Bonjour Paree!

Wed 11^th Sept continued.

The Eurostar train between London and Paris was a dream. We bought a carnet of tickets for the Paris metro in the boarding lounge, saving us the hassle of figuring out a ticket machine when we arrived. They cost 15 GBP, not sure if that was a good price, but, what the heck. That’s 10 tickets that we can share, one ticket per trip. Trevor impressed a fellow passenger with the cable lock he ran through our suitcase handles. Probably not necessary but gave piece of mind as we weren’t sitting where we could see them. Easy boarding and luggage stowage, found our seats and settled in for the 2 and a half hour journey. How can that be? So fast!! Well, the train reached a maximum speed of 300km/hr, not for long, but it did register. A man sitting across the aisle had his Navman set up and he was watching the speed and he allowed us to take photos of the best speed registrations. Then he realised he should take photos of it too! Wow! I’ve never travelled that fast on land.

Leaving England

It did hit 300!

 The bar opened not long after we left St Pancras International, so a beer went well with the sandwiches we made. How organised are we??

The Chunnel didn’t seem that long and the French countryside zoomed by so fast, but what we saw was the stuff of postcards, mostly. We were about 10 minutes late arriving at Gare du Nord, maybe we should have stayed at 300km/hr for a bit longer. Tristan, the owner of our Paris flat messaged just as we arrived with a reminder of directions to get to his flat and was waiting for us when we arrived. We had to change trains at Gare d’Austerlitz, what a nightmare!!! Sooo many stairs ……………. I had my first taste of French gallantry – a nice man offered to carry my suitcase down the last of 3 flights of stairs. Man, I was so happy, I’m glad I can say thank you very much in French, because I really meant it. There are drunks and deros the world over, but did we have to strike them on our first metro ride?? Inoffensive enough I guess, probably because we can’t speak Francais, but it was the volume and tone that made us wary. 

Tristan met us at his flat, showed us around, then left us to it. One very important piece of information he gave us was how to lock and unlock the door. You have to turn the key 2 times around to achieve this. Who would have thought?

Living area with access to balcony

same room, back the other way

compact kitchen

We unpacked a bit, put on some washing then went looking for dinner. There’s a supermarket downstairs with alcohol, again, very handy and so many restaurants, you’d never have time to try them all. Our first sustenance in Paris was a glass of wine and a chunk of a crusty baguette on our little balcony – just room enough for 2 chairs and a table – perfect!