The 4 Types of River Cruise Staterooms on 135 Meter Longships

by Hank Schrader, USMA '71, Europe Destination & Europe River Cruise Expert

Anne Schrader, Certified Travel Counselor & Certified Luxury Cruise Specialist

www.dreamdestinations.com

Most river cruise companies have 4 types of staterooms on their long ships. They usually are identified by these terms: Riverview (fixed window); French Balcony (sliding glass window); balcony; and suites.

One feature that sometimes surprises folks new to river cruising is there are no inside staterooms—most river cruise ships only have room for 2 staterooms and a hallways on the deck levels. This is a result of lock restrictions which can accommodate 135 meters long (443 feet) and 11.58 meters (38 feet) wide.

It can sometimes be very confusing trying to figure out the different approaches to staterooms by various river cruise lines.

Balconies or lack of balconies is often one of the keys defining differences between river cruise lines in stateroom cabin accommodations. This blog should help you understand each line’s approach to staterooms and should help you evaluate whether a fixed window, a balcony, and what type of balcony, or a suite would be best for your river cruise.

On river cruise ships, there are 6 possible views from your river cruise cabin stateroom. They are: 1) a small window, 2) a large window, 3) a French balcony (a sliding glass door), 4) a balcony with a window that opens halfway, 5) an outside balcony, and 6) a twin balcony. Suites can be a combination of balconies, with walk-out access, just larger French balconies or balconies and fixed windows combined.

Deck Designs of a River Cruise Ship

River cruise ships have 4 decks, but the upper deck, often called the sun or sky deck, is just a roof. There are guest cabins on the remaining 3 decks.

Deck 1 (the lowest deck) is for crew, with some guest staterooms and may have some public areas. Decks 2 and 3 have guest cabins and other public areas. Balcony cabins are only allowed on the upper two decks (2 & 3) of a river cruise ship.

Balcony cabins are always more expensive than window cabins. On the first deck, nearest to the river line, all cabins only have small or large windows, but most only have the small windows. There is a very good safety reason that only windows are allowed on Deck 1, as the windows are just a few feet from the water line. The cabins with only small windows are usually the least expensive cabins on each ship.

Suites, with their larger space, are always the most expensive staterooms on a rivership.

My best guess is that it costs at least 32 million dollars to build a 135-meter river cruise ship today. The costs really vary depending upon the interior design and features. The trend is toward more elegant staterooms and higher costs..

I also have read that the Viking ships that sail on the Mississippi cost from 90 to 100 million dollars to build but these ships do not have the height and length restrictions as do European 135-meter ships.

So, with that background, let’s explore river cruise cabin staterooms on the 135-meter cruise ships that are the most common ships in Europe.

What are the 7 Major River Cruise Companies that Market to US Travelers?

There are currently 7 companies who are the primary suppliers of river cruises to the US market. They are 1) AmaWaterways, 2) Avalon, 3) Emerald, 4) Scenic, 5) Tauck, 6) Uniworld, and 7) Viking. Each of these companies usually have different approaches to their staterooms on their river cruise ships.

AmaWaterways (78--81 Cabins)

AmaWaterways has 15 fixed windows staterooms on their long ships. They vary between 160 square feet to 170 square feet in size. Here are some pictures of these staterooms:

Fixed Windows StateroomPhoto AmaWaterways

Since 2009, when we took our first cruise on AmaWaterways, we have watched balcony cabins evolve on our favorite river cruise line. At first, they only had French balconies on all cabins in the upper two decks.

In 2010, starting with the AmaBella, they introduced the concept of twin balconies— ½ French balcony inside and ½ balcony outside. Since that time, all 135 m river ships on AmaWaterways use the twin balcony concept. No other river cruise line at present uses this concept for most of their upper deck cabins, although Viking does use twin balconies on a limited number of their suites.

Inside View Twin Balcony Stateroom Photo Anne Schrader

Twin balconies really are the best of both worlds—outside when the weather is good or inside with the sliding glass doors of the French balcony at other times. While there are a few French balconies on the upper two decks of their 135 m longships (they call them Cat C cabins), all the remaining 49 have the twin balconies. 65 of the 81 cabins on the 135 m long ships have balconies. Here are some pictures of the twin balconies and French balconies we have taken on various cruises:

Twin Balcony Bathroom Photo Anne Schrader

Suites are 2 rooms in one cabin on the 135-meter ships. There are either 3 or 4 suites on the 135-meter ships and they are either 300 sq feet or 350 sq. feet. Enjoy our pictures here:

AmaSiena Suite Bedroom Photo Anne Schrader

AmaSeina Suite Bathroom Photo Anne Schrader

This suite has a bathtub—a rare luxury on a River Cruise ship Photo Anne Schrader

Avalon (83 Cabins)

Avalon has 16 fixed window staterooms that are 172 sq. feet. Each has two small windows.

Avalon uses French Balconies only. They call their concept an Open-Air Balcony. This concept is that the whole stateroom is the balcony, with the bed facing the window and it has larger windows of 11 feet in the Panorama suites. They heavily promote the “wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling” windows of their staterooms. 68 of the 84 cabins on their longships have the Open-Air Balcony concept.

An important part of their Open-Air concept is that this preserves cabin space, as an actual walk out balcony takes living space from the cabin.

A good view of the total 11 foot balcony stateroom

There are 2 suites on their longships at 300 sq. feet.

Emerald (91 Cabins)

Emerald has 19 fixed window staterooms on the first deck. They are 162 square feet.

Fixed window stateroom Photo Anne Schrader

All Emerald ships on the 2 upper levels have balconies. They call their balconies an open-air system and it uses a button to lower the window horizontally halfway down from the closed position. 72 of their 91 cabins on their 135 m longships have the open-air system. Here are some pictures of the Emerald Sun balconies from a ship inspection we did in 2015:

Panorama Balcony Stateroom between 160 square feet and 180 square feet Photo Anne Schrader

Emerald has staterooms that they call suites that range from 180 square feet (23 cabins) and 210 square feet (7 cabins) and 4 true suites at 315 square feet (using comparable suite classifications used by most river cruise lines). They are on the top deck called the Horizon Deck.

Grand Balcony Suite 210 sq feet Photo Anne Schrader

Scenic (80-82 Cabins)

There are 11 fixed window staterooms on the 3 types of Scenic 135-m ships. They are all 160 square feet.

Scenic features a balcony they call the Sun Lounge—at a push of a button, the glass enclosed lounge converts to an open-air balcony by going horizontally down halfway—it is awesome! All cabin categories on the upper two decks have full balconies with the Sun Lounge. 68 of the 81 cabins on their 135 m longships have the Sun Lounge (the suites may have a slightly different set up). Here are some pictures of the Sun Lounge from our 2015 Scenic Opal cruise:

There is one Royal Owner’s suites midship at a whopping 520 square feet. There other large suites include the Royal Panorama Suite, most of which are 325 square feet (2 are 475 square feet) and a Royal Balcony Suite at 315 square feet (5 ships have one stateroom this size; 3 ships have 3 staterooms this size).

Tauck (67 Cabins)

The Tauck Treasures Rivership. It is clear from this photo there are no outside balconies on this ship Photo Hank Schrader

The some of the fixed window cabins on Tauck are different and unique than other river cruise lines. It has 8 cabins that are called loft cabins—they have a sitting area loft that is raised up from the rest of the cabin area and extends from the first deck to the second deck (they are 225 square feet and listed as category 3). There are 6 fixed windows at 150 square feet that are the more traditional fixed windows without the loft concept. All of these are on deck 1, called the Emerald deck.

Tauck river cruise ships have only French Balconies. 55 of the 67 cabins on their 135 m long ships have balconies. 23 of these cabins are on deck 2, which they call the Ruby deck, and most are 225 square feet.

22 of the 67 cabins are 300 sq feet (they call them category 7 staterooms)—they are on deck 3 which they call the Diamond deck and have 2 French Balconies. 8 of the 10 category 5 are 225 square feet (the other 2 are 190 square feet).

Uniworld (75 or 76 or 79 cabins on the true 443 ft ships; 64 on the 410 ft ship)

Uniworld, with its elaborately decorated boutique river ships, really has different staterooms sizes on each ship. Each stateroom is different.

Uniworld also has made 2 significant changes to its fleet. They have sold their 2 black A and B riverboats which were designed to appeal to a younger crowd.

Uniworld has sold their A and B Black ships Photo Anne Schrader

They also have leased 2 of the elegant former Crystal riverships from Riverside. It is my understanding that one will be in service this year (2024)with minimal changes from the Crystal brand and I just don’t have enough information to properly tell you about this 135-meter ship.

The fixed window cabins measure 162 or 163 square feet and there are 9 or 10 on most ships.

There are 4 ships that are longships—4 at 443 feet and 1 at 410 feet. The larger 135 m longships have French balconies on the second deck and the upper deck. On their 135 m ships 62 (68 if you count the suites) of the 77 staterooms have French balconies only (sliding door that must be opened manually).

The 6 suites include one at 415 square feet (the Grand Suite) and 5 suites at 305 square feet on the SS Catherine; two Grand Suites. The suites have a system similar to Avalon, that can open the French Balcony with a button control.

Viking (95 cabins)

Front view of a Viking Ship in port in Cologne.

A good view of the Balcony Staterooms on a Viking Longship. The bottom row of fixed windows on deck 1 are the fixed window staterooms. Photo Anne Schrader

The Viking Jarl. This shows clearly the French Balcony side of the Viking Longship Design Photo Anne Schrader

Viking on its 70 longships in Europe at present (they have total fleet of over 100 river and ocean cruise ships) use a patented off-center deck on their upper two decks of their riverboats. This allows for one side of the ship to have verandas (outside balconies) and the opposite side has French balconies.

Not to be satisfied with their numbers of longships, I understand they plan to add 5 more in 2025 and another 5 more in 2026 in Europe. This will just expand their dominance on the rivers, as they now have at least 25% of all river cruise ships in Europe. Currently there are over 350 river cruise ships in Europe operated by 27 different companies, according to CLIA (Cruise Lines International Association)—I got this from taking their new online class about river cruising.

There are 25 standard cabins with fixed windows on the main deck that are 150 square feet.

39 state rooms (205 sq ft) have outside verandas.

39 staterooms have 205 sq ft outside verandas Diagram from Viking River Cruises

22 staterooms (135 sq ft) have French balconies.

70 of the 95 staterooms have balconies. The outside balconies have 2 mesh chairs and a small drink table.

There are 2 large Explorer suites (445 sq ft) at the aft end of the ship that have wrap around balconies and 7 veranda suites (275 sq ft) with an outside balcony and a French balcony on the upper deck.

Varanda Suite Diagram from Viking River Cruises.

How To Decide If a Balcony is Important for your Cruise Experience.

Most river cruise guests spend most of their waking hours outside their cabins either in the main lounge or on the top deck, when they are not eating, or on tour. While a private balcony of any type is cool and a great luxury, we have seldom spent more than an hour on any of our balconies during any cruising day (24 river cruises).

I will admit, though, it is tough to beat having a bottle of wine together on your private balcony—a great escape and some quality together time. That alone, makes a balcony important to us—it really doesn’t matter if it is a French Balcony or an outside veranda or a twin balcony—it all is good (but we lean to the outside balcony)!

It is important to realize due to limited docking space, river ships often raft, or tie up next to each other, so your wonderful view now becomes a view into someone else’s cabin. Also, in some ports, the docking location has walls that may obscure views. There is also no view during time in a lock except to look at the concrete lock walls.

3 AmaWaterways Ships rafted in Vienna Photo Anne Schrader

A final point to consider is that sailing often is done at night (except in Portugal where sailing is only during daylight hours), so tours can take advantage of daylight hours, and this limits what you are able to see from your balcony during some sailing times. Even with these limitations, we always prefer a balcony of some type.

Our Final Thoughts--Should you get a Stateroom with a Balcony?

In my opinion yes! One of the best things about river cruising is the constant views along the banks of the river and the more you get to see, the better! We always recommend a cabin on the upper 2 decks for that reason. Another point to consider is that cabins on the river line deck with small windows often only are accessible by stairs and can feel cramped with the limited light from the small window.

We hope this has helped understand more about fixed window staterooms, and balconies that are offered on the various river cruise lines. With these interesting, ever changing views, it is easy to see what a great way a river cruise is to explore Europe!

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ANNE has earned a degree from the University of Houston in Hotel and Restaurant Management. Serving as the President of Visit Dream Destinations, LLC, since 2016, she is uniquely experienced professional travel advisor with over 26 years’ experience in the travel industry. Among her numerous certifications, she is a Certified Travel Counselor (CTC) by the Travel Institute, considered the gold standard in travel agent certification and she is also an Accredited Cruise Counselor (ACC) by the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), as well Luxury Cruise Specialist also from CLIA. Having traveled often to Europe since 1989, she has expanded on her certification as a Destination Specialist in Western Europe (DS) with extensive first-hand experience in luxury vacations. She holds numerous other specialty designations from individual vendors. An expert photographer, she delights in capturing the true essence of destinations to share with all.

HANK is a certified Western European Destination Specialist (DS) who has been traveling to Europe for 50+ years. He is also an Accredited Cruise Counselor (ACC), conferred by the Cruise Line International Association (CLIA). This recognized expert in cruise and leisure travel is a retired Army Officer, and taught World Geography for 8 years. He is a `71 graduate of West Point and has earned 2 master’s degrees. His other Certifications:

AmaWaterways River Cruise Specialist
Viking River Cruise Specialist
Scenic River Cruise Specialist
Emerald Waterways Specialist
Avalon Waterways Specialist
Brit Agent

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