AMA Paris Normandy on Amalegro

Has anyone recently returned from this trip? We are going in a few weeks. Any comments or advice for first time river cruisers?

I have not been on this particular itinerary, but we sailed from Budapest to Amsterdam on the AMALegro last August. Best vacation we have ever had! We loved the ship and the crew was fantastic! Artur the hotel manager and his crew was excellent and AMA handled a issue with low water and a grounded barge that closed the Danube for a while in an excellent manner. Artur mentioned that the AMALegro was moving to France for this season and he was hoping to keep his crew with him so if they all stayed together, you will have a great crew for your trip!

Thank you for the info! We are definitely looking forward to this cruise and I appreciate all of your positive comments!

Hi Cindy,

I started a thread for all Paris/Normandy sailings on the Roll Call thread. Join in.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1792931&page=4

We were on the maiden voyage of this itinerary, and I blogged about it and our entire stay (9 weeks) in France and Italy. If you are interested, the part about our cruise starts with this post:

http://coldpastaandredwine.blogspot.com/2013/03/wasting-time.html

It's about trying to find where the ship was docked. The following 7-9 days deal with the cruise and our time on the Ama Paris extension.

We were not wild about the fact that they didn't give us much time on our own on included excursions. Other friends who were on a later cruise (same line and itinerary) didn't mind it.

I will say that the wait staff and room stewardesses were wonderful.

Go and have fun.

I appreciate the information. We are counting down the days. Our first river cruise...should be interesting!

Mooneydiva, I have a few questions regarding the AMA river cruise Paris to Normandy. Did you stay in Paris on the 9th and 10th days? Did you take the Paris City Tour and Musee d' Orsay and the evening Parisian Cabaret at Paradis Latin? If so, are these things we should do? Also, the 10th day offers the Seine Cruise and Montparnassee Tower, with the Montemarte tour in the evening. Did you go on these tours as well? Or, would we be better off going out on our own? What do you advise?

We were on the Amalegro from Nuremberg to Paris (Trier) in 2011 and did the post cruise with AMA in Paris. We took all the tours they offered. While you can do all the same things on your own, if you do like someone else to organize everything, I thought the Montmartre and lights at night tour was excellent, you do get a lot of free time on your own for dinner. Lots of walking from Sacre Coeur down to the main street to get the bus.(there is the funicular also which is included in the tour). The Eifel Tower at night was fantastic and you do get off the bus to take photos. We also did the dinner show and while very cramped inside, food was just so so but the show was good. The city tour was a drive around tour with a photo opportunity at the Arc and Eiffel Tower but gives you a good feel where everything is. We enjoyed taking the metro on our own and walking around the Latin Quarter.

Wonderful! Very helpful. I appreciate your help. I may have more questions later, hope you don't mind!

Cindy, the tour of Paris is basically included. When you get off of the ship, you board a bus, and they take you all over the city. The museum is the last place you go before they take you to the hotel.

We did not do any of the other post-cruise excursions. The only one that actually went was the cabaret dinner/show. They didn't have enough sign-ups for the other two places.

Friends who did do the cabaret said the food was not very good. The show was interesting, from what they said. We didn't go to that because we live in Las Vegas and have been to similar shows here.

We liked the Musee d'Orsay best of the tour after the cruise. Beautiful museum.

BTW... The Montparnasse is a nice hotel, and the breakfast selection was excellent. Unlike some people on tripadvisor, we found the staff at the hotel to be very, very accommodating and pleasant.

Have a great trip!

Mooneydiva,

Thank you again for all of your help!

We just got back from that AMA tour and really enjoyed it. We did enjoy al of the walking tours - especially the markets in the little towns and Honfleur too. We did not choose to take the 3 hour bus trip to the Normandy beaches but stayed back and wandered around the town instead and thoroughly enjoyed it. We've take 2 other riverboat trips with Uniworld and thought Uniworld was more customer oriented and friendly, but did like AMA too. We thought there was too much free wine flowing and got tired of that at meals since we don't drink. The cabins are very nice, meals good. We liked the evening programs and port talks better on Uniworld - just different. Have a great trip. We stayed in Paris an additional 2 weeks in a rented apt so had plenty of time to live like a Parisian.

Each cruise is different so I don't know what the dining room vibe was on terrya's AMA cruise, but on our AMA Amsterdam-to-Basel cruise this summer I felt the freely-poured wine and beer was a major plus factor.

I never saw anyone who seemed to have over-imbibed. The quality of the wine (and beer) complemented the food at lunch and dinner, and not having to sign for every glass or bottle made for a wonderful conviviality.

CindyP1954, we are going on this cruise next March and I was wondering if you had a good time? and do you have any tips? It will be our first time in Paris, and our first river cruise. Tips from anyone else who have done this itinerary would be welcome too! Thanks :-)

trose27,

We thoroughly enjoyed the cruise. We particularly enjoyed the people! Dinners were such fun, we immediately found our own group of friends,which continued growing and growing until there wasn't a table large enough to hold us all! Food was good, not spectacular, but the wine was excellent, and the glasses were never empty. Everyone was extremely friendly and accommodating. Cabins were extremely small, but we found nooks and crannies for our luggage and it wasn't a problem. The tours from the ship were wonderful. Every one of them. Monet's gardens exceptionally beautiful and memorable. Normandy was a wonderful trip. We spent 3 days in Paris on our own after the cruise, staying at the hotel Mountparnasse. Location of the hotel was excellent, and we could see all of Paris from our window. We went to the Musee d' Orsay, Montmarte, Palace of Versailles, Eiffel Tower, and as far as dinners go, we just ate in restaurants near the hotel and the meals were outstanding, and house wine is always a great choice. If I can think of anything else, I'll post later. Hope you have a wonderful time!