After numerous international ocean cruises, my husband and I decided three years ago to sample some river cruising. We have travelled the Rhine, Danube, and this year we chose Vantage for our Douro River cruise. In order to keep this brief, I am going to list why I believe Vantage is the best choice for the Douro:

1. We have had countless cruise directors, and by far, Carmen was the very best Cruise Director we have ever had. She was constantly visible and available; she had the ability to communicate across the board from those that required limited information to those that required some pretty significant “adult supervision – there’s always at least one! LOL!” Finally, Carmen demonstrated a “genuine” concern and caring for all of the passengers. A “rare” attribute in a Cruise Director from my experience.

2. From the time we were warmly greeted at the airport upon arrival (even though our flight had been DELAYED by an hour and a half), to the time we were returned to the airport for our return flight home, Vantage took exceptionally good care of us. So much so that we weren’t just “dropped off” in Madrid to navigate our way through the airport. We had a dedicated agent who walked us to the counter to check-in, and then walked us to security. Very impressive service! Read more