River Cruises

River cruises have to be everyone's idea of a dream holiday, whether it is Nile cruises, Mississippi cruises or the Danube cruises. Some of the world's most evocative scenery can be seen from a river cruise trip.

The River Danube flows through 10 countries and it is Europe's second largest river, it begins in the picturesque German Black Forest and ends in a UNESCO world Heritage site at the Black Sea. Culturally the Danube is mentioned by composer Johann Strauss, he wrote the music for der schönen, blauen Donau, when on a Danube river cruise, but it has featured in films and books as well. Some of the oldest settlements in Europe are on the shores of the Danube; you can sample hot chocolate in Vienna, or wander through the ancient city of Budapest. 

The world's longest river in the Nile which runs through Upper Egypt, the iconic picturepicture of a  In everyone’s mind is an Egyptian dhow wafting dreamily down the Nile, with a hazy shaduff the world's oldest irrigations in the background.

The ancient Egyptians led the way for river crafts, because everything was transported by river, it carried live Pharaohs from their ancient capital Thebes, and the dead Pharaohs to their tombs in the pyramids. It transported food, agricultural produce, stone to build the pyramids, Nubian troops to defend the land of Upper Egypt, cattle and everything else.

Nile river cruises offer everyone something, whether it is the first time that you have travelled lounging on the deck of a dhow, or visited Luxor, the world’s largest outdoor museum. Somehow or another the Nile offers an intertwining of past and present cultures that span back to the dawn of time.

The Mississippi river cruises are another evocative experience; the chug of the mighty paddle wheelers, against the back drop of New Orleans, Memphis and Nashville wait is that the Mark Twain drawl you can hear saying

 “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.”

The magnificent steam ships still the most popular way of undertaking a Mississippi river cruise, they remind of us an era long dead in most of the world.  The river cruises traverse through areas that offer everything from the banks of great civil war battles, to the mighty country music empire. For the slaves it was a means of escape today it is pure escapism for those that embark on one its river cruises.