Épernay to Lyon via Paris

We left our apartment about 7:30 am and headed to the station for our train back to Paris. It was a nippy 2 degrees and so I got out my puffer jacket. The train was on time and before you could blink (Ed - long blink, 1.5 hours) we were pulling into Gare de l’Est. It was a beautiful sunny day in Paris, so we decided to walk to the Gare de Lyon (also because we have heavy cases and didn’t want to try and get up and down in the metro).

We predominantly walked along large boulevards with expedition leader (Ed - ceremonial role only), Ian, with the assistance of Apple maps, leading the way. We stopped at a brasserie for coffee and crepes on the way; the journey took us about 90 minutes and was about 4 km.

We entered the busy train station and found our way to the correct Hall and platform and had about a 50 minute wait. I decided to get us lunch for the trip and went to Paul’s. I started ordering in French and the server yelled at me to speak English - I don’t know why he was so mean to me (a French guy in the line behind me said my French was fine and the guy just has a bad attitude). When I told the others of my experience Ian suggested that perhaps he thought I was English, hence his gruff manner.

Our train arrived and we made our way to our seats in 1st class (worth the extra few euros). We had 3 seats in a group of four and were hoping we had a spare seat. However, just as we were leaving a young guy came and sat there. He had lots of attitude and had a few words with one of the staff when she asked him to move his bag out of the aisle. Then when they returned to check our tickets there was some issue with him (he wouldn’t show his ticket or identification) - it got quite heated, and there was talk of getting the police - he stood his ground, looked very surly and no police arrived.

It was a relief when we arrived at Lyon station just before 3 pm as there weren’t any stairs to navigate, just a large ramp to walk down. We then walked the kilometre to our apartment to meet our host, who let us in and gave us a quick briefing. The apartment was on level 5, so thankfully there was a lift, but it trumped the one at Le Petit Madeleine for the smallest lift ever.Read more