Cruise Planners "On the Road" - River Cruising on AMA Waterways - Paris to Amsterdam on Ama Lyra - November 4-14 2014 - Naples to Paris - Days 5 &6 - Luxembourg, Embarkation, and Bernkastel, Germany

TGV High Speed Train

Day 5 started perfectly with luggage pick up promptly at 0800 - we wouldn't see our bags again until getting into our cabin aboard Ama Lyra eight hours later.  In the intervening time, we did a multi-mode trip to meet the ship at Remich in Luxembourg.  Leaving the hotel by motor coach at 0915, we had a narrated trip to the Gare de'l Este (East train station) where we caught a high speed train (verified as high as 192mph on my GPS) from Paris to Metz, France.  

Paris East Train Station

From Metz, we caught another guide-narrated motor coach ride to Luxembourg.  We ate lunch here in Luxembourg City - pretty city - food looked wonderful but was pretty blase' after eating in Paris for 4 days.

Downtown Luxembourg City - Cold and Wet

Grave of General George Patton

After getting back onto our coach after lunch and souvenir shopping in Luxembourg City, we re-boarded our bus; next stop - the U.S. World War II Military Cemetery between Luxembourg City and Remich.  The cemetery was somber but beautifully maintained -- according to our guide, most of those interred here perished during the Battle of the Bulge. It is also the final resting place of General George Patton - the reason his grave is separate is because the amount of foot traffic around it when it was with the rest of graves killed all the grass.  So now he rests in a separate plot.

US WWII Cemetery between Luxembourg City and Remich

A retreat allows private time to contemplate the triumph and tragedy of war

We re-boarded the bus one more time for our short trip to Ama Lyra.  Overall, we were extremely impressed with the coordination and logistics of our pre-cruise activities.  Our cruise director Uwe had everything in hand at all times and every leg of our trip, thanks to excellent local guides, was a learning experience.

Once we were off the bus, we walked directly aboard and had two wonderful surprises.  First, check-in took about one minute - a new all time record for cruise ship check-in.  Then we found out we had been upgraded - thank you Ama Waterways.

Re-united with our bags - we unpacked and got ready for the Captain's Dinner.  Dinner was fanstastic - starting with a crabcake and crawfish appetizer, followed by a medium rare sirloin steak and excellent dessert.  White and Red wine is included and accompanies each meal - really quite good.  

This specific cruise is known as the President's cruise because Ama's President & CEO Rudi Schreiner is on board.  We've spent time with him each evening and are learning a bunch about the cruise business from him.  After dinner, the party really got started...  With live dance music, we danced until 1am when we walked upstairs to watch Ama Lyra approach her first lock on the Mosel (or Moselle if you prefer the French spelling).  Then off to bed to recharge our batteries for our first day on the Mosel.

Cruise Planners "On the Road" - River Cruising on AMA Waterways - Paris to Amsterdam on Ama Lyra - November 4-14 2014 - Naples to Paris - Day 2

Arrival at Charles de Gaulle was perfect - our AMA Waterways arranged driver was waiting when we exited baggage claim at 0730.  Very smooth transition into a very nice and new BMW sedan.  Driver was wonderfully calm during the almost 3 hour (yes 3 hour) drive into downtown Paris.  Note to self - don't arrive in Paris on a weekday during rush hour.  Traffic was really bad -- at least Valerie got a little bit of sleep.

Rush hour traffic 

Once we arrived, we were met just inside the door by Uwe, a member of the AmaLyra cruise staff.  He gave us our Paris package and helped take our luggage over to check in where we were met by a surly hotel receptionist who informed us that our room wouldn't be ready before noon.  Note to self - as we have watched at least three sets of aircrew arrive from the airport and immediately get rooms, don't stay at hotels where all of the available rooms are waiting for folks who just got off the same plane you did but are wearing polyester jackets and skirts with stripes and things.  The hotel Pullman Montparnasse is not scoring points in our book; forget about check in and the clerk -- the lobby is completely non-descript and maybe a 3.5 star at best.   Considering how much we paid for this hotel, we would get our own hotel next time and see about meeting AMA Waterways pre-tours in the hotel lobby.  Maybe things will improve once we get into our room - we're hoping...  Another piece of intel has to do with eating in Paris on weekdays -- before noon, you can get a croissant, orange juice, etc - lunch doesn't start until 12:00 - so after flying all night you are going to be pretty hungry by the time things open to eat a regular meal.  We are definitely hoping things improve after we get into our room and something to eat.  After all, it is Paris...

*** Addendum...  We did get into our room only to find that the room assigned us - 1803 - had clearly hosted a smoker in the very recent past - including a burn on the carpet.  In a non-smoking hotel with a 150Euro fine advertised - the nicfix must be worth it I guess...  They moved us to 2101 - much better although for a hotel with a rack rate starting at 530 Euro's - I would consider the room underwhelming.  The location is great - but this is definitely a businesspersons' hotel not a leisure traveler's first choice.  Then we went to lunch just down the street - we'll eat there again and get pictures next time - fabulous is all we could say.

Pullman Montparnasse Lobby with Aircrews checking in