Vermenton Railway Station

After the incredible 8 course dinner (or was it 9 ?) we had last night, I was rather sad to be leaving Joigny. In the short time we had spent at Le Rive Gauche Hotel, we had all fallen a little in love with the place. The town is situated in an idyllic location on the serene Yonne River, and the centre of the old city was very inviting.

Maggie and I decided to spend our last few hours in this city walking to the market. Although it was quite large, the range of goods was very similar to those peddled in just about every other market around the world - cheap clothes, handbags, Chinese toys and other so called "handicrafts".

We had also hoped to find somewhere selling SIM cards for my mobile phone, but the combination of poor language skills and unhelpful staff made this an impossible task.

Back at the hotel we checked out and waited outside for the taxi that had been ordered to take Maggie and Carol to the station. The rest of us formed a walking peloton and walked the one and a half kilometres. Somehow we managed to arrive about 90 minutes early, and had a long wait in the sun for the train to arrive.

Fortunately the train was not very busy, and we only had to make it as far at the next station, where we would transfer to a bus instead. The train part went smoothly enough, but when we climbed off at the platform, we were met by utter chaos.

There was a huge throng of people, all trying to clamber down the stairs to reach the connecting buses. I can never understand why a country that can build such incredible railways, cannot spend a few extra dollars to install more lifts and/or escalators in their stations.

Since Maggie was incapable of handling her luggage, due to her bad back, I was struggling to manhandle all our luggage by myself. Just at the moment I was about to panic, I was assisted by a friendly stranger who grabbed the back end of one of the cases and helped me down the stairs. It really was hugely appreciated.

When we found the buses, the chaos grew even worse. People were climbing on and off buses in seemingly random fashion. The SNCF railway even had three armed officers to oversee the mess (the officers did not have three arms, I mean they were carrying weapons).

it was starting to look like we would be standing up in the bus for the 60 minute journey to Vermenton, but somehow it all came good in the end as it mostly does. When we finally stumbled onto the correct bus, we found that it had plenty of seats, and it was nicely air conditioned.

About 70 minutes we arrived at Vermenton Station and were met by a guy who had been arranged to transfer our luggage to La Moulinette. The rest of us would be walking.

We have booked into this converted Mill House for the next 7 days, and are so looking forward to having almost nothing to do for that time, apart from rest, read and eat. Greg and Andrea had stayed in this very location 17 years ago, and had recommended it to us.

It did not take long for us to decide that the place was ideal. The location is as serene as you could imagine, and the ivy-covered exterior was picture perfect.Read more