AMA Amacello Budapest to Bucharest

[EmsMom]

We just returned from our AMA Amacello river cruise from Budapest to Bucharest. There was a land tour after Bucharest to Istanbul, but we disembarked in Bucharest having already been to Istanbul. We spent 4 nights in Budapest at the LeMeridien which was a wonderful hotel in every way. We used our American Express Platinum card to get a Starwood upgrade plus free breakfast (which was quite extensive) and a bottle of wine, fruit and pastries upon arrival. This hotel is well located for sightseeing in Budapest and for 129 Euro per night, we thought it was an excellent value. We also returned through Budapest and stayed at the Hotel Palazzo Vichy for one night. This hotel was also an excellent place to stay and a really good value for 80 Euro per night with breakfast, however, it is a good 15 -20 minute walk to the middle of Pest. I would highly recommend either of these hotels.

 

The Amacello is a beautiful ship with a well organized and helpful staff. We found the food to be very good to excellent and the service was great. Occasionally, we had to wait for over an hour for our dinner entrees but since we didn't have anything else going on, it was okay. The room was fine but a little tight. We didn't use the French balcony at all since the weather was very hot and we kept the door closed with the A/C running all of the time. The internet was intermittent. At one point, it was not working at all and they had to bring in an IT guy to fix it. It was also slow....that being said, it was better than the internet on the ocean liners and it was free. I was unable to get my iPhone to work with their WiFi and was told that sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't......I was able to use my iPhone on board for calling back to the US with no problem. Also, even with an adaptor, you probably won't be able to use your own curling iron or flat iron. I was able to get a curling iron from the ship but don't count on using your own.

 

We were among the younger people on the cruise. I would guess the average age to be in the low 70s....we are in our low 60s. It didn't really make any difference as we found people of all ages that we enjoyed on the trip. Most of the cruisers were either American or Canadian.

 

Our cabin was on the top deck toward the back of the ship. There were times we could hear the engines but after the first night, we really didn't notice it any more.

 

I am not going to describe every port we visited but I would like to address this itinerary.......Budapest was as good as it got for beauty and stuff to do. You will not see a lot of castles along the way and most of the ports required a bus ride to the towns we visited. The scenery going through the Iron Gates was really beautiful but the rest of the scenery was basically trees and shorelines. The ports we visited gave us a lot of information and insight about the Communist years and the war in Croatia during the 1990s. It was interesting but the towns are still trying to recover so they aren't like Budapest or Prague. The reason I am mentioning this is that there were some people on the cruise that were disappointed in the towns and scenery.....this is not the most picturesque or quaint area of the world. The guides were excellent and really helped us understand what has gone on in Eastern Europe in the past 100 years. We got off the ship in Bucharest and did a 4 day tour of Transylvania with a guide. We really enjoyed seeing Transylvania and would highly recommend this type of tour if you want to see more of Romania. If you only visit Bucharest, you won't get a very good picture of the real Romania. We stayed at the Hilton in Sibiu which was a great hotel and the Casa Wagner in Brasov which is very old but a good choice if you don't mind staying in an old and quirky building. I would highly recommend using a guide and driver as the Romanians are very aggressive drivers, the roads aren't the best and there many horse drawn carts on the roadways.....oh, and there is also the issue of find a parking space once you get into the towns. We have drive all over Europe but we are glad we didn't have to drive in Romania.

 

One thing I would suggest is to bring some one dollar or one Euro denominations as we wanted to tip the local guides and the purser on the ship was unable to give us change. You cannot easily get dollars or Euros at the banks in these countries. Yes, you can get local currency but it didn't make sense to get local currency just for a tip for the driver and the guide. You can tip the crew in Euros, dollars or put it on your credit card at the end of the cruise.

 

I would highly recommend AMA Waterways.....this was our first river cruise and we found it very relaxing and low key. There isn't a lot to if you're not on an excursion or eating which was fine with us. We did a lot of reading or worked out in the very tiny gym. They had a couple of nights of local entertainment which we enjoyed and a piano playing singer every night who was very good....All in all, a very nice way to spend a vacation!!

[s2c4r5a4p]

Thanks for the detailed review and the additional information about hotels, driving and so forth. I have wondered about that section of the Danube, good to know that it is not as beautiful, also good to know about the history. Thanks again.

 

Janet

[shoshona2]

To Emsmom,

 

Where did you get the private guide for your tour to Transylvania? My DH's family is from Romania and it is still on our list of places to see.

 

By the way, when you travel to Europe again, buy a curling iron at your local CVS or Walgreens that works on either 220 or 110. I have used one for years and all you need is the correct plug for the country you are in. I use it at home in Los Angeles, also.

 

Sheila

[EmsMom]

We used American Express Travel to book the tour......I had read some negative things about tour operators in Romania so I wanted to be sure that I had some backup if things didn't work out. It took them about 3 months to come up with something. I can give you the name of tour operator that we finally ended up using. Everything went well. Another problem I had seen on some boards regarding the Transylvania tours was that some people didn't like the hotels that the tour used. We avoided the problem by booking our own hotels. We also paid for our own admission to attractions and paid for our own meals. The guide had to pay for his hotel and car expenses. He was supposed to pay for his meals but we paid for them because we wanted to. The cost of the guide for four days was about $1000 which worked out well because we were two couples splitting the cost. He also picked us up in Ruse which was a little drive. If we had to do it over again, we would have gotten off the boat a day earlier when we were in Bucharest on the bus. That would have made for a much easier pick up. We met some people who did that and wished we would have thought of it. There is nothing in Ruse to see and we had to go through passport control to get back into Romania as Ruse is in Bulgaria.

 

I took a blower that was supposed to work on both voltages and it wouldn't work either. I had an adaptor, a convertor and a blower that was supposed to work on either voltage and none of them would work. Needless to say, I'm glad my hair was long enough to put into a pony tail!!

[shoshona2]

Hi Emsmom,

 

Thanks so much for the info on your tour in Romania and review of your river cruise.

 

Sheila