Italy, Day 1: London to Paris and Onwards
We had an early start Thursday to catch an 8.42 am train to London. On arrival at Liverpool Street station, we had over an hour to get to Waterloo station by taxi, and we needed a lot of it because traffic doesn't move very quickly in London. The Eurostar terminal wasn't as busy as on earlier trips and we breezed through checkin and security. Here's Sarh and I not long after departure.
In Paris we got in a taxi queue at Gare du Nord where I met the most persistent panhandler I've ever encountered. The taxi queue at that station is a railed path, so panhandlers have a captive audience of tourists. This one spent about a minute and a half on me before moving down the line.
The taxi to Gare du Bercy wasn't much quicker than our London trip. On arrival we had over two hours until our train's departure. Sarah had time to chase birds around the station.
Soon after we spent the rest of our wait in a lounge for overnight rail passengers. It was a nice bit of swankness and it was comforting to have newspapers and magazines to read and relax with.
Our Paris-to-Rome train left at 7:09 pm, giving us about ten hours of travel so far, subtracting the hour time change, but we had about twelve hours to go before alighting in Florence. Cheers to Margo for coordinating our travel and giving usplenty of connecting time - it was nice to not be rushed.
None of us have slept on a train before. Sarah was very excited, but her mood turned to disappointment once she saw our berth - she was expecting something like a hotel room.
To be kind, the berth is an efficient use of space. You can see one bunk on top, and the wall underneath folds down for a second bunk; the seating below folds flat to make a third bunk. A collapsible ladder under the seats let us climb to them. There's a small wash basin behind Margo and lots of clever hooks and holders that fold out of the walls.
We stowed our bags and made a reservation for the 8 pm dinner, the other being 10.30. We couldn't lock our berth's door from the outside so we put the items we could least afford to lose into shoulder bags and brought them to dinner with us.
We dined rolling through the French countryside at sunset. This was also our first real Italian meal. The menu was fixed, with a few choices for primi, secondi and dolci. For the first course, Sarah got pasta pomodoro and we got gnocchi. Refreshingly, the food was cooked on-site, with no detectable microwaving. We thought the gnocchi was disappointing nonetheless. But our second course choice of salmon was much better; very tasty. We also got side dishes (contorni) of spinaci - except for Sarah of course, for whom vegetables are deadly. Sarah was getting tired, so she and Margo left early, even before dessert. The dolci choices were fresh fruit and fruit salad, but if they'd known that chocolate & crema tortes were substituted for the fruit salad, perhaps they'd have stayed. I finished as we pulled into Dijon, too late to request mustard for our salmon.
I think our vision of sleeping on a train was a bit more romantic: being lulled to sleep while the countryside rolls by. In reality, it was more difficult. The bunks are of course small and a bit confining, especially for me on top. (I also got all the bad air, some generated by my cabin mates in a less than flattering manner.) But it's not all gentle: the train shudders at higher speeds, and as the cars tilt on corners, you feel your body being tugged this way and that. It took some getting used to; Sarah was up later than we expected. But soon Margo's familiar chainsawing was heard and Sarah was out cold. Even I eventually succumbed.
I'd turned on my mobile to use its alarm to wake us before our 7.15 am arrival. As a side effect, we got a text message from Virgin Mobile each time we entered a new roaming service provider's area. Around 11.30 it was "Welcome to Switzerland", which was a nice surprise. Around 2 in the morning it was "Welcome to Italy". And I'll leave the rest of the next day's story for our next post.
In Paris we got in a taxi queue at Gare du Nord where I met the most persistent panhandler I've ever encountered. The taxi queue at that station is a railed path, so panhandlers have a captive audience of tourists. This one spent about a minute and a half on me before moving down the line.
The taxi to Gare du Bercy wasn't much quicker than our London trip. On arrival we had over two hours until our train's departure. Sarah had time to chase birds around the station.
Soon after we spent the rest of our wait in a lounge for overnight rail passengers. It was a nice bit of swankness and it was comforting to have newspapers and magazines to read and relax with.
Our Paris-to-Rome train left at 7:09 pm, giving us about ten hours of travel so far, subtracting the hour time change, but we had about twelve hours to go before alighting in Florence. Cheers to Margo for coordinating our travel and giving usplenty of connecting time - it was nice to not be rushed.
None of us have slept on a train before. Sarah was very excited, but her mood turned to disappointment once she saw our berth - she was expecting something like a hotel room.
To be kind, the berth is an efficient use of space. You can see one bunk on top, and the wall underneath folds down for a second bunk; the seating below folds flat to make a third bunk. A collapsible ladder under the seats let us climb to them. There's a small wash basin behind Margo and lots of clever hooks and holders that fold out of the walls.
We stowed our bags and made a reservation for the 8 pm dinner, the other being 10.30. We couldn't lock our berth's door from the outside so we put the items we could least afford to lose into shoulder bags and brought them to dinner with us.
We dined rolling through the French countryside at sunset. This was also our first real Italian meal. The menu was fixed, with a few choices for primi, secondi and dolci. For the first course, Sarah got pasta pomodoro and we got gnocchi. Refreshingly, the food was cooked on-site, with no detectable microwaving. We thought the gnocchi was disappointing nonetheless. But our second course choice of salmon was much better; very tasty. We also got side dishes (contorni) of spinaci - except for Sarah of course, for whom vegetables are deadly. Sarah was getting tired, so she and Margo left early, even before dessert. The dolci choices were fresh fruit and fruit salad, but if they'd known that chocolate & crema tortes were substituted for the fruit salad, perhaps they'd have stayed. I finished as we pulled into Dijon, too late to request mustard for our salmon.
I think our vision of sleeping on a train was a bit more romantic: being lulled to sleep while the countryside rolls by. In reality, it was more difficult. The bunks are of course small and a bit confining, especially for me on top. (I also got all the bad air, some generated by my cabin mates in a less than flattering manner.) But it's not all gentle: the train shudders at higher speeds, and as the cars tilt on corners, you feel your body being tugged this way and that. It took some getting used to; Sarah was up later than we expected. But soon Margo's familiar chainsawing was heard and Sarah was out cold. Even I eventually succumbed.
I'd turned on my mobile to use its alarm to wake us before our 7.15 am arrival. As a side effect, we got a text message from Virgin Mobile each time we entered a new roaming service provider's area. Around 11.30 it was "Welcome to Switzerland", which was a nice surprise. Around 2 in the morning it was "Welcome to Italy". And I'll leave the rest of the next day's story for our next post.
posted by Michael Nelson at 5:30 am
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