squarevanman

I did see CroisiEurope were docking at least one vessel in Paris to house health workers to help them isolate from home. 

Just seen a facebook post from CroisiEurope regarding their cancelations. If the translation is correct they seem to be offering customers a refund plus €150 voucher per person for a future cruise.

I know it’s not passenger related but there was an excellent documentary on the building of the new super sewer under and along the Thames here in London. As they wanted to take a serious amount  of spoil down stream by barge they needed to train up new tug skippers to cope with the increased work load. They partly followed a first mate in his training which not only included taking charge of the tug pulling barges under supervision of an experienced captain but also at a land location further upstream. This was some sort of nautical training college and included a simulator similar to those used in the airline industry where they could programme in a variety of situations. It would be interesting if this is done for passenger captains on the european rivers.

When I went it was November 2009 and the temperature peaked at around 38c in the  Valley of the Kings. Thats around 100 on the Fahrenheit scale. Our guide told us she would not work July or August as the temperature was far too hot.

We have sailed on Avalon 4 times on the bottom deck. Never have had a problem with noise.

 

Our luggage has always been handled by the staff. Have even seen the captain moving luggage.

Exactly the same on CroisiEurope and not just the captain but chief engineer as well

Correct, there are no meal choices. It's a fixed menu. If you're a vegetarian or have food allergies, they will accommodate you. But you can't change just because you don't like it.

I was very surprised to see this statement regarding not being able to change food you did not like. I have been on 5 CroisiEurope ships and have seen passengers have alternative meals because they did not like the main course. In fact I had an alternative last year when I felt I could not eat rabbit. No problem as I saw the menu the previous day and spoke to the purser. When the waitress came to the table she asked who was eating different. When I replied my knife and fork were crossed and when the table was served my alternative was given to me.

I do hope CroisiEurope has not changed it policy on this.

CroisiEurope last year on the Seine one chap had a scooter. The crew carried it on and off the ship and even up stairs across deck into Viking ship and through Viking to land. Upon returning to ship he just left it at land side of gangway and members of crew carried it onboard and put on charge in reception area. As CroisiEurope do not include excursions he was able to get around ports easily on his own.

Bank to bank transfers are the norm in Europe, checks are much less commonly used, so I wouldn't regard it as a 'ploy' just the normal way to pay compensation...

Totally agree I have only written a cheque to one person in the past 15 months and that was only so they could give me a discount rather than pay paypal fees. Personal cheques are virtually unacceptable we use card or bank transfers.

I have been on 5 of their cruises and loved every one of them. I have posted a couple of reviews which you should find by using the search facility on cc. I envy you as I really would like to go on one of the paddle ships but circumstances dictate no river cruising for a few years.

I did the CroisiEurope Po trip in 2015. If you use the search facility for CroisiEurope Venice you will find my lengthly comments there. Sorry not sure about linking since I gave up the laptop. Hope this will be of help to you.

Great thank you for posting.

I have just seen a report on another site that for certain cruises on specified dates CroisiEurope are offering families of 4 (2 adults and 2 children under 16) a second cabin free of charge. Children will also have supervised water activities and will perform an end of cruise show. I do hope this will not just be for French speaking children as I would love to take my grandchildren when older. I hope CroisiEurope USA can enlighten us on this.

I'll just resurrect this to say that on my cruise, my wife definitely felt like she didn't pack anything nice enough after seeing how the other men and women were dressing. We read this and thought it would be pretty casual, however, nearly every single man had at least a tie and Or sport coat, including several in full suits on gala night.

I did fine, and was not over dressed with sport coat and tie.

I really am shocked. What was the nationality make up of your cruise? Even last year on the Seine where a lot of French were on board there was still a casualness about the restaurant even on Gala Night.

Recently son and his other half travelled to Miami with children aged 3 and 4. Both little ones had Ipads with their "special" cartoons and games pre loaded. I would hate to be the one who tells them they cannot have them on the plane.

Does CroisiEurope do any programming specifically for the younger people? The fact that they are welcome doesn't mean that they will enjoy themselves. Unless the programming on CroisiEurope is quite different from that I experienced on 2 Uniworld cruises in 2010 and 2011, kids will be bored stiff.

They certainly had a specific member of staff looking after the young travelers with some activities on a couple of the trips I was on. Don't know what ships and dates these are offered or if only offered in French.

I have been on a few CroisiEurope cruises and the youngest child I ever saw celebrated his 1st Birthday on board. I have seen many teens and pre teens enjoying holidays in multi generation family groups.

I have cruised Danube Vienna-Vienna, Douro Porto-Porto and Seine Paris-Paris all with CroisiEurope. In addition their sea cruise (virtually a river ship anyway) was Dubrovnik-Dubrovnik. Makes life a lot easier when looking for cheap air fares.

Had a great trip on the Nile in 2009 with Presidential Nile Cruises. Went with my 2 sons as birthday treat for the eldest (21). Certainly hope to go back again so I can visit both Giza and Abu Simbel.

On my CroisiEurope cruise along the Seine one of my table companions used a sccoter off the ship. Onboard it was left close to reception to charge. The crew carried off for him and on return he just left it at the gangway and crew returned for him. I think he managed to cover more ground than I did during the week.

I am not surprised that Viking is wooing the Chinese Yen. Just had a report on BBC London local T.V. 270000 chinese visited London last year spending over £600 million.

As documented before I usually float along the river with CroisiEurope. On all five cruises with them I have seen multi generational family groups. Often these cover 4 generations with the youngest child I have seen celebrating his 1st birthday in Venice last year. Usually these are French families but this year on the Seine there were two multi generation groups 1 French and 1 Russian. I am not sure about linking here so I wont and if I am wrong posting this host/mods please accept my apologies and delete. However I was trawling through a social network site and I came accross a link to something called traveling moms. This actually was a very interesting article about multi generational cruising by people on CroisiEurope.

I did not put two and two together until re reading this thread. Last week on my CroisiEurope Seine cruise the outside doors were kept locked whilst ship was docked. Everyone was told the entry code but many forgot. This ship also has stairs to the sundeck on the outside. This year I noticed every time I went on the sundeck in port there was a member of crew in the wheelhouse sometimes a sailor, sometimes a member of the hotel side. On reflection I have never seen this on my previous cruises and can only assume this is an additional security measure.

In Paris I noticed a lot of police on foot, bicycle, motor cycle and car patroling the quay side.

I hope it is ok to re post this review here having posted on the actual review section of Cruise Critic.

Having looked through it again I see I made a silly mistake about rafting. We were double docked against the Viking ship at Vernon not Honfleur. At Honfleur we docked against the Seine Princess.

If you have any questions I would only be too pleased to answer if I can. Happy cruising one and all.

Review of CroisiEurope Bottecelli 7 night cruise from Paris to Honfleur and return to Paris.

Ship was docked in the heart of Paris just about a 10 minute walk from the Eiffle Tower. I arrived at around 4.30 which was too early to check in (usually 6.00 pm). However by 5 many passengers were arriving and the purser began checking everyone in. At check in passengers were allocated dining tables according to language spoken. This works very well and everyone from the U.K. who I spoke to found this totally satisfactory. In fact a large group from a tour company spread over 3 tables nearly revolted when their rep suggested table hopping to get to know each other better.

I was shown to my cabin which was on the main deck. I had a twin for sole use which had t.v, safe, hairdryer, mirror,desk and chair. The bathroom consisted of w.c, shower cabinet and rubbish bin.

During dinner on the first night the ship sailed upstream and moored mid river until it was dark. We then had a cruise along the Seine to see Paris illuminated by night. Some of the bridges are very low so passengers were only allowed on the sun deck proving they sat down and had to remain seated for safety until the cruise was over. I sat at the front on the main deck which gave just as good a view. Not all ships are able to offer this as I noticed many would have been far too tall to go under ther bridges.

Being a French line all announcements are in French followed by English and then by any other languages needed. This cruise it was Spanish. The nationalities on board consisted at least of French, British, Spanish, Norwegian, Australian, Mexican and Russian. This time I do believe the French speakers were outnumbered by the English speakers.

Dining is a buffet breakfast comprising of cereals, breads, fruits, cold meat, cheese, hot eggs, hot sausage, hot bacon bits, croisants, yogurts, teas and cofee and possibly many things I have already forgotten. Lunch and Dinner are either 3 or 4 course meals to a set menu. Main courses included veal, chicken, pork, rabbit, venison and fish. The menu is posted on the information chanel on the T.V. and should you not like what is on offer a substitution was available. Indeed one course was not for me I just told reception in the morning and received an alternative without hesitation. I noticed some passengers were obtaining a vegetarian meal daily. Waitresses/waiter are not allocated to specific tables so you get to see and speak to them all. Drinks are included with meals and throught the day when the lounge was was open. I understand that some of the wines were excellent but as I do not drink it I cannot comment.

Entertainment consisted of a bi-lingual chap at an electric piano plus 1 night when a local singer and accordianist performed and another night where a folk troup performed. In addition we had the crew show which was based around the decades that the company has been in existance. Using film and live performers this was the best crew show I have seen on CroisiEurope.

Rafting did rear its head a few times. On the second day sister ship Seine Princess moored alongside from 2 till 7. In Honfleur we docked alongside a Viking ship and our passengers had to alight via the sun deck. A little later the Seine Princess slipped in between the Viking ship and us. At Honfleur we docked against and alighted through the Seine Princess and finally back in Paris we docked alongside and left through sister ship France.

Excursions were offered but as I am still recovering from a knee replacement I decided to explore the towns where we moored at my own pace. The exception being Paris where I went on a 3 hour panoramic tour of the city. The guide was excellent as was the driver. At €40 I thought this good value. My dining companions went on other excursions and I never heard any complaints.

As I said we had many nationalities but we also had a mixed age group. 3 children who I would have estimated to be between 5 and 12 a few in their 30's and 40's with many 50 to 80 year olds.

I am pleased that CroisiEurope still have a policy of tipping via a sealed envelope which is shared throughout the crew. Many unseen crew members do jobs which help our holidays run smoothly such as the kitchen staff and the engineers. This trip visits were made to both the wheelhouse and engine room but silly me missed out as I did not hear the announcement.

Currently on the Seine where it was rather cold and windy Monday morning. At one point I was the only one on the sun deck apart from the crew member in the wheelhouse.

Cruising the Seine with CroiseEurope from next Friday. First time I went with them I packed suit and tie for the gala evening. These were not needed as only a handfull of men wore a suit (mainly those from Australia). Last year only a very small minority, including me, wore a tie. So this year I shall be leaving my tie at home along with my jacket.