Europe Cruises

This is a catch-all shelf: European sailings that don't sit neatly under the Mediterranean, Northern Europe or river pages. In practice it holds three kinds of trip - round trips from Southampton down to Spain, Portugal and the Canary Islands, a few Northern Europe sailings from Copenhagen and Amsterdam, and Rhine and Danube river cruises from Amsterdam and Budapest. If you know which of those you want, the dedicated region pages have more choice.

The Canary Islands sailings are the distinctive part. They are winter-sun cruises built for the British market, and the shape is consistent: twelve to fourteen nights round trip from Southampton, a couple of sea days each way, and calls at Vigo or A Coruna, Lisbon, Madeira and three or four of the islands - Tenerife, Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, La Palma. Cunard, Princess, P&O and Fred. Olsen all run versions between autumn and spring. The appeal is the no-fly start: no airport, no baggage limit, and the ship is the holiday from the first evening.

The river sailings here follow the same rules as any European river cruise: small ships, a port most days, and water levels that can rewrite the trip. In 2026 a dry summer left the Danube at Budapest within a few centimetres of its 2018 record low, and operators were still swapping ships and running coach transfers on the Rhine and Danube into October. The river region page goes into that in more detail.

Sources: rolcruise.co.uk, cruisemapper.com, travelextra.ie