Saar

From Monday on, the german labor union Verdi calls all employees operating the locks to go on unlimited strike. Read about the background and the impact on river cruises in Germany.

A brief guide how to access them plus some a table with historical events of interest.

One huge difference between an ocean cruise and a river cruise are all the locks along the rivers. Most river cruise ships are designed in such a way not to waste any space and just fit into the locks. For example the lock width along the Rhine Main Danube Canal is 12meter, so all ships can have a maximum width of 11.40m. That leaves exactly one foot of space to the right and left if a ship enters a lock. Therefore they sometimes bump into the walls, which may be very unpleasant at night. That is one of the little details most operators or travel agents do not mention.

There are a lot of concerns about the river levels since last years drought. I can see this due to the web site statistics. And it is an important questions for a lot of people in river cruise forums. People interested in cruising Europe want to know the the water level for a particular month, and are sometimes really disappointed when they learn that it is too hard to say. WHY is it so hard to predict the river levels? Therefore I try to provide some background information on watersheds, river courses and the main areas where the cruiseable rivers in Europe draw their water from.

It's just a few days until the new season starts. According to German authorities all rivers are shipable again. There might be a few ice blocks close to locks, but this is not a major problem. And though river levels are rising due to melting ice and snow, there is no threat of high water levels at the moment.