Narrator
Here is your Luxury Travel Captain, Allen Suss.
Allen Suss
Welcome everyone. This is Allen from TravelManagers Australia, the Travel Cruise Expert. bringing you today’s expert, Jen Pagett. National Accounts Manager Australia of Uniworld Boutique River Cruises. Hello, or G’day as we say in Australia. How are you and thank you for coming on Jen.
Jen Pagett
Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. I’m really excited to talk a little bit of travel today with you.
Allen Suss
Firstly, tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got involved in travel.
Jen Pagett
Oh, I started traveling quite a bit when I left school and I really just loved going overseas, and meeting people and I studied University for a little while too, but actually decided that I wanted to be a travel agent. So that was how I started my career in travel.
And actually when I was working, I was working as a travel agent, we had the back room, and we had this old brochure from Uniworld at the back, when I was cleaning up the back room, and I found it and I started to slip through these pages and I hadn’t heard of you Uniworld before, I was pretty, still relatively new to the industry and, you know a lot to learn, you know, the best out of anyone, Allen. And I found this beautiful brochure and I really just fell in love with what Uniworld do and what they have in their beautiful ship so I took it home and I took it over to my mom’s place and I showed her and I said, Look how beautiful this is. And then I saw a job come up with Uniworld, a couple of months later and I just grabbed the opportunity to go and work there and actually I’ve been with Uniworld for four years now.
Allen Suss
OK, and now, perhaps, let’s start with the most obvious question, why do you think people should consider traveling with Uniworld, on a river cruise.
Jen Pagett
Oh, well, that’s a great question, and might be a little biased because I absolutely am just so proud to work for this company. But I think the big thing that sets us apart from all the other river cruise lines out there, there’s so much choice and I feel there is a little bit of a misconception, that every river cruise line is the same, and they’re all all inclusive and they’re all luxurious, but I feel that we are in, in a league of our own in the sense that each of our beautiful ships are completely different to the others and I sent you the images, Allen. Hopefully we can share with some of your clients, too, but no matter where you are in the world you’re going to be in that destination when you’re onboard the ship so you know our ship in Paris we couldn’t move down to say, Budapest, because she’s just designed to be 20th century crazy and flair, so that’s what I absolutely love the most about Uniworld, and why people should really consider us, because every time you travel with us you’re going to get a completely different destination experience. You won’t just be in a hotel anywhere in the world, you’re really going to be in that destination, so I think that’s what really truly sets us apart from everyone else.
Allen Suss
Yeah, look Jen, I have been on a river cruise or two and it must be is my favourite means of travel. And what I do love about traveling on river cruise is that you’re on a fairly calm waters, you are on a river, you can see the land, which is like 200 metres away, 400 metres away whatever and every day you stop most days, you do stop in some little town, some big city, and it’s just so interesting. Now, do you have any favourite places by the way, while we’re talking about places.
Jen Pagett
Yeah, I feel that’s a hard question to ask anyone in travel, right Allen
Allen Suss
It is sitting in Paris on the Champs Elysée, having a coffee, and watching the world go past.
Jen Pagett
Europe is my go-to, but I think my favourite is Germany, I absolutely just love that even if I’ve been, I’ve been lucky enough to go quite a few times now, and even in low season, you know, typically those shoulder seasons away from the summer. Every time I’ve been, I’ve stumbled across a beer festival or a dancing festival, or a street parade or I just love that they’ve always got something going on and I just really know how to have a good time, so I’d say Germany was probably one of my favourites, but I would love to go and do something like Eastern Europe. I’ve only dabbled to this I would love to go and see what that’s all about, too.
Allen Suss
So, we’re in Germany’s is your favourite place or places.
Jen Pagett
I would say, when I did the Amsterdam to Budapest itinerary with Uniworld, it was the first cruise I was lucky enough to go on. And we, we did a little day trip out to Rothenberg. Have you been, it’s a cute little warm medieval city, and it’s known for being very Christmas Eve and not at Christmas time we were there in August, with all the beautiful Christmas shops and the little rows and German houses and everything is just so picturesque so that will probably be, you know what, take a peek for so many great towns to choose from in Germany.
Allen Suss
I shouldn’t admit this, but I love the food in Germany and people also love their beer, but people don’t walk around getting drunk and plastered and all that, they just enjoy, enjoy life and the food. Because everybody. A lot of people think that German food is very heavy and, and, but it’s not. It there is an enormous variety of food, and they’re very proud of the way they cooked it and prepare the food and what I also love, is I love the cakes, go to a cake shop and they beautifully displayed and sitting in a cafe or at just outside a cafe, if it’s a warm day, and having a coffee with a, with a cake there, or an apple strudel with cream, you know, that is, that’s nice that you know what, do it in Melbourne too. If you, if you find the right place, why not?
Jen Pagett
Oh absolutely.
Allen Suss
They’re all very European. Yeah, but usually the cake. The cakes, you know, usually in Germany or Austria or wherever in Europe, they are very proud of their cake making, and if the cakes don’t come up to scratch, they can’t sell them. So, they have to be pretty good. Let’s talk a little bit, only talking about the places we enjoy, the food we enjoy. What does Uniworld cruise or have the river cruises. What places,
Jen Pagett
Yeah, absolutely. We have extensive ships over Europe, but actually, we only have 20 in our fleet in total, because something that’s really important to us at Uniworld is not just being the biggest, having the most amount of ships out there, or the biggest ships out there but actually staying true to being boutique which is in our name, being small, and being the best, in the region that we sail.
So beautiful itineraries, all the way through Central Europe, a really popular one with Aussies at the moment, I’ll let you know is Budapest out to Bucharest, so that Eastern Europe block that’s only been, you know, relatively recently opened to Western tourism.
We’ve got three ships in France, so they’ve all got their own beautiful individual character so when you do them back-to-back you get to experience three different, you know boutique experiences on that.
We’ve got the brand-new ship in Portugal, sailing along the Douro River Valley, which Aussies love that number two selling itinerary.
But also, with we are only cruise lines to operate in the Venetian Lagoon. So, I mean I could talk at length about that itinerary maybe we can chat another day, but it’s a beautiful program where we got the brand-new SS La Venezia, next year she goes around the lagoon, and she stops in Torcello, Burano and Chioggia. We dock right next to St Mark’s Basilica that’s a great itinerary, but, while we are so known for Europe.
We also have beautiful programs along the Mekong, on the Ganges. We’ve got a program along the Nile, so we’ve got a few destinations like that, and the ships are so different now because they also reflect the regions that they’re sailing there too so we’ve got lots to choose from lots of places for our guests to experience,
Allen Suss
Bucharest you realise, Bucharest, used to be called, the streets are incredibly wide, it used to be sort of Paris of Eastern Europe. It was, until the Communists took it over and all the rest of it, but it used to be a magnificent city and of course, the language is interesting. I noticed, it’s because they speak Romanian, but a lot a lot of French words and stuff like that, and so if you could speak French, you start to sort of understand part of the language which I found very interesting and very unusual.
Jen Pagett
That’s really interesting that you say that because a lot of our crew come from Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary or Poland, so a lot of the crew when you get on board and you meet them they are fluent in their home country’s language, but also French, a little bit of German, a bit of Spanish and completely fluent in English too. So, that’s really interesting that you say that there’s some similarities with Romanian because I know that traveling through those Eastern European countries, sometimes the signs can be really intimidating because they’re written in different characters than what we usually use, so that was an interesting fact that I’ve just learned from you, Allen
Allen Suss
So, you’ve got the, we can talk about different cruise ships. I was recently in Portugal, and in Porto where the ships go along through the river, and it really is seriously interesting. And, of course, the some of the views you see there, because you go past some of the wine district where they are growing the grapes and whatever and they, they’re on they are grown on the side of hills, mountains and whatever. And it’s just magnificent on a beautiful day, sunny day, it just looks absolutely magnificent. Anyway, that’s something else.
Jen Pagett
I could talk about that for a moment if you don’t mind.
Allen Suss
Why is it so popular with Australians, you mentioned that previously? Why is it?
Jen Pagett
Yeah, it’s really interesting, I feel in Australia, we love to just pick off, you know the bucket list ones, like Amsterdam to Budapest, perhaps a seven-night Rhine itinerary first, and now we’re looking for different destinations, and I feel that’s where Portugal comes in.
And interestingly, it hasn’t been, you know, as you know populated say as along the Rhine, on the main Danube Canal as well. So now we’re starting to see a lot more operators in the region, so it’s kind of, if you’re traveling, now you’re going to be one of the first to experience it, but actually what’s really interesting you’re saying about wineries on the hills and the views that you get, actually, because it is quite, you know, dangerous to travel at night, we don’t travel at night at all on that river, so very different to Central Europe where perhaps sailing over the evening and wake up in your new port. Actually along the Douro, you’re sailing during the day so you get to see all of that beautiful scenery while you’re perhaps having dinner or breakfast or over lunch, so it’s a great itinerary for lots of sightseeing.
Allen Suss
And of course, one of the main cities that you go to is Porto, which is a beautiful city Porto, and the ship’s park around. Porto is, there’s a river in between, which runs through the city on one side of his port on the other side is Gaia, is the other part of the city. And there is a serious rivalry between the two, the two banks. And, yeah, and also Porto, of course, is where Port comes from, the drink. And on the one side of the river, there’s a lot of Cellars and very well-known names on Port, so people that should know their Port would be, would be in paradise. And I went into one of those cellars, and I was looking at some of the bottles and one of the bottles went back to about 1742. That was the, that was originally bottled in 1742, was still there. So that’s quite amazing. Now, we don’t really have much more time, we will have to have another podcast. But why don’t we talk a little bit about the accommodation on the ship, and perhaps the meals.
Jen Pagett
Absolutely. Well, let me start with the food, then you know that food and cruise, they just go hand in hand, with delicious, amazing food. I’ve done, I’ve been lucky enough to cruise a couple of times it’s been a while now so I can really speak to how delicious the food is on board, in what you can expect at night-time, we’ve got beautiful four course meals with matching wine. We want to make sure that you’re trying the local cuisine. So, on that menu of the different courses, they’ll always be something that’s typical to the region that you’re in that day, so you’re mentioning the German food before you absolutely get a Weiner Schnitzel, on the menu, while you’re traveling through that part of the world, or a Hungarian goulash when you’re traveling through Budapest. So, you want to make sure you’re trying the local foods, and the local wines, but also, if you just feel like a piece of meat, or a piece of fish, you can absolutely have that on the menu too so there’s lots of lighter options.
Something that sets us apart too, is that our chefs cook everything on board, so from every croissant for breakfast, to every dinner roll in the evening so if you do have any, I guess, strict dietary requirements. We can cater for that, too. And also, obviously, we love it. We love to enjoy a glass of wine at dinner or a glass of bubbles in the in the lounge beforehand, so everything is included, including free flow alcohol, so anytime a day, you can have your afternoon a whiskey or a gin and tonic to your cabin, so it’s very inclusive. We take the inclusive up a notch with Uniworld too. So, it’s beautiful to try lots of different foods and drinks while you’re on board too, and I’ve got so caught up in the food I forgot what else you asked me.
Allen Suss
I remembered but I do like talking about the food because I love European food. The, I did ask you about the accommodation on board the ship?
Jen Pagett
Absolutely. So, you would know, and I’m sure that a lot of your clients have perhaps experienced ocean or river cruise before throughout Europe, we have to get through the lock system. So, that means our ships, are really quite narrow. So we’re looking at, you know, smaller ends of the scale in terms of cabins, but it’s completely compatible with all of the river cruise lines in the market but they’re designed so beautifully you have so much space to unpack and you put your suitcase, under the bed so that you don’t have to worry about that and, you know, every city or country that you wake up in the unpack once thing, has totally ruined travel for me. I love that. But, also we’ve got our beautiful. And then we’ve got our beautiful suites. So, you know you’ve got things from a large picture window, French Balcony in our suites which offer a lot more space, but also a butler service which I would absolutely love to do, have someone to wait on you hand and foot and also pack your bags and unpack your bags and really take care of you to that extra level too. So there’s lots of choice and I guess that means a lot of choice, and a lot of difference in pricing too, depending on what, what you want to experience on your holiday.
Allen Suss
Yeah look, that’s, that’s so true. What I am amazed, whilst the cabins are, they have to be smaller than sort of, but they’re not small. They’re, they’re compact, but they’re able to create, create so much room in a compact space which totally, totally amazes me. And of course, they have their own separate, their separate bathrooms included there within, which include showers, toilets, all the rest of it, so you know, and for ladies require good lighting in the in the bathroom, when they, so they can put the makeup on, do their hair and all the rest of it, it’s fantastic. I imagine that your cruise ships are no different to anyone else.
Jen Pagett
Absolutely and I think the one thing to take away too is that nothing from our ships comes out of a catalogue, everything is unique to that ship. We’ve got beautiful silk-linked statewide walls that dampen the sound in those cabins. The attention to detail on these two walls and embroidery, original artworks in the cabins when I traveled on the River Princess. I had an original Matisse sketch in my cabin, actually that was really beautiful. Touches like that that make it really special too.
Allen Suss
We really have come to the end of our little discussion today; we’ll have to have another one because there’s a lot more to talk about. It’s sad, we do have to come to an end, and I’m sure a lot, a lot of the people that are listening to the podcast want to hear more from you.
And in fact, I invite people if they want if they do have questions of Jen from Uniworld Boutique River Cruises, send the question into me, and I will certainly ask Jen, to give you the answers and the replies that are required, anyway for today I want to thank Jen. Jen Padgett, who’s the National Sales, National Accounts Manager, Australia Uniworld Boutique River Cruises coming and joining me in a podcast today. This is Allen Suss, from TravelManagers, Australia, travel cruise expert and thanking you for listening, and till the next podcast.
I hope that you have enjoyed listening to my special guest today, travelling, and even experienced travel agent help with your next trip. Call me directly on 0433 203 713. And as always be on the lookout for our next Luxury Travel Podcast episode. This is Allen Suss of TravelManagers Australia, wishing you a wonderful day.
