River Cruises - Europe Cruise Reviews

The boat, tour guides, and especially the staff are excellent...

The weather turned out horrible, sun, wind, hail, freezing rain even some light snow, and that was all in one day... The weather finally turned nice the last couple of days.  Keukenhof Gardens are well worth the trip, however some of the other stops are not that interesting, and required to much walking...

Unfortunately this was not my favorite Viking trip...

AMA is very thorough and provided excellent excursions, food, guides and entertainment. Crew exceptionally helpful and friendly. Cruise manager excellent as was the food

We booked the Wine Cruise, then book-ended the cruise with Barcelona and Paris. Two weeks of heaven. On-board I found the staff happy, friendly and always willing to help. They make you feel like family. The food was fabulous. (perhaps add more vegetarian options for dinner).

When the itinerary stated "Departing at 5:00pm" - they were on the dot. The precision timing of everything related to the cruise was amazing.

I loved that the ship only holds 150 passengers. Much more intimate than the big cruise ships. So much more civilized. I am definitely considering another trip on AmaWaterways. Very impressive.

3/27/2016 Rhine Rhapsody.  10 days from Basel Switzerland to Paris, France. A short wonderful breathtaking cruise from Basel, Switzerland to Germany towns, to Luxembourg and ending in Paris, France.  This cruise is available only a couple of times at the start of the year.  Ours is the first trip for 2016 for Viking Vidar.  Some passengers canceled their trip because of last week's Brussels terrorist bombing, Only 60 passengers pushed thru and we all have a fabulous trip with almost a ratio of one crew to one passenger.  We were pampered, spoiled and have a wonderful time.  For a New Yorker, I find Switzerland and Paris expensive, but what the heck, we were on vacation.  

We recently took the Viking Romantic Danube cruise – it was the maiden voyage from Nuremburg to Budapest. We were picked up at the airport and delivered to the ship hassle free.   I would like to start by warning there were several “issues” they blamed for being the maiden voyage, I would suggest not taking the 1st cruise of the season.  There were no issues with the water level this time of year; however, I would have liked to sit more on the sun deck to enjoy the scenery.  The temperatures got to the high 50’s – 60’s, but at 9am it was still only in the 30’s – which is too cold to enjoy the sundeck, also very cold for the included morning tours.   Most of the trees & foliage were not budded out yet – still seemed like winter.  We have taken quite a few ocean cruises so my comparison is based on a larger cruise ship.   As far as the Ship - the crew was excellent & the Program Director gave nightly “briefings” for the next day’s tours.  However, the WiFi did not work for 2 days; there is a bar, but for non-drinkers there was no place where our group could sit at a table to play card games - as the only entertainment after dinner was piano music. On a few occasions they brought aboard some locals, and had a “game night” that lasted about 45 minutes.  The Program Director gave a “narration” while we cruised thru the wine country -  this could only be heard on the sundeck, once again too cold to be up there, even in the afternoons.  As for the food – even though there are only 200 guests, dinner still took 2+ hours & didn’t start until 7pm.  I would like to suggest that they have 2 dinner seating’s.  The food is “European style” – meaning my meat was served “very rare”, not to my taste; there seemed to be an issue to get it cooked well done, also not like an ocean cruise ship where you could order several appetizers - this confused our waiter who brought only soup OR salad.  Breakfast had a good selection of items (eggs, cereal, fruits & breads); lunch was usually something characteristic to the area we were traveling.  My review of our stateroom is below.  Lastly the “included tours” – it was very nice to have tours at every port included – but because we did a few “paid” tours we could see the difference in the quality of tour guides. (the optional tour guides were much better).  There was never enough “free” time to shop or explore on our own & our biggest complaint was in Vienna, the ship docks 30+ minutes by bus from the old town & center for shopping.  Our morning tour took us to old town and back to the ship – there were no shuttles to go back into Vienna in the afternoon, we were on our own by either subway or taxi.  Their "suggested" gratuities seemed to be pressured to add when closing our account. The last day we had to get up at 2:45am to get to the airport for our return flight to the US - we had trouble at the airport finding our flight as we were dropped at the door and not informed as what airline we were using. (we booked our flights thru Viking).   All in all, it was a very unique cruise in comparison to the large ocean ships – we got to know a lot of the crew and the passengers.  I don’t know how to plan the right time for a river cruise as in the warmer months it seems to be an issue with the water levels, this is something we don’t have to be concerned with on an ocean cruise.   We also noticed that this type of cruise was adult oriented - definitely not for children.  Mostly the retired age.

Having been on numerous Viking River and Ocean cruises, we and some friends decided to try AMA. I can honestly say everything is just a bit below Viking's standards and you notice it. The food is a bit off--hot dished are cold many times. The servers mess up orders--then fix them. Nobody really knows your name like on Viking. I do like the Sip and Sail. All the wines were very good--no need for a Silver spirits package. One major delay/snafu moving luggage in Switzerland.

We thoroughly enjoyed our Viking River Cruisefrom Zurich to Paris. The food was excellent, and the staff were all very friendly and helpful. The tour guides employed by Viking were well-prepared and knowledgeable about the cities and areas we visited.

Viking is a ripoff. We booked business class air but because Viking staff didn’t know geography were seated in the rear row up against the wash room bulkhead in non reclining seats.

This was out 10th Viking cruise. It was fabulous, just like the other 9, which is why we keep coming back!

Learned about the people, culture, history, and politics of the region! The people and food were outstanding!

This was our first Viking Cruise to a part of the world we had not been to previously. So much history, much of it terrible. Not the most beautiful locations, but fascinating nonetheless. Would love to go on a future cruise. Wish they weren’t so expensive.

Great time. Second Ama cruise and looking forward to the next

Exceptional Cruise line and Itinerary which they off. Definitely would suggest the North to South route, with the additional 1 early day in Amsterdam and 2 additional days in Como. You won't be sorry! We purchased the "transfer option" and all went seamlessly, even with the additional 2 days in Como when we were on our own. We had no issues with the transfer from the hotel to the Milan airport.

This cruise is a great way to see a lot, yet just relax. Enjoy exceptional service, good and interesting food and drinks, and beautiful views as you float down the rivers.

Staff, food, ship, room all excellent! What I would do different next time: See previous comment above about clothing. Too many excursions were centered on always ending up in shops and shopping areas. With so little time we wanted local culture not shops. We had a much better time looking up local things to do and also asking the staff what they recommended and then going out on our own. Now to the big tip! Watch out for sick people!!!!! We were placed in close quarters (excursion bus for example) with people who were obviously ill. Severe wet sounding constant cough with no attempt at covering the mouth, they also couldn't stay awake. It was disgusting. Two men in particular, their wives refused to sit with them. I am not sure why these people did not stay in their room as they looked extremely miserable. I can only speculate maybe because the extra excursions had a no refund policy? Also at what point does staff intervene when someone obviously ill is constantly in public areas? To be fair I understand this can be a very touchy issue. We ended up eating dinner in our room each night (the staff was wonderful about our repeated room service!!!) and staying away from organized excursions and onboard activities. We did end up with a pretty hefty case of covid, feels like a bad flu. (didn't know it was covid until we got home, and I know no one makes a big deal out of it anymore). I am sure a tremendous amount of people on board our cruise are ill.

The entire cruise was a wonderful experience. The four hours or so we traveled down the Rhine passing all the old castles (with informed commentary from the AMA app and our cruise director) was a very memorable experience. We highly recommend this cruise!

This was our first river cruise. We were so grateful for options to explore Jewish history at almost every port. The dinners were delicious and varied, featuring local wines. Breakfasts and lunches, served buffet style, offered many vegetarian/fish options for those who don't eat meat or shellfish. We can't say enough about our charming, knowledgeable cruise manager (Veronica) who shared details of history and geography all along the way and made sure everyone knew how to access their individual programs each day. The days flew by but we will treasure all of the photos and memories.

The crew, staff, and services were excellent!! Our group of 10 thought it was the trip of a lifetime. Recommend this Viking Rhine River Cruise to anyone. Use he leisure excursions if walking is an issue. Enjoy the entertainment and the comic narration of evening update for next day. The Chef was excellent and the personalized service for vegan and gluten free was beyond excellent. A tip of my hat to VikingFreya crew and Daniel Garron at RCI tours who coordinated everything for a group of voyage novices. Excellent job Dan.

Overall the cruise was a good experience. First time to Europe was very nice. The pre-cruise Movenpick hotel in Amsterdam was not good at all. Terrible value for the price paid. Cigarette burn on the couch. Pillows were 2nd rate. The only upside to this hotel was it was close to the cruise boat and the breakfast provided was very good.

Most everything on the cruise was good, but returning to a sewage smelling room the first few days really put a damper on our cruise experience. The worst part is some of the crew we complained to could not smell it! The cabin steward could smell it, so it wasn't us! I was an issue that would crop up occasionally throughout the cruise. It was never fully resolved. I really enjoyed the shore excursions and the food!