Thursday, October 15, 2015
We went to the Dutch Shanty Choir performance last night
after dinner. The 4 of us walked in about 10 past 9pm and we were the only
people in there for the first 3 songs. I think we all felt bad for them. The
thing is that Clay & I were expecting shanty singing which is a Capella and
they had 2 guitars, a drummer, and 2
accordions in additional to the singers dressed as boat captains. It was a bit
strange and not shanty singing as we’ve heard it around the world. It was
entertaining and eventually more people arrived. We learned that the next
cruise southbound out of Amsterdam is a 60-person charter. The crew deserves a
break.
Today we finally leave Amadeus Silver II. If you must river
cruise in Europe, I can recommend this boat. It is nearly perfect. I had no
complains and couldn’t really find anything to improve. I still can’t recommend
a river cruise in Europe though, sorry. We were up early and had a big
breakfast. Clay and I each took something out of the restaurant to eat on the
train later. We shared it. We did end up being called to leave the boat for our
transfer and hour early at 9:30am. There was a driver and a tour guide to baby
sit us until we got on the train. So, Alexandra was the only ugly spot in the
whole debarkation/transfers process. I will never know what her story was. She
certainly didn’t help an already bad situation. The Thalys high speed train
arrived and we got our luggage stowed and got seated and waved goodbye to our
guide. Graham had the seat next to me on the train and he swapped with Clay so
we got to sit together. We got to Paris Nord about 2:35pm. We walked out past
the front of the train and quickly found a driver with Amras and all our names
written on a paper. I don’t believe he spoke English. I don’t believe he spoke
much to any of us except to have us point to our names on the sign and make
sure he had us all and all our luggage. Off we went. We loaded up a van that
couldn’t have held anymore and we drove around 2 hours straight through to Les
Andelys.
We walked through another boat to board and quickly got our
keys and our luggage moved into our cabins. We all went straight to tea for something
to eat. Then Clay and I took a quick walk around the charming half-timbered
little town in the hour before the safety briefing. It turned out the safety
briefing was postponed a day because not everyone had arrived. Instead we had a
life onboard talk/port talk in Finnish, German and English. This may get a bit
cumbersome. We had a problem communicating in the dining room that we are not
with the Celebrity Cruises/Amras group that has their own guide/director. The maître
d’ did change the sign at the table we wound up occupying but I don’t think he
got it. Things are a bit different here. They are also different. The cabins
are much smaller and less well insulated and built. I would say they are uglier
along with the rest of the boat but some people prefer the décor. We don’t have
refrigerators and even worse the Amadeus Diamond does not have an ice machine
in the Amadeus Club in the aft or any ice buckets to keep ice from the bar. So,
we already started with the bad news that the boat is not in Paris and there
will be no scenic night time sail away. The only reason that anyone saw the
Eiffel Tower is that I was looking around for it and pointed it out as we sped
off in a packed van in horrendous traffic in the rain. Our guide in Amsterdam
this morning told us that yesterday was the coldest temperature ever recorded
on that date! They skipped fall in Europe this year and went straight to
winter. Bad for us!
So, since we couldn’t have the safety briefing until
tomorrow we had the port talk. Tomorrow we will drive almost all the way back
to Paris to visit Auvers sur l’Oise. This is one of the Impressionists bases and
we will visit a museum about that. It is also where Van Gogh died and we will
see where he is buried. Looking and not looking forward to that. We were all
hoping they’d sail on towards the sea and catch the ports toward Paris on the
way back but no. We will stay overnight in Les Andelys. We had to move during
dinner because the police boarded the 3 riverboats and informed them that they
cannot sit and run generators all night. We all moved upstream outside the city
limits I guess and moved back the next morning because we weren’t allowed to
get on and off there. We did not sleep as well. There is also no alarm clock on
the bedside table. There is no bedside table. Well, things are different and
louder. The windows don’t move up and down electrically, but have one side
panel that slides open. That’s OK, given the cold and rain we haven’t been opening
the window much anyway.
There is a tiny inadequate closet and drawers compared to
all the drawers and shelves and walk-in closet on Silver II. Really bad news
since they expect us to dress for dinner on this boat and that was never
expected on the last! I hope they get over it because Clay and our dining
companion did not even bring coats and ties.
