Friday May 13

We were up and packed and out of the hotel before 10:00am. We went to the cafe we visited yesterday because they made a nice café viennois to make Sharon happy. Rather than the cute, friendly boy waiter we had yesterday we had a somewhat surly female. Yesterday we got our cafe, buttered baguette toast, and juice for 14 €. Not today! She was not accommodating. It seems our only negative server issues were in the a.m. Yesterday we got up and left Cafe du Marche because we could not get the server to even look at us.

Our dinner last night was exceptional. Di Felicie Ristorante Italiano. Wonderful food, good servers, and a birthday celebration at the next table - a French family who spent a year in Appleton, Wisconsin.

Sharon had aubergine, with tomato sauce and Parmesan - sort of a lasagna without pasta. I started with rocket, artichokes, and sliced Parmesan. I had veal Madeira with a wonderful sauce and a side of long pasta. Dessert was chocolate chip ice cream with fresh strawberries and whipped cream and finally I had a well made espresso.

Back to Friday! We took the Metro to Gare d'Est - a very nice, easily navigated train station. We were there early with about a 1 1/2 hour wait, but we had comfortable seats and could watch people, read, and relax.

We boarded the TGV at about 12:40, easily found our first class car and seats, and were on the way on time at 12:57 . It was a comfortable 45 minute ride to Reims.

The Reims Gare is lovely, quaint, and open. We walked out and saw a Touriste info building, stopped and got a couple of maps and confirmed the location of our hotel just a block or so away.

The Hotel Crystal was quite nice, large bright room and friendly staff.