Big Ben's Travelogue Blog

Thanks to my room mate it was an early start today.  A late night realisation that he had booked a train for the 11th of May rather than March (I always get those two confused) meant Alistair had to hastily book the first Eurostar of the day to have a chance of getting home in time for his mum to cook him a mother's day lunch.  I did find it quite funny when he realised his mistake, then less so when the alarm sounded at 06:15. A poor nights sleep was compounded by the room having about the same temperature as the planet Mercury, which as they told us at school, is so hot a tin kettle would melt on its surface.  Opening the window for a bit enabled me to doze for a while but the prevailing high temperature when coupled with the inexplicable lack of a clock in the room meant quality sleep was hard to come by. Following a hotel breakfast I decided the best course of action was to bid my friends goodbye and enjoy a leisurely walk in the Paris sun to the North Station....

Today was the day of the big game which we had travelled all this way to watch.  I realise that some of my readers may not be Rugby fans, therefore that is all I will say about that. The group met for an early-ish hotel breakfast which included some mini donuts so was not a terrible way to start the day, the coffee on the other hand was rather weaker than I would have preferred.  Post breakfast there was nothing planned so I retired to my room to await Alistair's arrival..... .....I then waited some more.  It turns out that letting the train take the strain really is the best choice.  A combination of a one hour flight delay and the pissburnt RER meant he did not arrive until it was almost time to meet for lunch.  Despite grand plans to go and eat somewhere 'really good' it was decided that in fact the best restaurant in Paris was the one immediately adjacent to our hotel, seems unlikely but true.  Being a creature of habit I had raw steak the same as I...

On a usual working day I have my alarm set for the beautifully palindromic 7:07 and when it sounds press snooze with the aim of hitting 7:17 then all the subsequent palindromes until 7:57 when it is game over and I finally get up (if anyone knows of an alarm that has an optional 11 minute snooze function do let me know).  Today I was too excited to sleep so got up at 6:26 with no alarm required. After an early morning trip to Mozzas, where I was able to enjoy "Pure Shores" by All Saints as I shopped, I went to the always excellent Green's coffee shop only to find they don't open until 8:30.  So I went home for a bit and returned for some eggs on toast to line my stomach ahead of what was likely to be a fairly booze centric day. The Cambourne contingent (Keith, Brenda, Chris, Louise) and I all shared a taxi to St Neots (SNO) where we travelled to King's Cross, a short walk to St Pancreas where we met the Oxford group (Craig, Jodie) and we were on the Eurostar. ...

Since returning from my last trip to the USA literally tens of people have asked me "who would win a fight between a monkey and a badger?"  In addition to this at least one has suggested I do some more blogging.  The main focus of this trip is the France vs. England Six Nations fixture but the group I am travelling with are real culture vultures so I expect to be reporting on the contents of Paris' many famous museums and tourist attractions.  Or possibly just a load of bars.  Either way a badger would win. Preparation for this trip has been quite challenging, we were keen to avoid a repeat of last year's Ireland England £350 match tickets debacle  (would have been worth it had England won).  So this time we took a different approach and made sure we had match tickets before committing to a hotel and Eurostar booking.  Only kidding.  Everything was booked then the scrabble for tickets started.  Luckily the Stade De France is a bit bigger th...