A prolonged drought and high heat have caused some European rivers to fall to near record-low water levels, causing disruptions to river cruises on the Danube and Rhine.
Riviera Travel River Cruises, Avalon Waterways and Viking Cruises are among the cruise lines alerting travel advisors and travelers of modifications to cruise itineraries due to low water in certain parts of European rivers.
Droughts Causing Itinerary Changes
The Avalon Impression, for example, has been unable to travel on the Rhine beyond the Koblenz area of Germany, and the embarkation city for its Legendary Danube cruise has been changed from Nuremberg to Passau. With no rain in the immediate forecast to raise water levels, Avalon has also cancelled several planned cruise departures.
Riviera has modified several itineraries on the Danube, Rhine and Main rivers. To bypass trouble spots, Viking has positioned ships on either end of low-water areas and transferred passengers from one vessel to another.
On Danube cruises scheduled to terminate in Vienna, low water has forced routes to stop at Budapest, with passengers transported by bus to the Austrian capital and their flights home. AmaWaterways, for example, has been putting passengers up in Budapest for the last night of their scheduled cruises. The segment of river in Hungary is currently at its lowest level in 30 years.
In several cases, cruise lines have also had to change from docks close to city centers to deeper water berths further away and bus passengers to planned port calls.
U.S. travelers bound for European river cruises are also being advised to prepare for extreme heat, which has reached 111 degrees Fahrenheit in central Europe this summer. A heat wave that hit the region from mid-June to early July was blamed for thousands of deaths across six countries.
