River cruises for a couple of hours from Paris

Are you looking for a cruise that goes outside the city? FYI, I've been eyeing the www.Canauxramacom cruise between the Place de la Bastille and Bassin de la Villette (in-city, through residential neighborhoods), but haven't yet made it happen.

Since Laura has mentioned Canauxrama, I'll recommend their Seine River cruise. It's offered only in the summer and only two are offered a day, both in the evening. They use the boats that go up the canal during the day. The trip starts at the boat basin near Bastille (called the Arsenal), goes through a lock to enter the Seine while a metro track is traveling above your head, travels up the Seine to just beyond the Eiffle Tower and then back down to the lock and back into the Arsenal basin. This is the best Paris boat ride I have ever taken (and I've taken a lot of them). It lasts two hours, whereas the others last one hour.

We are going to give the Canal Saint Martin a whirl in September, using Canauxrama. We'll ride it out, do a picnic at the Parc des Buttes Chaumont (or maybe just hit a really great restaurant!) and then catch the Metro back.
Edit: Note-this one is only about 2.5 hours in length, it leaves Arsenal, near Bastille, (we'll get it on a day that the 9:45 time is available) and goes to La Villette, adult ticket 16 euro one way. They have several others.
http://www.canauxrama.com/en/cruise/cruise-of-the-old-paris_117.html

Canauxrama also offers day-long cruises on the Seine and the Marne, well beyond Paris itself. I haven't done this but you may be interested and have time.

This is fun reading your responses.
I'll be in Paris three weeks this May and the cruise boats seem like a quiet and different outing.
I'll write about it assuming I take one of the tours.
Maybe I'll be able to recommend one.

:-)

I did the Canauxrama all-day cruise on the Marne. To be honest, it wasn't the best river cruise I've taken, but it also wasn't the worst. It is a long day, from 9am to around 6pm. I brought one bottle of water and some snacks along expecting to buy something when we stopped for lunch - big mistake. The place that we stopped for lunch was in the middle of nowhere and there was one restaurant that didn't have full lunch service; they also did not sell bottled soda or water and there were no other stores of any kind. This was not well stated before the cruise so be warned if you decide to spend a day doing this cruise and bring your own lunch. The cruise itself was quite nice but not exciting, a very slow cruise through part of Paris then through very industrial suburbs and then past some very nice upscale housing areas with some interesting architectural styles. It also goes through some locks (very slowly - one took 45min to get through). The narration was supposed to be in both French and English but the guy doing it apparently forgot and only pointed out a couple of things in English, everything else was in French so I sometimes lost interest.

If you've been several days of non-stop sightseeing (like I was) and think you're ready for a day of relaxation doing basically nothing, it could work for you. Otherwise, skip it.

Your reply is perfect.
You gave me all I would want for deciding about taking which trip.
Thanks