First of all, I took the CDG people mover train to terminal 2, where the long-distance train station is located. As I still had roughly 1 hour to spend before my train would be leaving, I walked around a bit in the landside part of terminal 2. However, when I wanted to find somewhere to settle down, I noticed that there were hardly any shops or restaurants in the landside part of this terminal, and even the terminal halls actually didn’t look quite spacious. I guess, there is no real reason to actually like Charles de Gaulle airport. As the departure time of my train approached, I went down to the platform and waited for the train to arrive.
When the train finally came it was almost empty - I had booked a ticket in the Premier category which basically means a seat in first class along with a meal during the ride. Unfortunately, with Thalys, you cannot select your reserved seats by yourself, but instead you will be assigned one during the booking process. As reservations are mandatory on those trains, there are also no indicators as to whether a certain seat has been taken or is still vacant, so you are basically stuck with the seat that the system has assigned to you. In my case, I had a window seat which was facing backwards and didn‘t really have a view to the outside as the strut between two windows was located directly next to the seat. Despite having only two other passengers in my coach, I did not bother changing to a different seat.
As the premier fare type includes catering during the ride, shortly after an on-time departure two attendants showed up and pushed a cart through the aisle. We were served a cold meal (which was more or less on par what would you would receive on an intra- European business class flight at this time of day) and also offered a choice of drinks including Belgian beer, soft drinks, red and white wine as well as tea and coffee. After approximately half an hour, the attendants passed through the cabin again and offered refills.
The ride to Brussels took less than two hours and was reasonably pleasant, even though the seats in Thalys trains do not offer much legroom (not even in first class). My knees were constantly touching the seat in front of me when I reclined my seat, and all in all, a Thalys train ride is actually not the most pleasant railway experience in Europe.
We arrived in Brussels on time as well, and while the train was continuing to Amsterdam, I got off as I had to change onto a train that was ironically going back to Frankfurt. I had another hour to spend before my connecting train would leave, and even though there seems to be some kind of lounge at Brussels station, the admission rules are not really clear and then, the lounge is also located outside the station so I did not bother to go there.
Approximately 20 minutes before my train was scheduled to depart, the departure board was announcing that the train was ready for boarding. When I came to the platform, the train was already standing there, but where is this playing do not board we are still cleaning on its destination indicators. It’s took another 10 minutes until the doors were opened and we could take our seats.
Contrary to the train from Paris to Brussels, this was an ICE train operated by Deutsche Bahn. While those trains are generally a bit more comfortable than the Thalys trains (particularly the legroom is much better on those trains), the interior is showing its age (those trains have been in service for roughly 20 years now, and are just being refurbished one by one).
No catering is provided here, however, you can buy small dishes, snacks and drinks at relatively fair prices in the dining car. We also departed on time but then, when we had our only intermediate stop at Liège-Guillemins (which is, architecturally, quite a spectacular station), we were standing there for about 20 minutes due to a technical problem with our train (which is actually more than common).
Another 20 minutes later, we finally arrived at my final destination, Aachen central station, approximately 2 hours later than if everything, including the connection at CDG, had gone according to plan.