We travelled to Paris on September 21 on the Eurostar with Ross and Susanna for a five-day sojourn in Paris. The Eurostar experience was such a pleasant surprise especially in contrast to the Gatwick experience getting to Portugal. Firstly it was much faster to get to – even after Ross took the long way by taking the bus to Bounds Green tube station instead of Highgate, which meant a couple of changes of train – exacerbated by a change in the Tube at Kings Cross that meant it no longer provided direct access to Waterloo that Ross and Susanna weren’t aware of as they don’t use the Tube all that often. Even so we were there is less time than getting to Gatwick and once there it took only little while to get our tickets (because our credit cards don’t have a chip on them so I couldn’t use the automatic ticketing machines to print out our tickets). Then getting through security was fast, then a short wait and then on to the train. Too easy.
The trip was great. Even though we were facing backwards (and I was concerned that it might make me travel sick), it was very smooth. It was also great to see the countryside both in Kent and France. The French countryside was beautiful and seemed very prosperous – crops, pastures, lots of dairy calves – just lovely.
We arrived in Paris very relaxed, stepped off the train with our luggage already with us and we were in Paris! We then sorted out a five-day rail pass and got the Metro two stops to our accommodation. After a bit of mucking around with the doors to get into the place where our key was (the doors were really heavy so you needed to give them a good shove to get in – I thought I’d been putting in the wrong security code), we finally made it into our apartment building. We knew the apartment was on the last floor – just not how many floors there were! We discovered the apartment was on the sixth floor up a narrow winding staircase – 91 steps. So poor Alastair had to carry the bags to the top and arrived thoroughly exhausted. We then struggled again with the door which had a fairly heavy duty dead bolt before finally getting into the apartment. The apartment was lovely. Being on the top floor it was light filled. It was not big but not as small as I had expected either. The building is a typical six-storey Parisian building. We are in the ‘attic’ style apartment that has exterior walls with wooden roof slates on them. It is in a little passage that separates a major boulevard from a minor one that runs next to a large covered market.
We had dinner nearby in Passage Brady, which specialises in Indian food, Susanna’s favourite kind of food.
Carlene
The trip was great. Even though we were facing backwards (and I was concerned that it might make me travel sick), it was very smooth. It was also great to see the countryside both in Kent and France. The French countryside was beautiful and seemed very prosperous – crops, pastures, lots of dairy calves – just lovely.
We arrived in Paris very relaxed, stepped off the train with our luggage already with us and we were in Paris! We then sorted out a five-day rail pass and got the Metro two stops to our accommodation. After a bit of mucking around with the doors to get into the place where our key was (the doors were really heavy so you needed to give them a good shove to get in – I thought I’d been putting in the wrong security code), we finally made it into our apartment building. We knew the apartment was on the last floor – just not how many floors there were! We discovered the apartment was on the sixth floor up a narrow winding staircase – 91 steps. So poor Alastair had to carry the bags to the top and arrived thoroughly exhausted. We then struggled again with the door which had a fairly heavy duty dead bolt before finally getting into the apartment. The apartment was lovely. Being on the top floor it was light filled. It was not big but not as small as I had expected either. The building is a typical six-storey Parisian building. We are in the ‘attic’ style apartment that has exterior walls with wooden roof slates on them. It is in a little passage that separates a major boulevard from a minor one that runs next to a large covered market.
We had dinner nearby in Passage Brady, which specialises in Indian food, Susanna’s favourite kind of food.
Carlene
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