On a river cruise, make sure the water’s deep enough to float your boat

People need to be cautious when scheduling river cruises. Rivers depths that are too low or too high can cause problems. We scheduled a river cruise on the Elbe River in late August. We also had plans and reservations to spend the two weeks after the cruise visiting in Hamburg, Germany.

A day before flying to Prague, Czech Republic, a representative from the line called and advised us that a decrease in the depth of the Elbe would probably not allow the ship to cruise the river. If cruising was not possible, we would live on the ship docked in Dresden and be bused to land excursions during the week.

We later found out, while in Dresden, that during the previous week the ship was unable to cruise for the same reason. The line could have been honest and called a week earlier and given us a chance to replan our trip and cancel the cruise.

I would like to advise people to quiz the cruise line about the river and time you plan the cruise. Also do your own research on river conditions for the same time in previous years. I wish we had.

Gary L. Palmer

Banning

Pets That Fly

I agree 100% with James Tyner’s Oct. 2 letter regarding pets with passengers [“Plane Sense About Pets�]. They should be cared for in cargo.

Recently I was on a long flight and a woman in my row had two small dogs (pampered pets) outside of the carrier. I advised the attendants, who spoke to her.

She glared at me and cooperated only until they left. I requested a complaint form before landing and then followed up with a letter to the airline. I received a thank you and noncommittal response. Nothing further; obviously it did not care to hear from me or do anything to make changes to better accommodate human passengers.

Ann Cressman

Laguna Niguel

Airlines that share

Catharine Hamm’s article explaining airline code-sharing was very informative, though it did not include a couple of important considerations [“Confused by Code Sharing? Don’t Be,� Oct. 2.]

We recently booked a round trip to Europe with Lufthansa. Because we would return to Los Angeles from London, Lufthansa booked us through United. It was fully disclosed.

However, the fight reference identifier with Lufthansa did not carry through to United, and I did not not know it. I had to call Lufthansa USA from London to get it. (I later found the United email with the reference had been sent late in the day before our London departure.)

More troublesome, we could not check in online. At first it appeared that Lufthansa had not transferred our traveler information, including passport numbers, but they did and our seat reservations were preserved.

I wasted an hour online the night before our London departure trying fruitlessly to add that information to my United profile and the United system just discarded it.

Tom Lang

Glendale