Tag Archives: Eurostar

The Journey to Paris

Arrived very early at St. Pancras station. It was organized but you need more time than I recalled. More time for vaccine card.  Proof of a negative Covid test.  And everything takes three times longer. But, at some point you get through. They give you a tiny card at French customs on the UK side and as long as you don’t lose the card you are good. The breathtaking journey to Paris.

Whoever remembers those awful journeys with flights from Heathrow or the ferries from Dover. I was musing about the absolute brilliance of bringing Europe together the other day. Brexit? Never going to happen. Boris Johnson. A joke. A clown. No way! Here we are. It’s all happened. Agghh!! But at least we have the train under the channel!!

Built over 5 years and opened in 1994 it has transformed access to Europe. Imagine. Two hours and 15 minutes. Thirty-eight minutes under the channel. 250′ feet under the bottom of the chalk seabed. The longest underwater tunnel in the world. Napoleon. Hitler. Nobody since 1066 has ever managed to breakthrough. Except the Chunnel. Even the EU got rejected. It’s a shame but at least we have the champagne bar to send us off as we go into the unknown. At least we have Europe. Well, hang on. They don’t want the Brits. The Chunnel was it. Brexit was the end! Oh well!

eurostar-train

Trains-Part 1

There’s a lot of talk at the moment about overnight trains…. They’re coming back!

I remember when they were so fashionable and …. expensive and then one day they disappeared. I also remember the unfashionable but super functional aspect of a night train. Tour companies would use couchettes all the time to travel from Paris to Venice, from Paris to Avignon, Paris to Madrid and Paris to Rome. An afternoon sightseeing and dinner somewhere in the Latin quarter before heading to the Gare du Lyon for a night journey across the European cities and towns that sparkled in the distance. Night trains were a way for tour operators to save the overnight in a hotel and provide a fun experience. Six to a cabin in times gone by.

Baguettes in hand and the trundle of tracks to put 700 to sleep before you awoke to the sparkling blue of the Mediterranean!  Then budget airline companies like EasyJet and Ryanair introduced the cheap and fast option to replace the train lines with airport lines and delays! Nothing was ever the same!

Before you knew it we were jumping on planes for weekends to Prague for less than €10 and suddenly night trains were relics from a distant era.  Just like that.  Consigned to the dustbin of history….. In addition, super high-speed trains started to populate the European landscape.  The TGV, the AVE, the Eurostar and the Thalis.  Faster than ferries and less hassle and infinitely more comfortable than a cheap flight.  The fact that you can now take a train from Rome to Milan in less time than it will take you on a plane changed everything yet again.  London to Paris; one hour and 20 minutes!  No seat belts, no hassle and rarely delays.  But there’s been a rekindling of activity on night trains.  Maybe not to replace the super-fast high-speed trains, but rather to provide that element, that adventure that we all remember in days past.  And 6 to a room wasn’t that bad!