TGV - a little luxury and a childhood dream
Not just on the TGV, no, we also went straight to first class. Money doesn’t play a Rolex? Actually, it does. Only… the surcharge for 1st class was actually €10 per person. We wanted to treat ourselves to that. The TGV from Stuttgart to Paris takes just 4 hours. And… the weight of the luggage is only mentioned pro forma. In the end, it doesn’t matter. There is a kind of luggage shelter every few meters (in addition to the shelves above, which can easily accommodate normal suitcases). We quickly found our seats (with a table). It was simply fantastic. The seats were actually more like sofas. The carriage itself was not as modern as an ICE, but not old, but rather elegant, like a modern lounge car. There were also plenty of power sockets. There was also an incredibly nice and funny employee who really made the journey even more enjoyable in his witty and charming way. Of course, it worked and we were already on the “let’s treat ourselves” trip anyway. So why not a French breakfast on the TGV. And it was really affordable. And somehow we felt like we were in a 5-star hotel on wheels. After an incredibly pleasant and comfortable 4-hour journey, we arrived at the Guard de L’Est in Paris.
Arrival in Paris - to the Musketeers
This time it was definitely much more tightly calculated than in Milan, for example. But that wasn’t so bad, as we didn’t travel overnight and had a relaxed journey so far. We arrived at 1pm, which was pretty punctual. Normally we like to be at the games 3 hours before kick-off. That way we can assemble our equipment in peace and quiet and take some pictures of the warm-up and the stadium. This time, unfortunately, everything was a bit tighter than expected. There was a queue at the cab rank with a guide and quite few cabs for the amount of people. In addition, there were some dogged older people (as we know them from the supermarket) who cheekily pushed their way past everyone in the queue to get to the person in charge. We got through to some extent. The cab driver then took us to the beautiful Stade Jean-Bouin. A little “take away” article later.
