10-Day Paris & Normandy River Cruise
Roundtrip Paris
AmaWaterways
Paris, the Seine, Normandy's coast, and the D-Day beaches — all connected by one of the world's most celebrated rivers. This is the itinerary I design for travelers who want France done right without living out of a suitcase.
Ten days. Paris on both ends. The Seine through Normandy in between.
This sample itinerary shows how I structure a Paris and Normandy river cruise on AmaWaterways — from your first morning in Saint-Germain to your last café au lait before the flight home. The cruise is roundtrip Paris, which means clean flights, no transfer chaos, and a city worth savoring on both ends.
It isn't a package. It's a starting point. Every hotel, experience, and detail is customized when we plan together. But this flow works — and it'll show you what a well-planned France trip actually looks like versus the version you'd cobble together from blog posts.
A Quick Note Before We Dive In
Who this trip is for
This trip is for couples, groups, and anyone who has always wanted to see Paris and Normandy but doesn't want to figure out trains, rental cars, and hotels across two regions. It's also for the traveler with a family connection to the D-Day beaches — and I plan a lot of those trips. They tend to be personal in a way that other vacations aren't, and that changes how I approach the whole itinerary.
Most people plan Paris and Normandy as two separate trips. This route does both — and the river connects them in a way that makes the logistics disappear.
AmaWaterways is one of the most consistent river cruise operators I work with. I've toured their ships, I know the product, and I recommend them here because the experience matches the destination. The food is excellent, the excursions are thoughtful, and the ship feels like it belongs on the Seine — not like a floating resort that got dropped in from the Caribbean. For travelers who want to compare lines before committing, I've built a side-by-side comparison guide that covers the top ten — no cruise line spin, just my honest take on who each one is actually right for. I'll send it to you.
You unpack once in Paris. You board the ship. You see Normandy, Giverny, Rouen, and the D-Day beaches from the water and on the ground. Then you're back in Paris to fly home. History, wine, extraordinary food, and two of France's most iconic regions without once dragging a suitcase through a train station.
Free Download: The River Cruise Comparison Guide
Top 10 river cruise lines. Side-by-side. No cruise line spin.
Inclusions, pricing tiers, and my honest take on who each line is right for — from someone who's actually toured the ships.
No spam. Just the guide — and occasionally, trip intel worth reading.
Pre-Cruise: Paris
Days 1 to 3
Day 1: Arrival in Paris
Private transfer from Charles de Gaulle to your hotel. I put most clients in Saint-Germain-des-Prés — the neighborhood feels like the Paris you've been picturing. Walkable, beautiful, full of brasseries worth sitting in for two hours while you pretend you're not jet-lagged. For clients who want more energy, we look at Le Marais. Either way, it's a boutique property with character, not a chain hotel near a highway.
Day one is simple. Get there, eat something good, walk until your legs tell you to stop. Paris adjusts you to itself if you let it.
Day 2: The Louvre, Privately
A private Louvre experience is one of the best things I book for clients in Paris. No crowd six deep around the Mona Lisa. No wandering through rooms you don't care about because you can't find the ones you do. A guide who can explain what you're looking at and why it matters — and who knows which rooms to skip and which ones most people walk right past. It's a completely different museum when someone is navigating it for you.
Afternoon is yours. Tuileries Garden, Palais Royal, a long dinner in Saint-Germain. If Versailles is on your list and you'd rather do it before the cruise than after, tell me — I'll build it into this day or the next. It's a half-day trip and it fits here cleanly.
Day 3: Paris by Neighborhood
A food tour through Saint-Germain or the Marais is one of my favorite ways to spend a Paris morning — cheese, charcuterie, pastry, wine, and a guide who knows which bakery is actually worth the line and which one is coasting on its location. You learn a neighborhood through eating. That's how Paris is supposed to work.
For clients who want to cover more visual ground, a private tuk-tuk tour hits the iconic sights without the misery of a tour bus. Eiffel Tower, Champs-Élysées, Sacré-Cœur — seen from the right angles, at the right speed, with someone who knows where to stop.
This is your last full day before the ship. I keep it intentionally relaxed. A good dinner, an early night, and you board tomorrow feeling like you've actually been in Paris — not like you sprinted through it with a checklist.
Part 2: AmaWaterways
Days 4 to 9
The River: AmaWaterways
This is where the trip changes shape entirely. You board in Paris, the ship becomes your hotel, and for six days you wake up somewhere new without packing a single bag. The rhythm of a river cruise is different from anything else I plan — slower, more deliberate, and surprisingly emotional for a trip that involves this much wine and cheese.
Days 4–5: Vernon, Giverny & Les Andelys
The ship moves upriver through the kind of French countryside that makes you understand why the Impressionists painted here. Vernon is the gateway to Giverny — Monet's house and gardens — and I'll say it plainly: the gardens are as extraordinary as every photo you've ever seen. The water lilies, the Japanese bridge, the light. It delivers. Les Andelys brings you to the ruins of Château Gaillard perched above the river — Richard the Lionheart's fortress, dramatic and crumbling and worth the walk up.
Days 6–7: Rouen & the Seine Valley
Rouen is a medieval city with a Gothic cathedral that Monet painted thirty times because the light kept changing and he couldn't stop. The Old Town is half-timbered, walkable, and the kind of place where you can skip the organized excursion and just explore on your own. I review every included excursion with my clients before boarding — Rouen is one of the ports where I often recommend going independent instead. You'll get more out of it at your own pace.
Days 8–9: The D-Day Beaches
This is the excursion that stays with people long after the trip is over. Omaha Beach. The American Cemetery. The rows of white crosses and the scale of what happened on that coastline. A lot of my clients have a grandfather, a great-uncle, a family connection to someone who landed on those beaches. For those travelers, this isn't a history excursion — it's a pilgrimage. And they know the difference before they get there.
AmaWaterways handles this day with the weight it deserves. The guides are knowledgeable, the pacing is respectful, and you're given the space to feel whatever you feel without being rushed to the next stop. I've had clients tell me this was the most meaningful day of any trip they've ever taken. I believe them every time.
Post Cruise: Paris
Days 10 & On
Post-Cruise: Paris — Day 10
The cruise ends back in Paris, which is one of the great advantages of this itinerary. No scramble to a different city. No connecting flight. You're back where you started, and the city is still there waiting for you.
I build in one buffer night after disembarkation for most clients. It gives you a real Paris morning — a café, a walk, a final meal somewhere worth it — instead of a race to CDG with your bags half-packed and your nerves shot.
If Versailles didn't fit in the pre-cruise, this is your window. A half-day from Paris, and the Hall of Mirrors and the gardens are worth the trip even if you're tired. Tell me when we plan and I'll figure out whether it fits before or after the cruise.
CDG is not an airport where you want to be stressed or rushed. I build the departure logistics around your actual flight time so that never happens.
Ready to build your Paris & Normandy river cruise?
Paris, the Seine, Giverny, and the D-Day beaches — all in one trip, without dragging your luggage through a single train station. The logistics on this one are simpler than most of my itineraries because the ship does the hard work. What I do is make sure the Paris days on either end are planned properly and that you're on the right ship, in the right cabin, with the right expectations for every excursion. That's the difference between a river cruise you enjoyed and one you'll remember.