Until last fall, the closest either of us had come to taking a cruise of any kind was riding the ferry from San Diego to Coronado and back.

We had thoroughly enjoyed our trips to New York, New England, Canada and across five European countries. Each entailed taking planes, trains and various modes of public transportation, and we embraced them all. Cruises held so little appeal for us that — in our 28 years as a couple — we had never discussed the possibility of taking one.

What, then, compelled us to embark on our first cruise last October, let alone on Viking’s 15-day Grand European Tour, which started in Budapest, concluded in Amsterdam, and stopped in more than a dozen cities along the Danube, Main and Rhine rivers along the way?

The sheer novelty was part of the allure for a pair of lifelong landlubbers like us. Ditto the Viking brochure that promised the cruise would have “no kids, no smoking, no casinos” on a ship whose capacity was limited to 190 passengers and 53 crew members. The fact that all meals were included, along with a daily tour in each port of call, was an additional incentive.

So, too, was the opportunity to start the trip a few days early in Budapest — where both of George’s parents were born and raised — and being able to spend four days exploring Amsterdam on our own after the cruise ended.

George grew up in Frankfurt, Germany. But since he had only been to four of the 13 places our cruise visited, we were able to have a shared sense of discovery. This held equally true whether we were visiting thousand-year-old cities or chuckling at such amusingly named businesses as Fries Before Guys, French Tacos & Co., We Are Socks! and (in Budapest) Gringos Amigos — Mexican Food Factory.

Free airfare!

What sealed the deal, though, was an unsolicited promotional enticement we received in the mail from Viking, which offered to provide free roundtrip airfare if we signed up for one of its fall European cruises.

The fact that two San Diego couples we know spoke highly about their Viking cruises in Europe also helped sway us. So did their enthusiastic recommendation of an experienced local travel expert, Christy Scanell, the founder of Dream Vacations.

We could have arranged our cruise and flights directly through Viking, which offers at least eight other cruises that include the Danube. But it was invaluable to have a savvy agent who gave us great advice, including which Budapest and Amsterdam hotels to stay at. Christy, who handled all our air and land bookings, knew how to ensure the smoothest trip by navigating around any potential snafus.

How invaluable became evident when Viking wanted to fly us from San Diego to Toronto, then change planes to continue on to Europe. After more than a week of back-and-forth exchanges, Christy prevailed on Viking for us to fly nonstop on Lufthansa from San Diego to Munich, from where we took a short connecting flight to Budapest.

Landlubbers aboard

After a two-day stay at the plush but unpretentious Kempinski Corvinus Budapest hotel — which Christy highly recommended (and got us a nice upgrade) — we spent the next night and day aboard our Viking Longship, the Skadi, before it embarked for Vienna. The four-level ship was docked on the Pest side of the Danube near the historic Chain Bridge.

We welcomed having time to acclimate ourselves to the Skadi before setting sail. Built in 2013, the 443-foot ship is 37 feet at its widest and has four decks. All 95 staterooms face out with river views.

Our middle-deck Veranda Stateroom measured a compact 205 square feet. But it is extremely well-designed to maximize every inch, including the small balcony with two chairs outside our sliding glass door, which afforded us one dazzling view after another. Except, we soon learned, in the few instances during our cruise when another Viking ship docked so close to ours — just inches apart — we could easily have accessed the balcony of the room facing ours on the adjoining ship.

Floating mobile hotel

Our comfortable queen-size bed had ample room underneath to store our empty suitcases. One of the best parts of the cruise was that we only had to unpack and pack once. Our mobile hotel allowed us to visit more than a dozen towns and cities in three countries without once touching our suitcases.

The climate-controlled room had a closet, a bureau that contained six drawers and a small refrigerator. There was also a 40-inch flat screen TV facing the bed, a chair, a bathroom with a heated marble floor, hairdryer and steam-free mirror, 110- and 220-volt outlets and USB ports, a safe, two bathrobes and two pairs of slippers. Bottled water was free and replenished twice a day.

As cruise newbies, we appreciated how easy it was to follow the clear instructions and daily schedules of the ship. The four-page Viking Daily informed us of the time and destination of each shore excursion. It also previewed each evening’s cultural and recreational programs in the large, attractive lounge, which we avoided mostly because the resident singer-pianist made classics by the Eagles, Led Zeppelin, Barry Manilow and Billy Joel sound as if they were all the same song.

Our room, 203, was blissfully quiet despite being only two doors down from the ship’s reception desk, and — just beyond — the automatic glass doors that led to the gangplank when we were docked. We were also conveniently close to the dining room.

Down the hatch!

On vacations, we always consider not having to cook or wash dishes a treat. The consistently appealing food on our maiden voyage was a luxury. The breakfast buffet — a European-style spread with a chef making to-order egg dishes — was decent. But the three-course lunches and dinners were consistently high-quality, offering a variety of delicious options.

Each lunch and dinner menu included a fish entree, which was good for us pescatarians. For example, one lunch menu offered the choices of salmon and spinach lasagna, Cobb salad and a BLT sandwich, with soup or salad as the starter.

Each evening’s dinner options included a “regional specialties tasting menu” highlighting the cuisine of where the ship was at the time. Passengers could also opt for items from the regular menu. The food presentation was elegant but not stuffy.

Main courses ranged from seared flounder filet and smoked trout to Angus rib-eye steak and roast leg of lamb. Some days we skipped a meal because we were so full. Other passengers noted how the amount of walking at each tour stop helped burn off some calories.

Wine and beer are complimentary at lunch and dinner and are often paired with the entrees to reflect the region the cruise was passing through.

We sometimes left the dining room for a less-crowded spot on the ship’s Aquavit Terrace, an indoor/outdoor area where passengers could dine while gliding past quaint European towns. Unfortunately, the Aquavit had only five tables and we sometimes arrived too late to snag a spot.

Out of our bubbles

Wherever we sat for meals, we almost always shared a table with fellow passengers. The majority were American retirees from across the nation. Nearly all were friendly and open to conversation. Almost no one discussed politics, despite — or, perhaps, because — our cruise took place just a few weeks before the 2024 presidential election.

At one dinner we mentioned being dazzled by the exquisite whistling of a Bach cantata we heard from afar during our guided tour of a 1,036-year-old abbey in the Austrian town of Melk. The couple across the table, Fred and Judy, beamed. The phantom whistler we’d heard was Fred, who had placed seventh in the annual World Whistling Champion competition some years earlier.

We probably would not have encountered our fellow passengers if we weren’t on a cruise together. Sharing the same ship for 15 days encouraged us all to get out of our bubbles. It was a welcome opportunity to break bread with people who, with few exceptions, appeared to come from quite different walks of life than us.

Fair weather

We chose the month of October for our cruise in hopes the weather would be mild, and it was. Daytime temperatures ranged mostly from the mid-50s to the high 60s and it rained only twice. More importantly, the river was high and flowing.

That was not the case for another couple on board whose summer 2023 Viking cruise coincided with a major European drought. The water levels were so low then that few ships could leave their docks, and the couple’s cruise morphed into a series of extended bus excursions.

The price of our cruise included daily shore excursions that were satisfying to us. Some were by bus, some on foot, and some a combination of both. We would join the morning or afternoon excursion led by a tour guide, then explore on our own.

We didn’t take any of the optional excursions, which cost extra and ranged from a six-hour sausage-making class in Regensburg to an 81/ 2-hour day trip to Munich.

Our tour guides were uniformly knowledgeable about their locales and most spoke with warmth. But our guide in Nuremburg, Germany, was clearly peeved when some cruise passengers (including us) asked to use the restrooms at the start of a long trek through Nuremberg’s Imperial Castle grounds. However, on the bus, the same guide’s account of the city’s infamous Nazi rally grounds — which stretched the size of five football fields — was soberly detailed.

In Regensburg, one day earlier, we had a terrific, twenty-something tour guide named Kristin. She was in tears as she expressed sadness and anger over the horrific treatment of Jewish people in her city and throughout Germany during and before World War II. She introduced us to “stumbling stones,” four-inch brass plates embedded in the ground to honor former Jewish residents who were victims of the Holocaust. We subsequently saw stumbling stones in other cities during our trip.

Locks, stock and barrel

To Viking’s credit, just about everything on our cruise ran with near clockwork precision. Except us.

After a walking tour of Nuremberg’s Imperial Castle and free time to explore the city, we waited (and waited) at the wrong corner for the Viking-chartered bus to return us to our soon-to-depart vessel. After phoning our ship, we hastily took a taxi. Our cruise director was waiting when the cab drove up, and — as we paid — asked the driver for our receipt. Soon after we reboarded, we were reimbursed in full for our unplanned cab ride.

Between Budapest and Amsterdam, our cruise went through 68 locks on the Danube, Main and Rhine rivers. We watched in giddy anticipation from the sun deck of our ship as we passed through the first few locks, which would raise or lower our ship to match the water level of the next stretch of river.

What we did not learn until several days into our cruise — and what none of Viking’s promotional materials appear to disclose — is that the sun deck would be closed to all passengers for nearly one third of our 15-day cruise, due to the many locks and aging bridges our ship passed through.

This not only denied access to the best outdoor vantage point on board, but also to the sun deck’s chairs, tables, comfy couches, oversize chess set, shuffleboard court, putting green and a walking track that offered 360-degree views of the rivers and shorelines so panoramic you easily forgot you were walking in circles.

When we asked when the sun deck would reopen, different crew members offered different answers that ranged from one or two days to three or four. There seemed to be a similar lack of consistency when we inquired why, of the three news networks on our in-room TV — Bloomberg, Fox and CNN — usually only Fox was available. That was a very minor issue, unlike the five days we could not access the sun deck.

But the opportunity to skim across across three major European rivers, each with one breathtaking vista after another, was an experience we will vividly recall for a long time. And while our next “cruise” will once again be from San Diego to Coronado and back, we are certainly open to another intimate river journey — especially if the accommodations and food are as inviting as on our Grand European Tour cruise.

Distributed by Tribune News Service.