The Oosterdam is in Aruba. The Amsterdam is at sea from Cairns to Brisbane. The Prinsendam is at sea from Fort Lauderdale to St. Thomas, USVI.
It was very dark at 5AM. I did some last minute computer work and final packing for the last stage of my trip and then headed down for a quick breakfast soon after service started at 6. Since I expected breakfast to be served on the train all I got was a little bacon and took a carton of milk along. I left the room about 6:40 and had the bellman call a cab. There is a bus but the service is only once an hour and I didn’t want to risk a missed connection. The ride is about 15 minutes and I arrived at the station soon after it’s 7AM opening. The station may have actually opened before that as there was already quite a crowd.
When I returned from my walk they had started boarding passengers who needed assistance. Next up was sleeping car passengers and I was the first in line. In previous years the sleeping cars have been at the front of the train and a golf cart was used to ferry us there. Today we are at the rear with just the baggage car behind us and I just stepped aboard. I was onboard about 7:55 for an 8:10 departure. It had been a very cloudy morning and it started to drizzle as we left.
We passed Port Everglades about 8:45. My view was better from the top deck of the Tri-Rail train but I THINK I got a momentary glance at the docked Crystal Serenity; I’ll board her there in 46 days. The dining car had opened as soon as we left the station but I waited until after Ft. Lauderdale to go up. Most of my meals came from the kids menu, for breakfast they are the same as the main menu but smaller portions; even so I skipped most of the breads. My first breakfast was a scrambled egg with sausage and potatoes.
The route through Florida is not really scenic. It’s a mix of swamp land, agricultural land and an occasional lake. Lunch came approaching Winter Haven; the kids macaroni and cheese, no match for the Prinsendam’s. My failing memory of Florida caused me to miss one of the sights I was expecting, Bok Tower Gardens. I remembered Lake Wales as being north of Winter Haven but in reality it was south and it was gone before I started thinking about it. From about West Palm Beach north the skys were mostly sunny. .
We stopped for construction near Kissimmee; it looked like commuter platforms, probably extending from Orlando. My mother spent most of her last 20 years at a retirement village near Kissimmee; I got a brief glimpse of the complex through the trees as we passed. We left Kissimmee later than our scheduled time to leave Orlando, over 45 minutes behind schedule.
Rather than making up time in Orlando we got further behind. I did get to walk almost to the front of the train.
I did get sort of a view of the sunset near Jacksonville. We made a little bit of time at that service stop but we were over an hour behind at Savannah (and still are Tuesday morning).
For dinner I skipped the kids menu and ordered the signature steak. Meals are less course by course than on cruise ships so my collage includes breakfast and lunch. I turned off the lights about 10,
Today’s parting shot will border on a rant. Amtrak has a new station in Miami, well not so new, it was completed about 2015. It’s in the multimodal complex, a 5 minute walk from the Sheraton, but it just sits there. Due to miscommunication between the city and Amtrak, the platform is just a little bit too short. It’s actually fine for most trains but in peak season a few trains are just a couple of cars too long and front of the train would block 25th street. Several solutions have been proposed and even partly implemented but then complications developed and work that had begun was undone. The latest official word (early this year) was that the station would be open late in 2017, but there seem to be no viable plans to make it happen. If the station were there I could have easily walked across the street from the hotel. Let’s get this done.
Roy
Solo Cabin Challenge 
Just curious why you didn’t take the train from Fort Lauderdale (you clued me in before that it was doable after getting off a ship)? Or is it you just wanted to visit Miami…
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It’s really a close call. I think it would be a very easy decision if the new Miami station were open but even the existing Miami station has more facilities and may be a little easier to get to than Ft. Lauderdale.
Roy
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