AmaMagna: AmaWaterways' Double-Wide Ship First Impressions

We're taking you aboard AmaWaterways' unique AmaMagna vessel with us to share exactly what makes this double-wide river cruise ship such a game-changer on the Danube River. 

You'll discover how the extra space translates into multiple restaurants, larger staterooms, and amenities you won't find on traditional river ships – including a pickleball court, full-size gym with spin bikes, and even a pool with a hot tub. 

We'll walk you through our honest pros and cons, from the spacious dance floor and guest laundry facilities to the limited itinerary options due to the ship's size. 

Whether you're an ocean cruiser considering your first river cruise or a river cruise veteran curious about this innovative design, you'll understand exactly who this ship works best for and how it compares to traditional single-wide vessels. 

We recorded this episode right from our stateroom on our final day of the cruise, giving you our unfiltered impressions of why bigger might – or might not – be better for your river cruise style.

For more AmaWaterways episodes, check out: 

• Top River Cruise Line Showdown: Viking vs. AmaWaterways
• Our AmaWaterways AmaDara Experience on the Mekong River 

Be sure to read more about AmaWaterways (with tons of photos) on our website, including articles about our AmaKristina Colors of Provence cruise, all about the food onboard, and more. 

Interested in the travel laundry sheets we discussed in this episode? You’ll find them

Chapters

• 0:35 Setting the Scene & A Five-Star Review!
• 2:16 Welcome to Our AmaMagna Suite: First Impressions
• 3:56 Multitude of Dining Options on AmaMagna
• 7:24 Exploring the Unique Size & Features of the Ship
• 12:21 Is Bigger Better for a River Cruise Ship?
• 13:19 Potential Drawbacks/Cons of a Double-Wide River Cruise Ship
• 16:16 Would We Cruise On AmaMagna Again?

Transcript

Mikkel (00:36)

We cruised on AmaMagna, which is a very special ship with AmaWaterways. And the reason it is special is because it is double the width of a usual river cruise ship that sails on the Danube River. There's only two of these kinds of ships that we know of. One is with AmaWaterways and we will reveal what the other cruise line is that has one of these during the episode. But before we get into the podcast,

I wanted to read a five-star review that we are so grateful for. B-WHYB says, "So informative! I didn't realize how incredible small ship cruising could be until I found this podcast. The more I listen, the more I realize this HAS to be on my travel agenda. I love Dan and Mikkel's dynamic and hearing their clear expertise in this mode of travel. I'm hooked!"

Well, we really appreciate all our reviews, especially those five star ones, but we welcome all your feedback and please keep rating the podcast and listening and following along as we discuss small ship cruising. With that, let's get into today's episode, which is a special broadcast that we recorded on board on AmaMagna in our stateroom. So if you want some visuals to go along with the audio, if you are just listening to the audio right now,

please know that all our episodes can also be found with video so you can see our lovely faces and the faces of our guests on YouTube. It is @sometimes-sailing on YouTube. Let's get into it.

Mikkel (02:16)

We are on the last day of our AmaMagna trip with AmaWaterways on the Danube and thought it was the perfect time to recap about our experience. It is our first time on this ship, not our first time with AmaWaterways and discuss our impressions, the pros of sailing on here, maybe some of the cons, depending on what kind of traveler you are and familiarity with river cruising. Let's dive into it. So what are some overall first impressions?

Dan (02:53)

But since it is a double wide river cruise ship, there's only what, two on the Danube? sure? And everything is big. The space really. Yeah. That's what stands out to me. Like immediately when we got on the ship, the lobby was much larger and the hallways, it feels like a hotel hallway.

Mikkel (03:05)

No. Yeah, more so like what you would experience going down a land side. Yeah.

Dan (03:23)

Yeah, so you forget pretty quickly that you're on a river cruise.

Mikkel (03:28)

Yeah. And because rivers rarely have any sort of motion in the sense of an ocean ship, you're like, my god, am I in a hotel on land? And you're like, no, it's floating. But yeah, the double wide is really interesting to me. And I think it's kind of an interesting experience being with some other passengers that we were talking about some ocean cruising and comparing some of this to what you would have on an ocean ship.

Let's dive into why it's unique to have several restaurants on board, for example. So on an ocean ship, might have, who knows, we've had as many as, you know, more than 10, depending on if it's Celebrity or maybe on Windstar, it's three restaurants. And it's always nice to be able to have that change of scenery. And I should mention that our experience with AmaWaterways is including AmaDara on the Mekong River and AmaKristina on the Colors of Provence tour in France. 

Both amazing, both single wide. And not just aesthetically and architecturally are there differences, but also comes with that some more variety. So the restaurants was like a really great pro in terms of a variety. And I love that. So let's go through the various restaurants on the ship.

Dan (04:48)

So you got main dining, obviously.

Mikkel (04:50)

There's Al Fresco. So that's kind of at the front of it. And some might say compared to a Viking cruise ship, which would have the Aquavit terrace, that's very similar to Al Fresco towards the bow of the ship. There is also the Chef's Table. Right. Yeah. And then you can say Jimmy's. 

Dan (05:09)

Jimmy’s was family style so kind of interesting. I think - what there was like 12 in our party or

Mikkel (05:16)

Yeah, it's almost like family style tables. Yeah. It's like three long tables on this side, three on the other side, I believe. 12 maximum at the Table, double sided.

Dan (05:26)

Yeah, it was it was interesting. I never experienced that on a river cruise ship before

Mikkel (05:31)

I think the concept is nice. were saying it doesn't work that well because it's the same menu as the main restaurant. The environment's different, but because it's sort of family style, it would lend itself to a different kind of meal, yet they're serving the same.

Dan (05:47)

Yeah, it was just same thing everybody else got just on bigger plates.

Mikkel (05:51)

So instead of like a lamb lollipop on one serving, was, you know, 12 lined up and several plates across the table. I think it could be really amazing. Jimmy is after Jimmy Murphy, the third co-founder of AmaWaterways along with Rudi and Kristin. Unfortunately, Jimmy passed away many years ago. So this is a restaurant in honor of him.

It was really charming to see the printed black and white photographs on the wall from his wedding, some from growing up with water in their lives and ocean experiences. They did mention - the crew there - that the colors are for his Irish roots. And I would love to see them lean into the Irish menu and a specific menu for that restaurant.

Dan (06:38)

Yeah, that would be a great way to spin it. It's a fun space. The concept is there. I just don't think they executed on it.

Mikkel (06:45)

Yeah, but the good news is they're not going to rebuild the ship. So they have that space. They could re-theme it on whether that's the menu or kind of like how they do seatings there. And then tonight we have Chef's Table, which is always a really fun evening and a different menu. 

So the menus at Al Fresco and at the Chef's Table are the same every night of the week. So whether you eat there once or twice, it's still going to be the same menu. The concept is that everybody gets to eat there once during their cruise.

And if there's space for another time and you want to eat there to have the same menu, you can. So I'm looking forward to that tonight.

Dan (07:19)

And keep in mind, it's a reservation policy, just like you would on a big ship.

Mikkel (07:23)

Yeah. Let's talk about the passenger capacity. So this passenger capacity is just over 190. It's 196. A normal single-wide ship, even with AmaKristina, AmaDara that we've been on. Well, AmaDara is a little different. It's on the Mekong River. I'm going to focus specifically on European river cruising, especially on the Danube. This double-wide allows for bigger cabins. So the passenger count being 196 versus 180,

It's really not that much of a difference. It's a difference of 16 passengers, yet you have double the ship. So what does that mean? That's awesome for passengers. It means that you have more variety in the type of categories for staterooms. We are in an SB suite. There's various suites. And there's more square footage per cabin.

Dan (08:12)

Kind of the irony is you have these amazing cabins, but you find yourself out exploring the ship because there's so much room that you can carve out with your own little area. So, like with the two libraries, there's a cinema, the lounge, you can go up on the top deck. Like you really can find multiple places throughout the ship that you can really kind of claim as your own and enjoy it. Enjoy the space.

Mikkel (08:37)

And you saying the double lounge, you just reminded me that we were kind of saying that it's sort of like double the fun, double the pleasure. So there's two lounges.

It felt like everything was a normal ship plus one, because it was two times the width. So the width of the ship is 72 feet. Normally with a single wide, it's just under 40 feet wide. But going back to the space that you were saying, passengers have more space. So...

You could go on the lounge on the left or the right. And the main lounge, they have an upper lounge and then you kind of step down almost like a sunken living room to the two lounges on either side and the cinemas in between, architecturally speaking. The main lounge is huge. And the nice thing about that has been like, there's a dance floor and we've like actually been able to have fun and dance whereas there's kind of a dance floor - it's always a multi-purpose room - on other ships.

It really feels like there's a dance floor in this elliptical shape wooden dance floor in the middle with the bar and it's just like a really great gathering space like the hearth of the ship.

Dan (09:40)

Yeah, it's interesting when you're saying that thinking back of other maybe performances or dance floors that we've seen and it's like you're kind of working around chairs and poles and things. But this is wide open space and it really feels special.

Mikkel (10:02)

Mm-hmm. Yeah, it does feel special. And then you also alluded to the top deck and this ship has something really special that... well, two things I think are special that other ships don't.

Dan (10:13)

The pickleball court, of course. You have to mention that because it's very unique. We don't play pickleball, but it's fun to have that option. Right. And I think with the growing popularity of pickleball and everything, it's definitely, really sets this ship apart.

Mikkel (10:32)

And I think that it was really wise of them to keep wellness top of mind. We've cruised with the owners before on AmaDara and it was so inspiring to see how active Kristin is. And she was at every fitness class and I love that. And the wellness programming on this ship has been really incredible. Gym is really nice. That's a good point too. The gym's a little larger than normal because the size is there and there is space for that.

Dan (10:49)

Yeah, but in the gym is really nice.

Mikkel (10:58)

They even have spin bikes on this ship, which is amazing. Like we haven't seen that. They have several. So I believe it's there's five plus the instructor. So there could be six people. So small, but you know, that's the perfect number on this kind of experience. Then the other thing...

Dan (11:12)

Right, right.

The other thing up top is the pool with a hot tub in it.

Mikkel (11:19)

It's very pretty actually. It's very pretty. It's very attractive. It especially looks nice this morning as we sailed into Budapest. That was so picturesque. We were so lucky to have blue skies and sunshine.

Dan (11:31)

Yeah. It's really a well thought out space up there. But you've got the covered areas that which most river cruises have. And then kind of this like sunken down space upfront by the bridge. That's, that feels very kind of intimate. When we sailed out of Vienna last night, I went sat there and you get such great views and you feel like, "Hey, the captain's literally right behind my shoulder. And we're in this together."

Mikkel (11:44)

It was a lounge.

Mikkel (11:59)

Oh, that was the other cool thing when I went to say hi to you and it was too cold, I admit I had to go inside. It started drizzling. It was a little windy. So I went inside, but I did notice how spacious the bridge is. Speaking of AmaMagna, everything's magnified. There's a double-wide bridge essentially in there. It felt very spacious. It almost felt like ocean-shipy.

Let's talk about this: Is bigger better for river cruising? Speaking of comparing it to an ocean ship.

Dan (12:27)

The way I look at it is it's an interesting stepping stone into river from ocean. It's something that you're not sure that you're going to like, or you feel like you're going to get bored. This ship has more. Just more. More amenities, more restaurants, more options and more places to call your own. So I think it's a nice bridge if somebody wants to get into river cruise.

Mikkel (12:54)

Yeah, from ocean cruising, I think it's great for people that want to, like you said, bridge like in a funnel if we're going from bigger to smaller, go down funnel into the smaller ships. I think that it's a really nice, attractive product for that person that's looking for more options on the ship and even more - at its simplest form - more venues, more space, perhaps.

I with the pros always come some cons. So some drawbacks could be that there's not a lot of these double-wide ships. There's currently Riverside Mozart with Riverside Luxury Cruises and AmaMagna with AmaWaterways. And I can envision a world where, of course, as more river cruise ships are on order, Celebrity is coming into the mix soon in a couple of years. They just announced that recently.

I could see, of course, other people are going to do this, but right now it seems like it's the outlier. And, you know, while it's great, it also is not something to be expected for most of the river cruise experiences. And along with that, because the rivers have constraints and that's why the ships are the size they are - we just did the Douro River in Portugal and those ships are even smaller. So.

It is a good gateway into river cruising for people that are used to bigger ships. However, it's not the norm. Most of the ships are even smaller. Yeah. And that's something we love about river cruising. We love the intimate, small feel. We don't need a casino. It's always nice to have options, but bigger isn't always better in that regard. And as our podcast is Small Ship Cruise Talk, because size matters,

we're not saying one is better than the other. It's really based on your preference and there's a river cruise for everybody, but it is something to consider. We don't want to do any false advertising either as the cruise lines don't that the expectation for river cruise ships is normally a smaller vessel. Right.

Dan (14:55)

Yeah, and understanding that coming into it, or maybe that's the reason why you want river to begin with, because you want something smaller.

Mikkel (15:02)

Yeah. And another thing that comes with that in the size is that AmaMagna can't cruise the entire length of the river because of the size. So your itineraries might be more limited. So this is great for somebody that wants to try out river cruising coming from a bigger ship perhaps, or maybe it's just that the price point and the itineraries work and you want to go to the cities that it's hitting up. That kind of thing. But also you're going to be more limited in the itineraries that you have choices from because of the size of the ship.

Dan (15:34)

Yeah, yeah. It makes a difference, but it's just a preference. At the end of the day, it's like, what kind of experience do you want?

Mikkel (15:39)

Yep, preference.

Yeah, yeah. I think of the other Ama ships and the gorgeous staircase on those more traditional river cruise ships that they have. And also they have such a beautiful elevator. And they have that here. They have a double-sided staircase in a different way. And I've enjoyed that. It's like you said, it's not better or worse. It's just different. So aesthetically, it's kind of different than AmaWaterways' traditional river cruise ships.

Dan (16:10)

Right, it's definitely got its own feel. Yeah. To the river.

Mikkel (16:16)

So some final thoughts about AmaMagna and the highlights and all of that goodness with river cruising. Would you do it again? What's your final thoughts on would you go on AmaMagna again?

Dan (16:29)

Yeah, I thought it was really enjoyable. And personally, what I liked about it is there's so much space that you can work in the library or work in the lounge. Usually as soon as you open your laptop, like somebody starts talking to you and you get in a conversation and get nothing done. But here I was able to carve out a little bit of time and to really do some deep thought and some work. 

And I enjoyed that quite a bit. Also, I just thought the amenities were great. The gym is just beautiful comparatively. I have worked out in some places that feel like a closet. I'm on a cruise ship and I'm able to...

Mikkel (17:01)

You want to be able to breathe in a space...

Like when you're literally doing reps, with dumbbells.

Dan (17:05)

It's all glass, so you still can interact with the river and see things. See the views. There's been a few that are kind of in the basement and you're working out and you sort of get a sliver of light. So I like that. And yeah, overall, just thought it was a fantastic experience.

Mikkel (17:24)

I can't let this podcast episode end without mentioning - because you brought up the gym and naturally, I think sweating and sweaty clothes - there is guest laundry on this ship! You can send your laundry out, but you can also go do the laundry yourself, which we really like. If you're traveling and doing carry-on only, or you're going to be here for a pre or post-cruise extension, whether you do it on your own or with a river cruise, the guest laundry is like, mwah! Chef's kiss! Like buttah!

It's so nice to be able to have that. We bring our dryer sheets, we bring our dry sheets for the detergent that we always travel with, the eco-friendly ones. And they do have some, but actually when we went, they were out of the detergent and everything. So it was great that we had it and didn't have to ask for it, but that was awesome too.

Definite perks overall. I would for sure cruise on this again. I am also grateful that there's other itineraries and other ships that can go to other regions, but I think that it is an awesome play in the river cruise industry to have more variety.

Dan (18:27)

Yes, overall, great ship.

Mikkel (18:30)

So thanks for chatting about it, as always, and looking forward to more Small Ship Cruise Talk in the future.