Outskirts of Shrewd'm / Travel Wanderer
No. of Recommendations: 1
Impulsively grabbed a river cruise when a less than half off sale came up in a 2 week period we had nothing scheduled. Our first river cruise, and only other cruise was close to 30 years ago when pregnant with Youngest and had a 2 year old in tow, so am assuming this will be nothing like that Caribbean mega cruise! Friends and family have strongly recommended Viking, even at full price. The price was well worth the gamble.
Looking for suggestions on international health insurance and medevac insurance. What I have gleamed from past posts seems to be Alliance and MedJet? Anything else? We like the annual plans for the medevac that are also good h(ere in the States, as we are not home much. We are self-insuring for trip cancellation.
There won't be much time in each port, and we are mostly doing the included tours, but open to suggestions. Honestly pumped even about simply walking around the different towns. Late June sailing. This is our itinerary, roughly:
Amsterdam
Kinderdijk, The Netherlands (windmills tour)
Cologne, Germany
Koblenz, Germany
Wertheim, Germany
Würzburg, Germany
Bamberg, Germany
Nuremberg, Germany
Regensburg, Germany
Passau, Germany
Melk, Austria
Vienna, Austria, overnight
Budapest, Hungary
While I have lived in Europe for a total of over 2 years, that was some 40+ years ago and not a huge amount of time spent in this area. Wetting our feet on heading overseas with an organized tour, but happy to abandon the included group tours of the town if there are must sees. We do have a classical concert that we are doing the night we are in Vienna, and very much intending to do other things there.
Any other general suggestions re international travel welcome. Because of the elections and potential for repercussions in Hungary, as well as the potential for fuel shortages, we used Viking to secure our included airfare, making them responsible for the whole trip, rather than risk a disconnect between the flights and the cruise.
Weird being back to being a newbie.
IP
Hoping the world politics go along with our desire to seriously step up travel
No. of Recommendations: 2
Looking for suggestions on international health insurance and medevac insurance. What I have gleamed from past posts seems to be Alliance and MedJet?
Allianz, if you get their better policy, covers MedJet. So, probably better to get that one. Though MedJet does have a tier where they cover evacuation for political/terrorism reasons (as opposed to just medical). Not sure Allianz has that one.
I originally had MedJet (I think it is still in effect, actually, for the next year or so). But Allianz seems to fit the bill for what we are concerned about.
Can't speak to your cruise. I read a year or two ago that Europe's river levels are getting very low. Not sure if that will be an issue. I know they had to close one river so they could remove munitions barges that were sunk during WWII. The water level was low enough that they feared boats colliding with them and exploding, as I recall.
General international trip suggestions:
pack light (lugging lots of bags is a pain); don't pack "outfits", pack mix-and-match so that everything goes with everything, and you can change your look just by changing a shirt or pants, and it will all match
have a under-clothing money belt
some pocket cash is useful, but most places do credit cards...if you can get a chip/PIN card, that is ideal
sink-washable clothes reduce the need for boat laundry services (expensive, or takes time from your vacation if you find something ashore)
spare glasses (if you wear glasses) in case your primaries get lost or broken; including sunglasses
You probably know other suggestions I would have, as they haven't changed much since you traveled there. You're aware of cultural respect, etc.
No. of Recommendations: 0
Most places in western Europe I've gone to in the last year or so take payment with my iphone (Apple Pay) which makes things even easier since I don't have to take a credit card out at all. I just make sure it defaults to one of my no-foreign fee credit cards although you could load Apple pay with cash and pay that way.
Not sure if this is obvious, it wasn't for me, but in Apple's wallet whatever card is at the bottom of the display is the default payment. You can change it by simply dragging a new card to the bottom.
In my case I have a debit card, several credit cards and Apple cash listed.
Rich
No. of Recommendations: 3
MedJetAssist and Allianz are two separate animals. Alliance supplies a full breadth of travel insurance with many of their policies with a provision to transport you to the nearest "adequate" medical facility and then repatriate you after you are healed. MedJet is not insurance, but rather an air ambulance contract to take you, once stabilized, to the medical facility of your choice. We carry both because our traveling frequently takes us to weird corners of the earth and I have a concern about the interpretation of the word "adequate". That said, if our travels were limited to Europe, North America and a handful of specific Asian countries (Israel, Singapore and Japan spring to mind), I probably wouldn't bother with the MedJet contract. (Not advice, just what I would do).
Jeff
No. of Recommendations: 0
That said, if our travels were limited to Europe, North America and a handful of specific Asian countries (Israel, Singapore and Japan spring to mind), I probably wouldn't bother with the MedJet contract.
Appreciated. We like it for the annual contract. We are on the road more than we are home, and like that we can use it here in the US as well. I am still not sure I will get any other coverage beyond MedJet. DH is covered by his various Medicare policies, (G?,)and knock wood, I am pretty healthy. We are not doing trip insurance. The price of the trip is well within self-insuring levels. Happily, still have time to rethink that, and given we are heading to Canada for a couple of months this summer, may very well do so.
IP
