No two cruises and ships are ever the same. I seem to find something new each time I cruise.

I’ve been on ships with balconies many times. That is one of my favorite things to do on a cruise – sit on my balcony and watch the ocean or the river roll.

But my cruise on the beautiful new Amadeus Silver II had a delight I had never seen before. My cabin didn’t have a balcony. Instead, it had a French window.

The floor-to-ceiling window in my stateroom covers almost the entire wall. I don’t have a walk-out veranda but I have an inside veranda. What I do to bring the outside in is to push a button and the upper half of the window comes down. It does feel as though I am sitting outside.

The window wall is framed with wood, almost like the window is a work of art, which it is. The scenery outside that window is gorgeous and changing. The window does have heavy drapes which cruise director Lorelay Bosca us in our first-night briefing are very important.

This is a Rhine River cruise, not an ocean cruise. We may go to sleep with nothing around us but the river and the shore in the distance. Then we may wake up docked near a small town or a park or even another ship.

And, as Lorelay warned, we could be in for a rude awakening if we left our curtains open and come out of the shower or the bed au naturel and give a surprise show to unsuspecting people outside our big window. Good to know.

Story and photo by Jackie Sheckler Finch