Cruising Down The Rivers, Europe May 2024

MS L'Europe

Dates of trip:

30th April 2024 - 20th May 2024

I have rarely posted trip reports in the past few years; I am afraid I got side-tracked by other things. I will begin again with my most recent trip. Last May I spent three weeks on a river cruise from Strasbourg to Constanta on the Black Sea along the Rhine, Main and Danube rivers. I'll open with a report on the boat and the company. 

I chose CroisiEurope for several reasons: their single supplement was less excessive than other river cruises and I was able to combine two cruises of 12 days from Strasbourg to Budapest followed by 9 days from Budapest to the Danube Delta. That became a seamless 21 day cruise. Another advantage was that all meals and most drinks were included but excursions were not. That kept the costs down by allowing me to choose the excursions I preferred without paying to visit towns I had seen previously. I enjoyed the cruise but there were pros and cons. 

The forward lounge

The pros included: 

• Cabin. My French Balcony cabins on MS L'Europe, initially double then twin, had comfortable beds and reasonable space but the showers were very cramped. 
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• Adults only. I doubt there were any passengers under 30. As an old curmudgeon that suited me fine. I don't think it was an active company policy, just that the cruise activities were not designed for children or adolescents. 
• Excellent food. The company promotes their culinary standard and I enjoyed most of the meals, even though as a diabetic I chose to leave some of the high-carb sides and desserts on the plate. 
  
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• Alcohol included. The choices of wines and beers were limited but acceptable and ordinary spirits were included. Higher priced options were available for payment. 
• Navigation staff were excellent but rarely seen after initial introductions. 
• Service staff were always polite and did their jobs well.
• Hospitality staff tried hard within limitations. 
• The trip itself. I loved watching the world pass by as we slowly and quietly cruised by. The many locks; changing landscapes; occasional ancient ruins on hills; wandering through small towns I had not been to before; coffee and snacks (and authentic gulyas) in little cafes; chatting to locals in mutually incomprehensible languages punctuated by lots of gestures and smiles; planning ways to use public transport in Strasbourg, Vienna and Budapest; etc etc. Those aspects of travelling tend to outweigh all the cons for me. But I’ll list them anyway to help anyone considering a river cruise. 
  
  
  

  

  
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The cons included: 

• Language. The French company advertises that all staff speak at least English and some are multilingual. That may be true but only a small number of English-speakers were on board the boat and we found all announcements began with a long statement in French followed by a much briefer English version. This became worse when a large group from Brazil joined the second cruise and a long Portuguese announcement was added before the English version. On some excursions, possibly to save money, a bilingual guide was used in the same way: a long French description followed by a very short English version. Some excursions had a dedicated English guide, but not all. That became very frustrating for all the English speakers. 
• Management Inflexibility. A couple of examples. I had paid for an excursion to the Danube Delta when booking the trip. About ten days in I discovered by chance that we were no longer going to that region because of the proximity to the Ukraine border and we were now going to Constanta, further south on the Black Sea. A wise decision but I could not get approval from the ship's management to change excursions or a refund. Eventually a change to the Constanta excursion required several emails back to my Australian booking agent who contacted CroisiEurope head office. Another example. I had worked out a method to reach Bucharest from our final port of Oltenitsa in Romania using a cab to the local rail station, train to an outer Bucharest suburb and another cab to the centre. At disembarkation I and several others found that buses had been arranged direct to Bucharest for several groups. There were plenty of vacant seats but when we asked if we could pay to join the buses we were told that was not possible as we should have booked those before the boat trip. Our trip took several more hours than theirs.
• No laundry Facilities. There were absolutely no laundry facilities for passengers, I even tried bribing the housekeeping staff without success. Making life more difficult the sailing schedule from Strasbourg to Budapest rarely had us in a port near a laundrette long enough to do the job. I became aware of this after booking and bought a “travel clothesline” but doing this every few days and ducking under damp clothes to use the bathroom became a pain. After using a nearby laundrette in Budapest the second trip included some suitable ports with nearby laundrettes. 
  
• Entertainment. Two excellent musicians & vocalists were on board and performed during the complete trip. They were good but I expected more variety to fill 21 days on board. I hoped for some form of local entertainment as we passed through many countries. Instead we only had one night, which was quite good, as we passed through Bulgaria. On other nights and some afternoons apart from the two musicians we had the sort of party games I would have expected in a retirement home. The hospitality staff tried hard but there is a limited amount of entertainment in repeated word games, name-that-town, name-that-song and similar games. Luckily I enjoy reading and had loaded enough books on my kindle app to fill my evenings. But it was disappointing.
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A birthday

Chili

My slow cooker breakfast chili.

Makes 10-12 individual serves.

I developed this recipe over the past year or so and found a one-cup serve did not spike me at breakfast. Of course, it can be eaten at other times of day if you prefer. 

Ingredients 

All are approximate, American equivalents in brackets.

• 1kg Minced beef (2-3 lbs ground beef)
• One cup chopped celery
• 2 large or 3 medium sliced carrots
• 1 sliced medium to large onion
• 1 can diced tomato
• 3 crushed/minced cloves garlic
• 1 crushed or grated knob of ginger
• 150gm dry weight (4-5 oz) red kidney beans
• 2 tbs paprika
• 1 tbs cumin seeds
• 1 tbs oregano
• 1 quill or 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 cup beef stock
• Chili to taste. I use 2 or 3 very hot birds-eye from my garden. Use your favourite.

Method

I set this up in the evening and leave it in the slow-cooker on low overnight. It can also be cooked in a large saucepan on the stove or in the oven but you'll have to work out your own timing for those methods.

At least 8 hours prior put aside the red kidney beans in a couple of cups of water to soak.

I use a wok for preparation but any large skillet will do. I use olive oil for medium heat frying. Fry the meat in batches, separating any clumps and add to the slow cooker when browned. At this stage the slow cooker is on high.

Add a little more oil and fry the onion on medium heat until translucent. Add the ginger and garlic and continue stir-frying. As the onion begins caramelising add the carrot and celery. Stir-fry until those are beginning to soften then add the can of diced tomatoes and all the spices and herbs. When the mixture begins bubbling transfer to the slow-cooker and change the temperature to low.

De-glaze the wok or skillet with the stock (I sometimes finish the de-glaze with a little red wine) and add the liquid to the slow-cooker. Drain the beans and add them to the mix and stir well. If the mix is too dry add a little water but not too much. Put the lid on and leave it on low for six to eight hours.

I have a one-cup serve for breakfast next morning and store the remainder, after removing the cinnamon quill, in one-cup containers in the freezer.

Options

I often add other veges in modest portions if I have them in the fridge: capsicum (bell pepper), cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower etc. Similarly I might add some extra herbs from the garden (thyme, mint, parsley, basil) or other spices (nutmeg, turmeric) for some flavour variations. I have not worked out the carb count but this does not spike me after breakfast. The main carbs are from the beans, onion and carrot if you want to cut further.

Cheers, Alan

Everything in Moderation - Except Laughter

How Many Grams of Carbs Per Day Should I Eat?

How many carbs? What are the limits?

Now that the diabetes world has begun to wake up to the fact that type 2 diabetes is a condition of flawed carbohydrate tolerance I see this question repeatedly on forums and reddit. The time has come to make a brief but clear statement on that subject. 

It is per meal which matters, not per day. Your blood glucose rises and falls after every meal or snack containing carbohydrates. Your blood glucose is not stored up for one big spike at the end of the day. 

My meter used at my peak after eating guided me to these personal per meal limits:

• Breakfast: <10gms carb
• Lunch: <15gms carb
• Dinner: 40gms+ carb
• Snacks: the same as the previous meal but not more than 15gm.

But those are just my personal limits. Every type 2 has slightly different levels of insulin resistance, first phase insulin response, levels of fitness, other health problems, signalling flaws for glycogen release, dietary limitations, the list goes on. Therefore your limits will be different to mine. 

Discover them using this technique at your peak timing after meals: Test, Review, Adjust