Letters: How to leave more money in your pocket as you cruise the Danube

Regarding “Sail Into a Fairy Tale” by Rosemary McClure, April 30: We had a marvelous European river tour last summer on Grand Circle Cruise Line, which offered a near-identical trip to the Viking ships we docked next to each night, except our cruise was a lot less expensive.

Plus Grand Circle and its mother company, Overseas Adventure Travel, make a point of giving back to the communities where they travel.

Laura Newman

Santa Barbara

Puerto Vallarta, wheelchair-accessible

I have cruised to the Mexican Riviera annually for several years, and I am increasingly disappointed that the major cruise lines offer no wheelchair-accessible shore excursions.

I was delighted to find a solution on a recent visit to Puerto Vallarta. Two sisters, originally from Yakima, Wash., offer private excursions in wheelchair-accessible vans.

They also offer accessible transportation in the Puerto Vallarta area as well as rental of mobility equipment to hotel guests and residents.

They can be found at www.beachcrossers.com.

Dave Novitski

Glendale

Dreams of Ischia, Italy

Thanks for writing about Ischia [“Creating Their Own Joy,” by Joy Y. Wang, April 23]. My Danish aunt moved there as a young single mother somewhere around 1970. She never left. My first European trip was to Italy and included a three-day trip to Ischia to visit her and her son. Her son took me around my first day to introduce me to friends. At each stop, we had an espresso. By the end of the day I must’ve consumed 14 espressos, and my hair was tingling and toes and fingers were numb. In my aunt’s jewelry store, I heard her speaking English, Danish, French, German and Italian, all fluently. My last trip to Italy was two years ago with my sister and her Italian-born husband. Unfortunately, I had work obligations and didn’t have time to join them on the leg of their trip to Ischia. I’m hoping to go back in September.

Ken R. Nielsen

West Hollywood

They’re dancing on the river

Regarding “Being Charming Is Job One,” by Rosemary McClure, April 23: Gentlemen hosts are also available on domestic steamboats cruising our nation’s rivers. They ride free of charge and earn their keep nightly because a significant number of cruisers are solo women who have perfected the graceful art of ballroom dancing decades prior.

What great fun it is to watch them dance nonstop the entire evening, dressed to the nines.

Riverboats handle the subject of gentlemen hosts mingling too much with the women with humor. According to their onboard handout, any host caught in a guest’s room will “have to dogpaddle to shore the next day.”

Kyle Kimbrell

Playa del Rey

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