Wednesday 17 January 2018

Random Bits of News

We have some good news, and some bad news..........

First the less good news: We arrived back in France at 06.35 last Friday morning. On the plane I slept quite well, but appeared to have caught a cold. Saturday was spent being (I'm sorry, there isn't a politer word for this) very snotty. By Sunday it had migrated to my chest, and by Monday I was at the doctor's for an investigation. I have asthmatic bronchitis (as opposed to the usual slightly inconvenient form of asthma I am subject to day to day) so I am on a course on antibiotics, and three (count 'em) different types of corticosteroid. It is now uncomfortable rather than painful as long as I don't cough, but extremely painful (and distressing for Susan) when I do cough.

Boo to airlines making their planes so cold!


But now the good news: Yesterday I booked our train tickets to go to Paris for Retromobile. I was pleasantly surprised (actually no I wasn't, I was amazed) to discover that if you're lucky you can now get from Saint Pierre des Corps (4km from Tours) to Paris in less than an hour, for 10€ (yup - ten euros!) per person each way. This is because Ouigo now service our neck of the woods with their no frills trains.

>There are a couple of fairly easy to deal with conditions - you have to check in (on the platform) at least 30 minutes before your train, and your baggage allowance is a cabin bag and a handbag each. Additional luggage (up to 30kg per person) is 5€ per bag. You have to pay an additional 2€ if you want a seat with a power plug, and the trains arrive and depart from Paris Montparnasse Hall 3.

The previous cheapest TGV tickets to Paris were 17€, but usually more like 20€ or 25€ depending on time of day, so this is quite a win! There are supposedly 3 Ouigo services per day from Bordeaux to Tours, stopping at Angouleme, Poitiers, and Saint Pierre des Corps. All tickets are 10€pp until 18 July. There's more info here

12 comments:

chm said...

The recycling air in the cabin of an airplane makes the spreading of germs urbi et orbi so much easier! Hope you are completely recovered for your trip to Paris. Are you going to stay again in my neck of the woods?

potty said...

Getting more customers by reducing the price is fine but I gather that some of these trains have surplus capacity. Peak hours in the UK are at maximum capacity and I am sure that they put the prices up to stop the casual traveller. Hope the drugs are doing the anti coughing trick.

Simon said...

Very close - we're going to be about 100metres from Galciér (hopefully)

Simon said...

This is a new service from the low cost branch of SNCF, hence the different route. It's rare that the TGV has much in way way of empty seats except on the very early and very late services.

The cough is on the mend, thanks. Although nowhere near as quickly as I has hoped!

chm said...

What is Galciér? Google says, inconnu au bataillon.

Simon said...

Metro Glacière https://goo.gl/maps/FR5n1Pd4Lxt

chm said...

LOL, Simon! It jsust occured to me you meant Glacière, on métro line 6!

chm said...

We were typing at the same time. LOLOLOL

Jean said...

It was the recycled air on a flight to Cyprus that caused me to spend three weeks of a one week holiday languishing in a Cyprus hospital, definitely the worst three weeks of my life.
Hope you get better soon, but be kind to yourself and don't expect too much too soon. Getting better takes time. X

Unknown said...

Bonjour. I am an Aussie, living in Champagne. I am heasing to Retromobile on the Sunday. If you are there it wiuld be good to meet, if you are interested. Robert.

Simon said...

G'day Robert. We'll be at retromobile on the Friday evening, because that's when Traction Universelle have their mvin d'honeur.

If you want to email us, click on Susans profile in the right side column and we will see if we can organise to meet up

Susan said...

We'll be in Paris several days, including Sunday.

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