time with our tour guide. First, we needed to buy more Euros, and then we were determined to buy original “Mozart {chocolate} balls”. We had to find our way back to the store that sold it. The store is so tiny, only a couple of people can fit in it at one time; therefore there’s a line. Luckily it moved quickly.

Any German readers out there, feel free to translate this.

At this point we knew we needed to get ourselves to the meeting point – Google maps to the rescue!

After another 2 hour drive back to the ship, it was time for our final cruise dinner, and pack up.

I don’t yet have the traditional photo of our table with our wonderful wait staff, but when I do, I’ll update this blog.

Thus concludes Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2024 Part 3: Frozen Edition. I am sitting across from our gate at the Frankfurt airport. Our flight doesn’t leave for another 2 1/2 hours. In retrospect, I don’t know why we didn’t have a non-stop back from Munich to Dulles. I booked these flights so long ago, I have no clue. There must have been some reason?

Anyway, hope you enjoyed this blog. I don’t always finish them, but this layover gave me a great opportunity.

G0d willing, there’ll be another Excellent Adventure on the Danube in May, 2025. Stay tuned!

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2024 Part 3: Frozen Edition – A Bit Of Day 7 and All Of Day 8

December 23 and 24

Where We Heard A Wonderful Concert And Had No Issues With The Elevators At The Melk Abbey

Day 7 Part 2 December23

When we arrived at the concert venue, there was a bit of confusion. Mario told everybody who was taking the elevator up to hit the button with the biggest number. A bunch of us landed on the 4th floor, which was obviously wrong. At some point Mario appeared and apologized – he should have told us floor “2”.

We were still seated in plenty of time. Very nice program – a flute, piano, 3 violins, a bass, and a cello. The first half was Mozart, the second half, mostly Strauss waltzes.

I did manage to get lost after the program – I found a bathroom on the 2nd floor with no problem. It was all the way down the hall on the other side of the building. But when I came out of the bathroom, the hallway I came from was blocked by a closed door. I ended up taking the first elevator I found and exited the building – around the corner from the bus. Eventually Mario found me and the bus pulled around. Always something.

Day 8 December 24 Melk

The morning was scenic sailing until we arrived in Melk at about 11:00. Mario told me that the abbey had reported to him that the elevators were all working!

When we docked in Melk, we were ready to go – it was a 10 minute walk from the ship to the bus parking lot.

When we arrived at the Abbey, the elevator was indeed working – but there was still quite a bit of walking to get to the Abbey entrance. Most of the surface was either small cobblestone, which was not suitable for the transport chair, so I did my best to get myself there.

The Melk Abbey is about 1,000 years old – one of the first abbeys established in Europe. There are 21 monks still living in the abbey.

We were not allowed to take photos inside the abbey museum or the abbey itself. The museum exhibits showed items from baroque to modern times, including an example of a reusable coffin that Franz Joseph I instituted as a cost saving method. I found this photo out on the interwebs:

There was a 16-paneled painting – 8 on one side telling the story of the crucifixion, and the other 8 telling the story of Jesus childhood. Below is a post card of one of the baby-Jesus panels

A postcard image of one of the panels of the 16-paneled painting

At some point we were outside on a terrace, where we could take photos of the view.

The Abbey library is stunning. It’s still an active library. There is one book that is almost 1,000 years old.

The room where Maria Theresa did her entertaining had a trompe l’oeil ceiling that looked differently depending on where in the room you were standing and the angle.

In this postcard photo, if you follow the marble columns up into the ceiling, the painted columns on the ceiling appear foreshortened. When you stand in the middle of the room on the grating, the columns on the ceiling appear much taller

The Abbey’s sanctuary is beyond stunning. Here’s two postcard photos.

One of the side walls with the sarcophagus of Saint Coloman, the patron saint of Melk

Once we were done with the abbey, we retraced our steps back to the bus.

On the way out through the gift shop, I took a photo of this thing that I’ve not been able to identify. Looks like a clock.

We were back in time for lunch, where we were able to watch a lock go by.

We had more scenic sailing for the rest of the afternoon. The sun sets around 3:30 in this part of the world.

Dinner this evening was a celebration of Austria! Which meant: mostly pork. Fortunately, there were alternatives. I had the char (a salmon relative), and Andy had the “taste of Austria” minus the pork sausage.

After dinner, there were assorted Christmas Eve activities. The best part (for me) was Mario showing us his ventriloquist talents!

Our Motley Crew. Doe we look cold? We’re cold.

Tomorrow: Linz

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2024 Part 3: Frozen Edition

Days 5, 6, and most of 7 (December 21, 22, & 23)

Where I Ended Up With An Accidental “Day At Sea” (But Still Had Strudel), We Froze In Bratislava, And Saw A Snippet Of Vienna

Day 5 (December 21) – last day in Budapest

Originally 4 of us were booked for the 8:00 a.m. Budapest city tour. Andy was booked on a castle hike excursion. When Susie, Janet, and I thought about it, we realized the Viking excursion was almost the same as the tuk-tuk tour we took the other day. So we decided to skip it to avoid having to get up at oh-dark-thirty. Plus, Susie and Janet had the thermal bath excursion scheduled for the afternoon, and we were all booked for the included 2 hour walking tour to the Christmas Market at 5:30 in the evening.

This was all fine. It was a nice relaxing day.

To make a long story short: when Andy and I were all bundled up and ready to go to the 5:30 Christmas Market tour, we found out that there were many, many steps involved, making it impossible for me to go. Would have been nice to know that.

So Day 5 for me wound up being an accidental day “at sea” (at river?). Not the end of the world, just a little annoying.

Janet and Susie enjoyed the baths.

Here are some highlight photos of excursions I did not go on (from Andy):

View of the Chain Bridge from the Buda side – the ship is our ship, the Viking Tor

View from Castle Hill/Fisherman’s bastion

Lady of our Buda Church / Matthias Church

The good news is that Mario, our Program Director, brought me back a cheese strudel that I would have gotten if I’d gone on the excursion. Sorry, no photo. It’s already long gone.

Day 6 December 22 Bratislava

Unfortunately for us and Bratislava, we had a weird time slot. We docked at 2:00 p.m. with all-aboard for 11:00 p.m. Considering the sun starts to set at 3:30, we had all of an hour of daylight.

The weather was already threatening when we started our walk into the old part of Bratislava – it was very cold and felt like rain.

Also unfortunately, none of us really remember much of what the tour guide said.

Bratislava is old
It’s had many names (it still does)
Earlier generations spoke multiple languages because Slovakia has been shuffled around assorted empires
There are some Jews left in the city, but not many (we couldn’t find the big menorah she talked about).

There was this guy:

We stopped by a church to listen to a Christmas organ concert. Somehow in our minds, we were picturing a huge pipe organ with magnificent sound. It was a small church with a small organ. I was on the wrong side of the sanctuary to get a photo of the organ.

Church Altar. The organist and singer were off to the right

The organist and singers performed for about 20 minutes maybe? Their CDs were available for sale for 10 Euros or $15 (the exchange rate Euro –> USD is not 50%). It was pleasant enough, but somehow not what we were expecting.

When we came out of the church, it started to rain – at first just a drizzle. We started our walk around the Christmas market.

As we walked around the market, it started snow/raining harder. Even with my umbrella, I was getting pretty wet.

It was raining hard enough that we just toddled as fast as we could back to the ship. Andy did go back out in the rain to do some (successful!) shopping. I’m sure Bratislava has a lot more to offer than 2 hours in the cold, rain, and dark.

In the evening on board ship after dinner, we watched a performance of a local (male) chorus singing Christmas carols – from traditional Slovak to modern/familiar tunes.

December 23 Vienna (part 1)

We still have a Mozart/Strauss concert this evening, but I figure I can tack that on to the next blog.

We were on the bus by 9:00 a.m. We were in the “Leisurely” group, which meant that we missed St Stephen’s cathedral. G0d willing we’ll be back in Vienna on our next cruise in May, so we started a list of things we know we need to see.

It was gloomy and cold, but at least it wasn’t raining!

We drove around “the ring” road that circles the inner city. Many impressive buildings, many of them built by Franz Josef, who ruled as emperor for 68 years (out done only by Queen Elizabeth II). A couple of his fun innovations: reusable coffins (bodies were put into a coffin, taken to a cemetery, then the body dumped out the bottom into a mass grave), which is why nobody really knows where Mozart is buried; and all plays had to have a happy ending – re-written as needed.

Truly impressive buildings:

We walked through the courtyard of the Hofburg Palace, originally the seat of the monarch, and still used as a seat of government.

We passed by the stables of the Lipizzaner stallions. A couple of them stuck their heads out to say hello!

Many impressive statues as well.

Our tour guid gave us a brief intro to Hitler’s early life, and showed us the balcony where he announced the completion of the Anshluss. An unsettling feeling, if there ever was one.

The statuary in Vienna is amazing. This is Maria Theresa, the last empress of Bavaria. She had 16 children, 10 lived to adulthood, all of them in arranged marriages for political purposes. I’m sure some of her children married some of Queen Victoria’s children.

Unfortunately, we didn’t take any photos of the market as we wandered around.

Originally we thought we might take the shuttle bus back, thinking there’s probably a shuttle every hour or so. So we walked back to a big square that had a souvenir shop where we could get the requisite items. It was about 12:20.

And then we looked at the shuttle schedule and saw that the next shuttle wasn’t until 2:45! Oh no, that was too much time to be wandering around in the cold.

In a mad dash, we “zipped” back to the bus that was literally pulling out as we caught up to it – luckily, Janet asked them to stop, and we were spotted by Mario and our tour guide. Phew! Leave it to the Austrians to be so prompt – it was exactly 12:30!

We came back to the ship and had lunch. We’ll be having an early dinner so we can attend the Mozart/Strauss concert at 7:30.

Good thing we have plans to be back in Vienna in May 2025. This was barely a glimpse!

Tomorrow is Krems/Melk. The issue of the 65 steps up to the abbey has not yet been resolved.

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2024 Part 3: Frozen Edition

Day 4: Where We Head Out Of The City To A Small Town, An Art Museum, Christmas Market And Chocolate Cake.

Many Cobblestones Are Involved

December 20

Today is the day we transfer to the ship, the Viking Tor (or Thor). After we had breakfast made sure our bags were out in the hallway before 10:00 a.m., all 5 of us in our group boarded a van for the same excursion to Szentendre (Saint Andrew), a town about 40 minutes from Budapest. The group was pretty small, so we had a van instead of a big tour bus. These vans are great, because they are easy for me to climb up and climb down.

The town seems to have one main street. Our tour guide told us all we had to do was follow the cobblestone road to find our way back to the bus.

Szentandre is a classic small town in Hungary. Some of the population is actually Serbian in origin (Eastern Orthodox) and some Hungarian (Catholic). We wouldn’t know the difference, that’s for sure.

The little booth is the beginning of the Christmas Market. More cobblestones.

We slowly made our way towards the Magrit Kovacs museum. I know I had never heard of her. She was famous in Europe in the first half of the 20th Century for ceramic art, at a time when the concept of “ceramic art” wasn’t a thing.

There actually is a remnant of the Jewish community still in Szentandre. This street is the entrance to the Jewish quarter.

When we arrived at the museum, we discovered that it was actually a house converted into a museum; therefore there were a bunch of steps and no elevator. I’m always at a loss when cruise ship excursion descriptions can’t seem to include this kind of info.

But our tour guide, Nickie, was able to talk to the museum staff, and they opened up a back door for us so we could enter without steps.

Here’s a link to some detailed info on her life. Magrit Kovacs was an artist who decided to turn ceramics (normally considered “just pottery” and therefore not “art”) into a true art form. Her work is amazing! Her bio says she was “born into a Jewish family” (I never really know what that means), but many of her works have a strong Christian theme. By the time the Nazis came to power, she was so famous that somehow they dared not murder her. This is pretty amazing, since that never stopped the Nazis before (e.g. they were after Einstein). She was essentially under house arrest for the duration of the war with a big yellow Star of David on her front door.

These are some of her works that we saw in the museum:

The people she portrays almost always have a little smile

The smiles disappear after her mother dies. This is a portrayal of Magrit and her sister with their mother on her deathbed

During the Soviet occupation of Hungary, she was instructed to create this map of the world that is missing the US.

After the museum, we went to a coffee shop and had a drink and some cake, which turned out to be “lunch”. We had time to wander around the town for a bit giving us the opportunity to contribute to the local economy, which we did. We walked back to the bus along the smoother-surfaced street down by the embankment of the Danube.

Now it was time to head to the ship. We made good time until the last mile, where it was backed up a bit.

It’s great to back on board a Viking ship!

We unpacked and tried to figure out what was going on with the excursions via the TV app. Nothing made sense. We went to the front desk and started asking questions of the young guy waiting there. He immediately sensed he was over his head and called for the Program Director Mario.

We’re guessing that because this is supposed to be a Christmas Market cruise, and many of the markets close by December 24, Viking did their best to rearranged things to maximize the Christmas experience. The end result is massive confusion.

The day we’re in Krems (12/24), we’re not doing anything in Krems, but going to a cathedral in Melk. Mario said there’s 65 steps to walk down to get from the parking lot to the church. We thought he was joking. He was not. We predict that about 1/3 to 1/2 the ship will not be walking down 65 steps (and then have to walk back up). Though Mario mentioned there is a path down, but it’s all cobblestones. And then the church itself has steps, though *maybe* the elevator will be working. This does not sound hopeful.

The day we’re supposed to be in Passau we will be going to Salzberg, because the Christmas market in Salzberg is still open.

Linz now has an included walking tour that wasn’t listed a month ago, and definitely not over the summer when we were deciding on our excursions. We had booked a private walking tour in Linz (though Viator still hadn’t confirmed they were actually providing a tour guide while happily taking my money). We all agreed there was no point in doing both, so we canceled the private tour.

Also, a new Budapest Christmas Market and St Stephen’s church walking tour was added for Saturday afternoon. Since the morning “Panoramic Budapest” tour in the morning is pretty much the same as what we saw on the tuk-tuk tour AND it starts at 8:00 a.m., Janet, Susie, and I opted to not go on that one. Andy had a castle hill hike scheduled anyway, and Tom said he was going on the panoramic tour so he could go into the church at the top of that hill. Many hills, many churches!

I think we have it figured out? It remains to be seen.

Tomorrow: last day in Budapest

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure 2024, Part 3: Frozen Edition (a/k/a Blue Danube Part 1)

Days 1, 2, and 3 (Though Days 1 and 2 Are Actually Just One Very Long Day (As Is Tradition))

Where We Have A Relatively Easy Time Getting to Budapest (A Pretzel Is Involved)

And I’ve Already Given Up Trying To Pronounce Anything In Hungarian

Days 1 and 2 (12/17 and 12/18)

Our flights to Budapest were relatively uneventful. Something stupid always happens, but luckily the stupidity was relatively minor. We had booked oodles of time for the layover in Munich, so when the stupidity manifested itself (eg. Lufthansa changed the gate 3 times, each time sending me an email (G0d forbid, why not a text) in *German*, which, alas, I cannot read with any kind of proficiency), there was plenty of time to fix or work around it.

Good news! We were able check the box for “German pretzel”.

(Note: the following is my growing list of must-have foods in assorted countries).

Italy = gelato
Spain = paella
France = chocolate crepes, onion soup
Germany = pretzels
Hungary = ?
Austria = ?

Anyway, we arrived right on time and were promptly picked up by the Viking rep. Once at the hotel, we received the usual Viking briefing for their location extensions.

One couple who was with us on the ride from the airport seemed to be getting off on the wrong foot, by declaring that so far on this trip their interaction with Viking had been a disaster (they were picked up and the airport on time and arrived at the hotel?). Our observation was that this couple was just not really hearing what the Viking rep was saying (possibly an artifact of sleep deprivation and looming jet lag). They had told us this was their first ever river cruise, so perhaps that added to the mix. Stuff always happens (this time, some excursions on the cruise itself were rearranged generating a bit of confusion), Viking always fixes it, and you go with the flow and have a great time.

Anyway, eventually the rest of our group of 5 arrived. Three of us went on the 4:30 “orientation walk” provided by the Viking rep. It was pretty helpful.

We had dinner at the hotel – our first taste of Hungarian food, which I already knew I liked. The chicken paprikas sealed the deal.

I did have to deal with the issue of the “pillow top” bed before I could pass out. Apparently now all hotels in the immediate universe have these beds that come to my waist, making it physically impossible for me to climb into them. However, this time I had brought with me a tiny folding step, which works like a charm. Just way too much work to be able to go to sleep.

Day 3 December 19

Janet had booked a private 1/2 day “tuk-tuk” tour of Budapest for today. A tuk-tuk is basically a motorized rick-shaw. It looks like a motorcycle with some seats stuck onto it. It’s open air, so we were all bundled up.

If we look like we’re a little bundled up, it’s because we are. I’m wearing many layers.

Our guides were Gabriel and Gabriella.

First we went to Hero’s Square, built at the end of the 19th century with monuments and statues representing Hungary’s long history. New fun fact: “Hun” in Hungary comes from the Huns invasion over 1000 years ago (as in Atila, the Hun).

Millennium Monument/Hero’s Square – 7 Hungarian kings (St Stephen on the left)

Seven Tribal Chiefs (Millennium Monument/Hero’s Square

Gabriel our tour guide said that during the Communist era, the Soviets replaced some of the statues with Soviet “heroes”. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the original statues were put back.

Continuing on our way, we drove by the Széchenyi thermal baths. Apparently, Hungary is second only to Iceland as a capital for thermal baths (and without the volcanoes and earthquakes).

Our next stop was the Vajdahunyad Castle, built for an expo at the end of the 19th century. It does absolutely nothing other than look amazing. We did contribute to the Hungarian economy in the Castle’s gift shop.

Onward to the Hungarian State Opera House! We were able to go inside to the lobby, where we looked up at the fantastic ceilings.

From this angle you can see up to the 2nd floor

Our tour guide said that if we took the official Opera House tour, the last 10 minutes is a mini-opera performance. We figure that would be about as long as we could stand (not opera fans here, sorry not sorry).

Up until now, we had been touring Pest (where our hotel is located). Pest is very flat. Now we were heading into Buda, which is the 180 degree opposite of “flat”. On the way to the bridge, we passed by the Dohány Street Synagogue, one of the largest in Europe. Not sure we’ll have time to tour the inside during this visit, but it’s on The List.

We drove across the Liberty Bridge. It was originally named the “Franz Joseph” bridge, but at some point the name was changed. It was built as a part of the Millennium expo at the end of the 19th century. Our guide, Gabriel told us he really doesn’t like the name “liberty”, as it has nothing to do with anything.

Eagles perched with golden apples, and the royal crown insignia in the middle of the span

Immediately on the other side of the bride is this fabulous church built into the rock – the Gellért Hill Cave Catholic Church. An extraordinarily unique church, it first opened in 1250. It has survived conquering armies, wars, you name it. It reopened as a functioning church in 1989 after the fall of the Soviet Union. The temperature stays at about 72 degrees F all year round with no active heating or cooling.

I think that’s Saint Stephen on the right

Most modern addition to the church – look at the intricate carvings!

Our last stop was the Buda Castle grounds/Fisherman’s Bastion in the Castle District.

Buda Castle/Fisherman’s bastion – good thing we drove up to the top.

The tower that’s all that is left of the Church of Saint Mary Magdalene destroyed during WWII

By now it was getting pretty late. We were all both frozen solid and hungry. We headed back to Pest over the Széchanyi Chain Bridge, the oldest bridge connecting Buda and Pest.

Széchenyi chain bridge Budapest Hungary. Opened in 1849 – the first connection between Buda and Pest.

What a fantastic tour! We have Gabriel’s card with his info for future reference.

After we defrosted a bit, we went for a late lunch at a restaurant recommended by the Viking host. A hot bowl of Hungarian beef goulash soup did the trick!

Though we had to make sure we tried a chimney cake – there was a little vendor across the street from our hotel, so Andy got one (chocolate sprinkles) for us to share. It was huge!

This evening we went on a Viking excursion for a Folklore dinner/performance. The folklore performance was very good, but as usual, the food provided at a mass-meal event was not that great. But the streets at night are beautiful.

Time to pack up, so we can leave our bags outside our door before 10:00 a.m. tomorrow -.

Tomorrow: More Budapest and Transfer To The Ship

Amy & Andy’s Excellent Adventure(s) 2024 Part 2 – O Canada Edition: Day 9 Prince Edward Island (9/16)

Where We Are Once Again Schlepped Around From Here To There For The Entire Day.

But At Least We Had A Beaver Tail

And Anne Of Green Gables, That Too.

Knowing absolutely nothing about Prince Edward Island (PEI) other than it’s the site of the “Anne Of Green Gables” books (by Lucy Maud Montgomery) that I read and re-read fairly endlessly when I was 12, I had no expectations as to what it was like (other than what I vaguely recall from the books I read almost 60 years ago.

We thought we had this bus-reserved-seat thing down pretty well. Andy told the bus-ticket person we needed to reserve seats near the front of the bus, the bus-ticket person made the note, and we thought we were good.

When our bus number was called, all sorts of confusion occurred once we exited the gangway. We lost the rest of the group as we wandered through the cruise terminal, and ended up being one of the last people on the bus. There was no reserved seats for us. The bus driver said, “We had 6 reserved seats and they’re all filled”. Obviously, they did not check the reservations against the room numbers. Good news: there was still a single seat in the second row, and another right behind that. Bad news: decent photos through the windows were not going to happen.

The ship was docked in Charlottetown, PEI. Whenever the tour guide starts the tour by pointing out ordinary structures (the middle school, the shopping plaza with a Walmart and a Home Depot), we’ve discovered this does not bode well. A nice enough town, the largest on PEI (40K) that gets a ton of snow every winter.

Farming is a big part of the PEI economy, with potatoes being the biggest crop. This meant that as soon as we left the city limits, the scenery consisted of nice rolling hills and farmland.

To our surprise, today’s tour included lunch! Which was, of course, a lobster roll and potato salad. Fortunately, there was also the choice of chicken salad and potato salad, or some vegetarian option (with potato salad (you see the recurring theme here)). The tour guide tallied up all the choices, and, I assumed, phoned it in to the restaurant.

Our first stop was at the Marine Rail Historical Park – mostly a bathroom break, but also a photo op for the Confederation Bridge that connects PEI to New Brunswick ($25 toll each way, but paid only on the way back to PEI). There’s a monument to the ferry service that existed before the bridge was built.

Next, we were off to the Gateway Village, that had a nice gift shop and a statue to Anne of Green Gables.

You could dress up as Anne in period costumes (came in assorted sizes and included a hat with attached red braids), and have a friend take your picture. I’m a big Anne Shirley, but not that big.

The lobster industry is another big part of the economy on PEI; everyone was offered a taste of lobster potato chips by the staff. Since lobster is about as unkosher as any food item can get, we declined. We said, “We don’t eat lobster”, to which the staffer replied, “YOU DON’T EAT LOBSTER!?!”. Nope, still don’t, hasn’t changed.

On we drove to Cavendish, the town where Lucy Maud Montgomery lived and the setting for the Anne of Green Gables books. We stopped at Cavendish beach for a photo op – you can see how red the soil is on PEI by the red cliffs:

Cavendish beach off the Gulf of St. Lawrence

Hurricane Fiona hit PEI in 2022 and did some serious damage to the island, especially the crops and the beaches.

After the beach, it was time for lunch. Somehow, even though the tallies of lobster, chicken, and vegetarian sandwiches were known, getting a non-lobster sandwich turned out to be something of a challenge for some unknown reason. Fortunately, we still had plenty of time before we needed to board the bus when our lunches finally arrived.

Then we were off to the “Green Gables Heritage Place” (IMO, an awkward name?).

Lucy Maud Montgomery never lived in this house or on the farmstead, but some of her relatives did. She visited frequently and used the farmstead as the inspiration for the location of the books.

Keep in mind that I was the one who had read these books all those years ago. Andy had not. So while seeing this place brought back memories of the books in my mind, it didn’t mean much of anything to him. What a good sport!

We had plenty of time to share a beaver tail pastry before boarding the bus. I’m going to save the photo of the beaver tail for the very end, so it’ll be the cover photo for the blog. For the uninitiated, a beaver tail seems to me to be a flat doughnut with yummy stuff on top.

We got one with Nutella, peanut butter sauce, and Reese’s Pieces. They make it for you on the spot. It was super hot and hard to figure out how to eat it without getting burned fingers. Utensils were nowhere to be found. We forged ahead and managed to make it disappear pretty quickly. UNBELIEVABLY GOOD.

On the way back to the ship, we passed by the cemetery where Lucy Maud Montgomery is buried. Here is an awkward photo of her grave, taken through the window as we drove by, and I’m trying not have a seat mate photobomb:

Lucy Maud Montgomery’s grave – the two cone shaped everygreen bushes with the flower bed in front

I tried to get some photos of the countryside. This was the best I could do:

We arrived back at the cruise terminal something after 5:00. We didn’t have a lot of time to look at the shops, because all-aboard time was 5:30.

Tomorrow is a sea day. Wednesday, 9/18, is Portland, ME – our last port on this cruise. Some “Welcome Back To The US” immigration stuff is happening that morning. The ship’s crew has been working with CBP to set up the schedule to process all 3K passengers by 12:30 p.m. This should be entertaining.

Here is the beaver tail: