Drought Drops River Levels, Forcing Itinerary Changes on Danube and Rhine Cruises
If you're booked on a Danube or Rhine river cruise, especially routes marketed around castle views, check with Avalon Waterways or AmaWaterways about possible itinerary changes tied to the ongoing drought. Be prepared for the possibility of bus transfers between ships, which travelers have reported can take around five hours and may affect prepaid excursions. Pack with flexibility in mind in case you need to move between vessels on short notice.
The numbers here tell the story: minus 42 inches at Paks on July 27 is a record for the Danube, and that's not a marketing spin, that's a nuclear plant's own gauge reading. When Avalon Waterways and AmaWaterways both flag itinerary risk, it signals this isn't a one-off complaint but a sector-wide operational issue tied to weather nobody controls. The losers are travelers who booked specifically for castle views on the Rhine's shallow stretch and got a bus ride instead, some over five hours, with prepaid excursions missed in the shuffle. The winners, relatively speaking, are passengers whose lines managed the disruption well enough that Reddit reviewers still called the experience "great," even while frustrated. My take: if you're booked on these routes this summer, call ahead and set expectations low on castle views, high on bus mileage.