Stollen, Spice & Story: A Soulful Christmas Markets Journey

There are journeys you take, and there are journeys that take you. This is the second kind.

Stollen, Spice & Story is a 7-night luxury river journey from Basel to Amsterdam aboard the elegant AmaVenita, part of AmaWaterways’ celebrated Soulful Experience collection. This itinerary is curated to honor Black heritage and the African diaspora alongside the magic of the European Christmas markets.

Embarkation in Basel
Your journey begins on December 15 in Basel, where Switzerland, France and Germany meet along the Rhine. Before you step aboard, take time to wander the old town. Basel’s Christmas market, one of Switzerland’s finest, glows across Barfüsserplatz and Münsterplatz beneath the red sandstone Basel Minster, with handcrafted ornaments, mulled wine and warm spiced treats drifting through the cold December air. Most travelers fly into Basel’s EuroAirport or into Zurich, about an hour away by train. Arriving a day or two early lets you settle in, shake off the flight and enjoy the city before embarkation.

From Basel, the AmaVenita sails north through a week of ports that carry the full weight of European history, Black cultural survival and a culinary depth most travelers never find.

In Breisach, you cross into Alsace wine country and the fairy-tale village of Riquewihr, unchanged since 1500. In Strasbourg, the Capital of Christmas, you wander La Petite France and the oldest Christmas market in France, then enter the Château Musée Vodou, home to the largest collection of West African Vodou objects in the world. More than 1,200 sacred pieces from Benin, Togo, Ghana and Nigeria are housed in a historic water tower on the French and German border. This is not a curiosity. It is a homecoming.

In Heidelberg, the perfectly preserved medieval city along Germany’s Castle Road, you tour the red sandstone castle and its legendary Great Vat, an enormous wine cask that has stood since the 18th century. In Rüdesheim, lantern-lit cobblestones and open-air wine gardens welcome you into the Drosselgasse as choirs drift from the village churches. Then the AmaVenita glides into the UNESCO Rhine Gorge: 65 kilometers of the most castle-dense landscape in the world, with more than 40 fortresses rising from the hillsides as the Lorelei Rock passes in silence.

Cologne brings the jazz. Papa Joe’s Jazzlokal has hosted live Dixieland and New Orleans swing every single day since 1974, nearly 17,000 concerts. Jazz is an African American art form that traveled to Europe and took root here, and you will hear it in the room where it lives. The Cathedral rises overhead, six Christmas markets wait at your feet, and the music of the diaspora fills the Altstadt on a December evening.

Aboard the AmaVenita, evenings come alive with Kinara candle-lighting ceremonies and daily Kwanzaa reflections on the seven principles: Umoja, Kujichagulia, Ujima, Ujamaa, Nia, Kuumba and Imani. Every dinner carries the signature of James Beard Award winner Alexander Smalls, whose curated menu is woven into every Soulful Experience departure. This is not background programming. It is the heart of the vessel.

The voyage concludes in Amsterdam, with an optional West African Christmas dinner at Restaurant Kenneh. Chef Samuka Kenneh, trained in Michelin-starred kitchens and rooted in the traditions of Sierra Leone, sets a feast that brings the entire journey home.

You fly home on December 22. Rested. Full. Changed.

Food Not to Miss
Basel: Basler Läckerli, a spiced honey and almond biscuit that has been the city’s signature treat for centuries. Every market stall and bakery has them.
Strasbourg: Bredele, the little Alsatian Christmas cookies sold by the bagful at every market stand.
Rüdesheim: Rüdesheimer Kaffee, coffee flamed with local Asbach brandy and topped with whipped cream, served all over town.
Cologne: Reibekuchen, crispy potato pancakes with applesauce, fried fresh at every Christmas market, best with a small glass of Kölsch.
Amsterdam: Oliebollen, warm Dutch doughnuts dusted with powdered sugar, sold from stands all over the city in December.
Everywhere along the way: Stollen, the fruit and marzipan Christmas bread that gives this journey its name.