Day 5 - Thursday, May 4, 2017 - Cruise to Vienna

While the "rumble" may have been comforting last night, it was quite loud and the whole room was shaking, with the lamp shades rattling. I barely got any sleep although fortunately, Carmen is able to sleep through just about anything.

In the morning, I checked with the front desk and they were able to switch us to a room much closer to the front. This was quite fortunate as often the ships are completely full. This room was much quieter and we slept quite well for the rest of the trip. The beds are very comfortable.

Most of the day we were relaxing on board, cruising up the river. In order to control the flow of the river and also generate power, there a large number of dams and locks on the Danube (and most major rivers in Europe). Each lock raises or lowers the ship around 40' or so. The ships are designed to the maximum size that will fit in the locks. Often there is less than a foot between each side of the ship and the lock - it is impressive that the captain can navigate so precisely.

 
 Entering the lock

The ships can't be too tall either or they won't fit under the bridges - this can be a problem with high water. There is also a problem with low water as there may not be enough clearance on the bottom for the ships to pass - the challenges of shipping in rivers. In the photo below, I could have almost touched the bridge while standing up. The gray beam is the bottom of the bridge and you can't see any clearance with the top of the wheel house - there is just enough. The crew needs to take down all the railings on the upper deck in order to go under some of the bridges.

 
Low bridge clearance

We docked in Vienna in the late afternoon and had dinner before going to a concert by the Vienna Supreme Orchestra, a 9 piece wind and string orchestra, at the military museum. The military museum is part of an 18th century military training facility in Vienna and is exceptionally ornate with paintings or frescoes on all the walls and the ceiling. The orchestra played "favorites" by Strauss, Shubert, Mozart, Beethoven and other famous musicians connected with Vienna. Although Beethoven was born in Bonn, Germany, he lived and composed in Vienna most of his life. We greatly enjoyed the concert.

 
Performers

Battle painting

Carmen thought the artist paid much more attention to the detail of the horses than the detail of the soldiers.

On the way back to the ship we had a driving tour of the city.

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