05/09/07

We woke up at 7:30 this morning and had breaky – toast and cereal, a photo with Anna and Bella (the dog) , then I was dropped off at the train station (handshakes all around on departure) to get to Paris. I would need to change trains four times so I would have to be on full alert. However it all rolled over pretty smoothly, only once did I think that I was on the wrong train on the leg from Kalese to Basel. When I did make it to Basel I experienced something that I probably have only ever experienced once before when I was between the ages of 0 and 4 years old – having no idea what country I was in… fair to say though when I was a little tyke I probably didn’t know or understand the concept of a country though so it probably doesn’t count. The voice on the loud speaker sounded French, but I saw some newspapers in German and from what I could hear I couldn’t hear any funky French accents. Then I saw a sign that said France but I wasn’t sure whether past that sign was France making me be in Germany or whether the whole place was France. Turns out I was in Switzerland, where my travel pass wasn’t even valid. Although the ticket collectors were very relaxed with my pass and didn’t know what they were looking for on it. As yet no has looked at the page with the amount of days I am allowed to travel, let alone marked it off, although one guy did try and punch a hole through it. I think that it would be quite possible to travel everyday of the two months I can use the pass in, not jut the five that I paid for – but that would be cheating. From Basal I went to Mulhouse, then to Belfort with any waiting around. In Belfort I got a nice look around the rather pretty little town and a free sample pa chocolate – ahh France! Some girl also said ‘save?’ randomly in the street to me which I instantly replied ‘we sava’ back to her – then she and her friends walked away. Oh. Sava means ‘how are you?’ and ‘we’ means yes (although its spelled oui) and this is how you are meant to reply (maybe not though). So now I’m on the longest leg (four hours) to Paris and I should arrive at about 8 o’clock. Apparently you can do the whole trip in about 4 hours by the super fast TGV train that goes about 300kph, but it doesn’t stop off at nice villages or Switzerland or have nice scenery (and more importantly it costs more). Udo’s wife, Mrs Schonperlen (no idea how to pronounce it) made me four sandwiches to take with me on my trip and I’ve still got one more to get through. I’m not sure where I’ll stay tonight – I asked a couple of people on the coach surfing website, but haven’t’ had the chance to check to see if they have replied – if not with them then I’ll try and hit up the hostel I stayed at last time I was in Paris – I also need to try and get a spot on a bus back to England tomorrow. Ahh so much fun to be had in my one night in Paris!** ‘One night in Paris’ is the name of Paris Hilton’s infamous porn film