Allure boat/barge tour reviews — 1 to 24 of 24

Experiencing the Dutch countryside via bike. Loved cycling through the quaint villages. The landscape was breathtaking. This trip certainly exceeded my expectations. The crew of the Allure was awesome.

Despite chilly and wet weather it was a terrific trip. The Allure was very comfortable with good heating in the cabins. Food, service, crew and guide were all excellent. Friendly and efficient. The biking - distances and routes were great. Our guide was very knowledgeable and pleasant.
Highly recommend.

The staff/crew was amazing. The food was also amazing. The barge was a very clean but tired. There was condensation on the bedroom walls (exterior) and it would run down and make the sheets wet.

This trip had a great staff. Ana went out of her way to prepare food to fit My dietary needs. The ship is going to be repaired better. Out tour guide , first mate and captain was great. A good time was had by all. No one had control of the weather. ( a little cold windy and wet some days). Loved the Tulips! The country side and flower market were real high lights.

My highlights were the tulip fields, Keukenhof, the flower auction, and the functioning windmill. I also loved the camaraderie with staff and fellow travellers.

Some improvements:
The rating was easy but I think that pertains to the flatness of the path. biking between 30-65 kms per day wasn't easy with the wind conditions. Some clarification might be useful.

Also, some of the times and plans for the day were fluid and sometimes confusing. Still liked it an awful lot though.

The views along the Moselle River were spectacular. I especially loved riding bikes to the quaint little towns and through the vineyards. Every meal on the barge was delicious.

Stopping at local towns to sight see and hit a cafe mid-morning and for a glass of wine or beer in the afternoon. Allure barge never made enough food for our group, rarely made stops while biking at cafe’s or towns for coffee or drinks in the mornings or afternoons. Felt rushed to get from point A to B and not enjoying the ride.

The only thing keeping this trip from 5 stars is the boat we were on. The Allure was disappointing.

The magnificent route, the crew’s attentive service, and the interesting side trips by the guide. The guide was very affable.
The food was amazing

The cycling signals were not to accepted standards and inconsistent.

Each day was wonderful and the staff was great and very attentive.
Because we did not all have E bikes the guide needed a better cornering and swipe system. The were separated in towns with traffic or if we had to make twist and turns in the villages.
Reservations would have been a nice suggestion on the night we had to eat in town as it was hard to find open seating for our group.
Our weather was quite warm and our cabin was hot at night. A fan to circulate the air would have made sleeping easier.
Overall a fantastic experience.

The Mosel River valley is quite beautiful and made for a great cycling trip. The Allure staff were great. Very helpful and cheerful. That said the boat is in need of a refresh including maybe at least fans in the cabins which gif hit and stuffy. The cycling guide seemed I’ll prepared to work with a group of various cycling tour experience.

Great trip. I highly recommend this. What a wonderful week-great group, great staff, great sights, great food. Fantastic tulips!

We did some of the biking with the whole group, but mostly we did self-guided biking. The entire group (19 people with the guide) was just too big to bike as one group. Three small groups of riders (with 4, 2, and 2 riders) would usually ride separately from the group and guide, making the main group a reasonable size. The GPS software was excellent, however people needed a unit to attach their cell phone to the bicycle. External batteries and Bluetooth earbuds were also very helpful accessories. The Keukenhof Gardens were a must see on any visit to Amsterdam. Such wonderful colors with thoughtful designs/patterns created by the workers in the gardens. The action packed visit to the Aalsmeer flower auction was an experience that people will not want to miss. The visitation/tour to the family cheese farm in Gouda was both yummy and informative.... very sincere and nice people own this farm. The barge did not have enough biking helmets and only sizes small and medium, so we would suggest you bring your own. The bikes were 7 speed, not 11 speed, however these were really good bikes with comfortable seats and 7 speed was good enough. We did not use e-bikes. The terrain was flat, as mentioned, however the very strong winds should have been mentioned in the information. Wind would get stronger in the afternoons and we had wind everyday, which the boat captain said was typical. The guide, Anne, was always willing and able to answer questions and was an extremely capable guide. Anne was a strong biker and guided us safely through areas.

One problem became evident at the time of the one significant incident when one client while riding her bicycle down a sloping gravel road ineptly/incorrectly applied her front brake only, and somersaulted, leading to a serious leg injury. The group problem as far as I am concerned was only the lack of easy communication between the cycle group leader and the last riders in the group. The designated last rider needs a device such as a small UHF transceiver, or where mobile phone coverage is a certainty a tested/checked cellphone link, to be able to immediately alert the leader of any problems behind.

The journey was well organized. The crew were fantastic, friendly, obliging and fun. The food was world class delicious and beautifully presented at all times. Our guide was very nice and did her utmost to adapt to the differing expectations of individual riders. We loved that she also took us on evening walks after dinner.

We were a bit late in the season so weather not great. Food brilliant.

Excellent staff, excellent food. Very professional.

I loved your barge/bike trip!! Would do it again to somewhere else, but I need a travel companion!! Thats the only thing holding me back.

Everything about the Allure and holiday was just amazing,a holiday we won't forget in a long time. The staff just so helpful and nothing was ever a trouble, bikes and our leaders just great. Thank you.

While I was totally satisfied with everything, I had to ask for a change of sheets after 2 weeks. Our cycling guides tried their best but our 1st had a little communication problem. Our 2nd was great. Overall I would go back tomorrow if I could. The food was great and plenty of it. The crew marvelous. In all a great holiday. Very easy cycling.
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We had a lady guide, who was very quiet and we had a large group (20) which made her job difficult as the people at the back could not hear her. Some of her instructions were not clear and maybe there should have been an instruction on road usage in Europe eg keep to the right hand side of the road (coming from Australia) . Understanding the various traffic lights was also a bit of an issue as we come from a relatively small country town with NO traffic lights and no cycle paths we had to be extremely careful negotiation some of the busier roads as there were 2 sets of traffic lights to negotiate while crossing the roads. It was a wonderful trip and greatly enjoyed by all. The only thing that marred the experience was an unfortunate accident on the very first day which resulted in a serious leg injury.

Our 1st guide was not quite as good as our 2nd. She wasn't as clear on her instructions as she could have been.
On the barge we had to ask for our sheets to be changed after 2 weeks. Everything else was clean and well run. Ours may have been an oversight. This in no way stopped us from having a great holiday. Loved everything from start to finish. Would love another trip on the same boat.

Walked onto the Allure at Koblenz in Sept 2014 and immediately knew that the week ahead would be enjoyable. Skipper Martin's smiling face was ever present and the crew were simply obliging. Our cycle guide was a scream...we lost her regularly as we stopped off for the occasional German ale. It was with heavy heart that I left the Allure in Merzig 7 days later.

Good trip, crew great, not one meal however with a German main dish!

The guide needs to get off the Dutch bias. We were in Germany so we would have liked to see some things from the German point of view not the Dutch "bias" to say it nicely!