AmaWaterways River Cruise Final Thoughts - What's Included In The Price? - Would We Do Another One?
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- Опубликовано: 15 июл 2024
- It's time to wrap up our AmaCerto series and give our final thoughts on our first ever European river cruise! We'll be discussing anything and everything AmaWaterways... embarkation & debarkation, food & drinks, entertainment, cabin types, excursions, the cost of the cruise, what's included & what's not, and answering the most important question... would we do another river cruise?!
AmaCerto Bar Menu (from our friends at Cruise Habit):
www.cruisehabit.com/daily-pro...
00:00 BOOM!
00:04 Welcome To The Wrap-Up
00:40 Embarkation
03:05 Food & Drinks
08:55 Entertainment
10:27 Cabin Types
11:52 Excursions
14:58 Debarkation
16:54 Miscellaneous
22:13 Cost Comparison
24:52 What's Included
26:11 What's Not Included
28:07 Facebook Questions
33:22 Would We Do Another?
35:48 Our Amsterdam Hotel
36:49 You Made It To The End!
We sailed from November 7-14, 2023 on this AmaWaterways cruise... let's do this thing!! :D
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The Rhine cruises usually do one port per day so more time in the port. A river cruise is a boutique hotel that travels from place to place. You move and your toothbrush stays by the sink!
This vlog series was incredibly helpful! We are doing a French itinerary with Ama around the same week this fall, and it was so nice just to see how everything will work. Thank you for your hard work and time!
What a fabulous series! So thorough and detailed. Love this Final Thoughts with the Q&A woven throughout! Hope to see more wrap ups like this. Great job both of you!
Thx. Loved this series. Going to look at river
This was a great series & after thoughts...! Felt like I was with you the whole time!
Thank you! I loved this series and your wrap up! You two are so nice and sweet and knowledgeable. Thanks for letting all of us virtually tag along on all your adventures!
Love all the information, and I really enjoyed following your river cruise!!
I also enjoyed this series. Good info
Thanks this was my favorite series y'all have done
Really enjoyed this series and your review. Glad you enjoyed it so much!
Good breakdown. I really enjoyed this video
You guys are adorable and funny great reviews ! Thank you
Loved the River Cruise videos and I loved the Final Thoughts Video too- especially summarizing the pros and cons and the pricing and comparisons to other ships too
We were on a Viking river ship on the week of Thanksgiving. Really enjoyed it. We were in the “swan room” and liked the privacy when we were docked next to other ships.
This was a thorough and very enjoyable series. After watching, my wife and I are considering one of these in our future.
Loved this series. Interesting fact on gluten sensitivity is a lot of non celiac gluten sensitive people can tolerate gluten in Europe even though the gluten in North America bothers them.
Belated Merry Xmas, and the Very Best of the New Year!!!! Terry and Jean🎅🏻🎅🏻🎅🏻🎅🏻🎅🏻🤙🤙❣️❣️
Loved your videos. Seeing my country through the eyes of someone who’s never been here. And seeing how great a riviercruise can be.
And yes jet lag is more a problem coming from the USA to Europe then the other way. I have less problems flying to the other side, then coming home. It takes several days to recover. So yes fly a couple of days early.
Happy Boxing Day from 🇨🇦
I love the pampered feeling of river cruises. Also love that you are generally right in the port and walk on and off easily the whole time you’re there. Scenic had more evening entertainment, including taking the entire ship to a tour and concert at a palace after dinner. Also local musicians and performers that changed nightly. More local food and wine too.
HAPPY NEW YEAR 😀
Good morning!
Thoroughly Enjoyed your journey because next year my 1st river cruise Xmas Market 10 day on Certo. I'm in the swan cabin. I like the philosophy of AMA and it welcomes solo guests. I'm an ocean ship person 40 of them since 1992 including Baltic, West Mediterranean and this past Sept was on British Isles. Since 2016 ships exclusively NCL and hope AMA will be likewise for River journeys
Thank You So Much for this series! I will be going to Europe this year for Work and am just starting to look at options to add a week afterwards. This year is our 30th anniversary, and i am trying to find a memorable option that won't break the bank. We typically cruise the Carribean for vacation, but i would like to find something special this year. I subscribe to EECC as well, so i am going to jump over to see their thoughts as well.
First, I just want to let you know that you are perfect examples of how one (or in this case, two) individual(s) can made a positive difference to the quality of life of so many. Your port guides are wonderful! Last month on a CCL Journeys cruise to the Southern Caribbean, several cruisers mentioned how much you have helped them. Specifically, choosing the Thenford Grey tour in St. Kitts. It was great, hosted by "the man" himself. The tour was actually the icing on the cake to meeting such a distinguished gentleman.
It seems as if the river cruise food selections are much more limited than ocean cruising. We are healthy eaters, and really like the variety of fish, salad bar, and other array of offerings on the ocean cruises. Jerry doesn't like ordering from a menu at all, preferring a buffet so as not to wait for food. Maybe there was more offered, but burgers and pizza for lunch would hardly be my idea of a good meal, as one can get that anywhere. (We favor smaller ocean ships, anyway, to avoid big crowds and a lot of kids.) We do enjoy the entertainment at night, but mainly go for the ports and like doing our own thing, whenever possible. Seems like the excursions were a bit short. So this sounds more structured, like a guided tour. Conditions can't be helped, but it would be a bummer to take hours to pack up and change boats.
Many thanks for such a comprehensive review! QUESTION - Perhaps I missed it, but did you mention if there were enrichment (destination) lectures? Viking advertises them, and we have had them on some longer trips on other ships, notably on the Island Princess Panama Canal crossing. Hubby and I are very interested in history on the ports.
This was a great series. I would, however, like to comment on pricing that we experienced with Viking. We did a 7-day Rhine river cruise in May, 2022 from Amsterdam to Basel. We stayed in a standard balcony cabin that cost $11,498.00 CDN. Viking offered 1 included excursion in each port, which were excellent and we opted for 1 paid excursion at a cost of $264.00. Viking also offered a Silver Springs beverage package at $400.00 and Pre-Paid gratuities at $336.00. Total: $12,498.00 CDN. and that didn't include our gratuities to our guides. Viking did not have a Chef's Table nor a pool nor the late night buffets. Our food selections were minimal and we contributed that to the fact that cruising was just coming back after COVID. The cruise, on the whole, was amazing and I base that on the excursions. The weather was in our favour everyday. We had high expectations from Viking and couldn't justify the cost of approximately $1,785 per day.
Dee, you look so cute in your headband.
Really enjoyed this series. I sailed on AmaLyra in early 2018 (Seine river cruise) and have a severe shellfish/seafood/fish allergy (as well as other foods). I added that info to my booking ahead of time and then was asked to meet with the chef and maitre’d on embarkation to review menus and plan alternatives. I never had an issue with the food and it was delicious. I had my sister with me and she was on a fairly restrictive diet that included a lot of juicing. She chose to purchase a juicer in Paris before we embarked and gifted it to the kitchen (they were very excited). They provided her with fresh juices daily. I don’t recommend buying a juicer and taking it onboard in the hopes of having the kitchen team accommodate you, but it worked out in this instance. BTW, my sister opted for every bike excursion offered and loved it (better weather for us that week than y’all had).
Oh wow! That's awesome that they were able to accommodate your needs though. I guess the wording on the website is to cover their booties, just in case!! :P
Thank you for the video. However, Amawaterways is not a budget river cruise line. Viking is actually cheaper initially. However, Viking doesn't have quality food and excursion options like Amawaterways. There is no pool on Viking and no chef's. table. Plus, having the twin balconies suites on Amawaterways is amazing.
Probably a more comparable price comparison for a river cruise is a bus tour with a similar itinerary although the bus tour will have less included food and drinks.
True, for a closer comparison of ways to explore Europe. Makes sense! Since most of our regular audience is ocean cruisers in the Caribbean, we wanted to find a similar Caribbean experience there that would compare price-wise to our AmaWaterways experience. I suppose it was more of a price-match versus an experience-match!! :D
Crosi and similar are 3*, Viking just a bit above 3 , some 4 star ones , AMA 5 star / Avalon/ Scenic too, Uniworld and others 6 star
Hello! Loved the series. Ya'all never disappoint! Do you have to stay with the tour guide in port or can you do your own thing?
Thankee! The guides didn't seem to mind if anyone wanted to do their own thing, as long as they were back on the bus for headcount at the end of the day!! :P
Incredible video, AMA a is a higher end river line compared to Viking which is much more basic, they use more frozen foods, smaller cabins, and have 15 more cabins or 30 more people in the same space, they market a lot to Americans but actually isn’t such a luxury line on the river, their ocean are higher end , Avalon also amazing and similar to AMA
I loved this series! Were there any solo cruisers on this river cruise? Is pricing similar to ocean cruising for solos I.e. single supplement? Thanks for your great videos!!
Such an excellent video! Do they have any single rates? Glad you had such a great trip. I used to live in Germany and this series brought back some great memories.
They do! Looking at the same 11/13/2024 sailing that we quoted in the video, it was $6,366.40 total for two guests including port fees, and it's $4,662.80 for a solo traveler, so it looks like a slight break there!! :D
Thank you for checking on it. That is great news. Hope you guys had a wonderful Holiday Enjoy time with Dee's Family.@@parodeejay
Happy New Year🎉
Great series and so enjoyable to watch all the fun you had.
How did you get from the Moxi Amsterdam hotel to the cruise port?
Thanks so much
We snagged an UberLyft over on the day of the cruise!! :D
@@parodeejay thank you again
The train ststion is justmeters awayfrom the port.There is a train thatgoes directly from Amsterdam Centraal Station to Schiphol airport. However the transfer seems easiest.
At the moment waterlevels are to high, due to the rain and melting snow.
True! Our end point was super close to the train station, but it was a different dock location than our starting point, which was interesting!! :D
Great summary of your River cruise. My bucket list includes a river cruise from Amsterdam to Budapest. However, my fear is the water levels and the boat not being able to complete the entire trip by boat.
I’m glad y’all had a great time. The thing I was surprised about was the distance from where the ship was docked to the destinations. It looked like a lot of bus trips. I always thought you pull up and get off and walked into the towns or cities. I guess it depends on the itineraries?
That probably does depend on the itinerary... our easiest access ports besides Amsterdam itself were Veere and Kinderdijk, where the main highlight was just a few steps off the ship. Otherwise, it did seem that we were riding a bus 30-60 minutes to get to whichever highlight we had chosen for the day!!
That phenomenon only exists in the Caribbean.
Love Dee necklace where can I purchase one. Love the info on the river cruise but unfortunately I would not be able to take one because I am disabled. Enjoyed the series and thank you both.
Thankee! It’s in our Amazon shop!! :D
www.parodeejay.com/amazon
@@parodeejay thank you and Happy New Year to you both.
Thank you for making this video. We cruised AmaWaterways this past December 2023 and were so disappointed. We spend well over $10,000 per person USD and the trip was nothing like what had been sold to us. We have emails from AmaWaterways stating they would make things right and that was back in December 2023. We are still waiting. How long would you wait? I have been to over 108 countries and all seven continents and this trip was one of the most disappointing cruises/trips ever.
What made it so disappointing? I’m going this December.
@@rachelsuchla2408 What was so disappointing was that the Cruise Manager and home office promised to fix our issue about flights and never did. They waited until the night before we were departing the boat and then sent a bottle of cheap wine and an apology that they could not fix our flight that we had booked through them as first class. I returned the bottle of wine to them that night and ask how could a bottle of cheap wine make up for this big mistake. They had booked us on an economy ticket to fly to Istanbul. We brought this up before we even left home that the flight towards the end of our trip was not booked correctly and they left us hanging our entire trip until that last night. This left a dark cloud over our entire trip. We even have messages from the home office staff that they would make this right. These emails are from December 2023 and we are still waiting. You might want to reconsider your plans so you don't have to go through what we went through. We were in the highest and most expensive suite on the boat and nothing really special except for our room was different than anyone else.
Did the AMA ship have American 110v outlets or only European 2 prong 220v outlets?
We covered that a bit in the "cabin" section of this video, as well as during our cabin tour in part one, just the 220v so a converter would be needed!! :P
@@parodeejay Thanks! We will bring an adapter.
Were you able to separate the bed on Ama?
We didn't think to ask, but looking around the ol' Google machine, I'm finding a few articles that say yes, twin beds can be achieved!! :D
Able to get multiple entrees or appetizers at a time?
Sure! They didn't seem to have any limit to what you could order at any meal on our sailing, other than chef's table which was a set menu!! :D
Dee what agency are you with?
I'm an independent travel agent, but under the Travel Quest Network host agency umbrella. ~Dee
What happens if you touch the wall?
We aren't sure! With the number of times they told us not to, I suspect it's a teleportation device and we'd be whisked away through time and space forever... maybe... :P
@@parodeejay If you ever hear any further details, I'd be fascinated to know.🙂
Wondering about ADA accessibility ?
Watch around 18:40. They go in detail
Yeeeeeah, we covered that pretty extensively in the video!!
I use a scooter instead of a wheelchair and yeah I asked before you got to the wheelchair part
So not really sure about the scooter and the ramps etc
True, you would have to climb a full flight of stairs unassisted from Deck 3 to Deck 4, then a full flight back down to deck 3, then walk down the ramp to board the bus, all without the scooter. I don't even know that the scooter would be able to be taken off the ship in that case, so you would have the entire day in port without the scooter. Could be dicey!!
My question would be what are the options for solo travelers? I know some lines offer solo cruises, Avalon is the one I know of. Are the supplements as high as they are for ocean cruising? This may be a Dee question as the travel agent. Just wondering....I'm going on a Riverboat Cruise with Grand Circle in France as the supplement was less than $1000. The rooms are not so nice, older ship but french balcony and you do spend more time doing excursions. So with airfare and several days before and after it was about $10,000 for me, but I get like 3 weeks there. Thanks.
Heyo! Looking at the same 11/13/2024 sailing that we quoted in the video, it was $6,366.40 total for two guests including port fees, and it's $4,662.80 for a solo traveler, so it looks like a slight break there rather than a full charge for a non-existent second guest!! :D
Do you have to have an international drivers license to rent a car?
I didn't need one in Iceland or in Canada, but those are the only places we've ever rented a car internationally. Interesting thing to research next time we're thinking of renting a car in another location though!!
did y'all watch that riverboat murder mystery movie in preparation?
We’ve seen Death On The Nile a couple of times, if that’s the one you mean!! :P
@@parodeejay that's the one! I'm happy that your vids are less eventful
Love your videos, my hubby and I have been watching for a long time and are so envious of your travels 😂😂😂 I hope you had a very Merry Christmas and look forward to your travels this new year 😊🎄🎁❤
Thank you for doing this. It was very interesting and a totally different way of travel. Really interesting difference between Icon of the Seas and a river cruise regarding cost and what's included. ❤❤
River cruising would not be for us based on your review. Too confining, not enough on board variety, etc, so ocean cruising will continue for us.