So, I have just returned from my little holiday with N. We went first of all to Paris, hung around on Paris Plage, drank beer, watched the sun set etc... we then stayed with a friend of N's in a little Paris suburb. First observation, Paris suburbs are NOTHING like London ones. It was just like being in a little village, only it had access to the centre of Paris within 30 minutes on the RER. We were laden with food and then off we went to sleep ready to a miniature hunt the next day.
Our hunt the next day first thing was actually for the coffee as insanely the people we stayed with had a lot more tea and it took us 20 minutes to find where the coffee was kept. The real hunt started after we got to the centre of Paris. We were determined to find Shakespeare and Company bookshop extrodinaire. I know my way around Paris very well and with Hemingway and his Movable Feast we found it, and it was good (apart from the irritating Americans doing the 'soaking up the culture via the guide book thing'.
Once we had found Shakespeare and Co. we were satisfied, we headed off to Gare de Nord ready to board our train to Aix, we were early and so went and sat at a café for a beer. We then looked at the tickets and realised that in fact we needed to be at Gare de Lyon. Off we sauntered to Gare de Lyon only to arrive 4 minutes after it's departure. Oh well, these things happen, so I went and bought some new tickets for a train leaving in an hour's time so off we trotted to a café to have a bit of food and wine. We sat in full view of the station clock and according to it, left with 15 minutes to get onto the platform. When we got into the station we realised we in fact had about 5 minutes. So we stopped sauntering and trotting, we ran. We ran up to the platform; the train was still there, we ran along the platform to the nearest door; the train left.
We'd missed another one.
So we went to the ticket office, and waited in line. The woman saw our ticket, refunded it, looked at us though she severely doubted we would be able to get on a train ever, told us the last TGV leaving today was leaving in 5 minutes told us which platform and so we ran. By miracles of all miracles we got on the train, found out seats and promptly got more wine to console us with our stupidity.
I was all ready to take these difficulties as a sign that perhaps I should move to Paris and not Aix, it's obvious that subconsciously there's something stopping me from leaving Paris. (I do really love the place).
Anyway, we got to Aix, and to our hotel (miles too late) but the night security guard let us in and so we unloaded and went to sit downstairs in the courtyard for a bit. This is where we met some lovely friendly people who have us some chateau neuf de pap. Oh how terrible that was.
The next day was Aix...I shall write about that later on.
