Riverside Luxury Cruises pivots smoothly when drought rules out the Rhine.
Something’s a little off here with my Rhine River cruise.
I’m admiring an 800-year-old round-towered fortress as I disembark from the luxurious Riverside Debussy cruise ship at the pier. OK, that seems Germany-like enough. However, the street signs are in Dutch. There are no rolling hills or Riesling vineyards.
Whoops, I’m in Antwerp, Belgium! And this is the Schelde River, not the Rhine. What happened?
Answer: my September itinerary completely changed one week before I flew from Vancouver to Amsterdam. A summer drought saw Rhine water levels hit record lows, making sections of Europe’s second-longest river unnavigable. Climate change offered a wake-up slap in the face — the kind ski resorts have been taking for years.
So forget about Dusseldorf, Rudesheim, and Nuremberg. Hello, Brussels, Vlissingen, and Rotterdam!
Great Dutch art provides a welcome diversion
Regardless of the last-minute U-turn, I never consider cancelling the week-long trip. After all, I venerate great Dutch artists from Vincent van Gogh to Eddie Van Halen and Belgian classics like Kriek cherry beer and Tintin comic books.
Ironically, it’s bucketing rain when I board the 55-suite, 110-passenger-capacity ship in Amsterdam. Yet even a quick taste of my Seahorse Suite — with floor-to-ceiling windows and a king-sized bed — makes me feel at home on the Riverside Debussy.
The welcome platter features a bottle of Brut with macarons and chocolates. I freshen up in the glass-doored, walk-in shower with Natura Bissé products, stepping out on to the heated bathroom floor. (Not overheated like our planet, mind.)
After a traditional canal boat tour, I enjoy three hours at the Rijksmuseum, the ultimate Dutch art and history showcase. Rembrandt’s The Night Watch (1642) is undergoing restoration in a glassed-in chamber. Yet every detail of Vermeer’s masterpiece The Milkmaid (1658) is visible, from the distinctive Delft light to the reverent portrayal of a blue-aproned woman pouring milk.
A true feast with Riverside Luxury Cruises
It’s hungry work exploring small Dutch cities like Hoorn, a quaint port with horse-drawn carriages and flower baskets, and Kampen, a Hanseatic trading city noted for its 1844-founded cigar factory.
Normally, Riverside cruises in the Netherlands focus on the spring tulip season, when guests eat tulips. Just kidding! Actually, each day, I’m amazed by the quality and presentation of the meals — probably the best I’ve ever had on a cruise.
The Debussy’s kitchen is three times larger than that of a standard river cruise ship, and includes a bakery for bread and pastries. Emphasizing sustainability, items like fish, vegetables and cheese are sourced whenever possible from local markets.
A special Vintage Room dinner finds me feasting on duck breast, scallops and venison filet, paired with French champagne and Spanish red wine.
Even “regular” dinners feature appetizers like twice-baked aged Gouda souffle with roasted garlic veloute. Veal tenderloin with risotto and zucchini and halibut with shrimp pil pil are outstanding main courses. Desserts range from tiramisu to Kruimelkoek (Dutch apple crumble cake). And the servers offer as personalized service as the butlers who bring bedtime tea or anything else I desire to my suite.
I neglect the Heineken in my mini-bar, since my premium all-inclusive package includes unlimited handcrafted cocktails in the spacious Palm Bar. From Thyme after Thyme to Blackberry Lime Smash, the booze flows better than (obviously) the Rhine.
Reckoning with an uncertain river cruise future
Is there a better reminder that you can have it all and then lose it all than Waterloo?
In Belgium, I take a shore excursion from Brussels to the 1815 battlefield where Napoleon’s reign ended. I climb a commemorative 40-metre-tall grass mound topped with a lion statue for a sweeping panorama, and tour an excellent underground museum with artifacts and videos documenting the British-Prussian victory.
“Based on today’s weather, you might think Belgium is a tropical island,” quips an interpreter dressed as a 19th-century British officer at the cannon-firing demonstration.
Climate change reminders keep popping up. It’s 27 degrees Celsius in Antwerp — seven degrees higher than average for September. Smaller-than-usual Belgian fries are served at the 1842-opened Fritkot Max chip shop due to smaller potatoes grown during the drought, per my food tour guide.
Abundant jellyfish surround me as I swim in the warming North Sea off Vlissingen. This Dutch maritime hub also displays a captured Secord World War Nazi submarine on the waterfront.
Before the cruise ends in Rotterdam, I chat with on-board hotel director Ilija Marojevic about what all European river cruise operators are now facing: drought-related re-routing, rebooking and rescheduling.
He notes that Riverside — a family-owned, 2022-founded company — has certain advantages: “We have excellent suppliers and extra flexibility. Feedback goes directly to our owners. If we need to adapt something, it doesn’t take 20 emails or 50 calls. We must assume there will be more summers like this.” Marojevic floats the possibility that less drought-susceptible Dutch and Belgian waterways could become more popular regular routes.
As athletes say, you control the things you can control. We’ve all got a long way to go before we can control the beast called climate change.
If you go
A week-long Rhine cruise with Riverside Luxury Cruises starts at about $9,000 per person. Round-trip KLM airfare from Vancouver to Amsterdam is around $1,300.
The writer travelled as a guest of Riverside Luxury Cruises, which did not review or approve this story prior to publication.
