September: Night Train to Paris

At 4.35 in the morning, it was still dark. I got there five minutes early to pick up the Good Wife from our local train station. There was no one around, just an anxious husband in a car and an intrigued dog in the back seat. What on earth was I doing waking her from her sleep and transporting her down the Côte Matthieu at such an hour?

There was no need for anxiety. At 4.42 precisely, the night train from Paris rolled into view. First stop Saint Denis près Martel, as SNCF refer to it, even though locals and La Poste know it as 'lès Martel', an antiquated form of ‘near Martel’. Only one passenger emerged: Debs stepped down from the train like Anna Karenina arriving at St. Petersburg, or wherever it was, minus the exhalation of engine steam. She was remarkably bright-eyed and bushy-tailed after a night in a couchette shared with five other travellers. Cue great excitement from husband and dog. She’d been away for over a week, another last-minute trip to ever-damp Cumbria, this one precipitated by her mother’s lack of carers. One was on holiday and the other, Sarah the Carer, in hospital. So there she was, and suddenly it must have all made sense to our bewildered dog.

What a service, you might say. And you probably aren’t referring to that of the anxious husband, who set his alarm for 4.15 to throw on his clothes, rouse the dog and drive down to the station, there to embrace his wife, carry her case to the car and drive her back home. If you mean that of SNCF, well… yes and no. Yes, on this occasion – even though Debs had booked an all-female couchette, not due to trepidation but simply because it was on offer, only to find that three of the five other travellers were men. She didn’t sleep much, but it all seemed quite civilised, she told me. Everyone was very quiet and respectful, one of the benefits of living in a country like France, where children are taught a form of social responsibility in school. No drunks, no midnight-snackers, no one listening to, looking at or talking loudly  into their phones. 'R-E-S-P-E-C-T! (sock it to me, sock it to me...)'

However, ten days previously things did not go quite so swimmingly. We had very good friends from London staying with us on their first visit to these parts. Debs had taken the week off to enjoy their company and experience a full house, which – she suggested – is just what this house was created for. But then came the last-minute S.O.S. So she booked to leave on the Thursday night to spend Friday in London with our daughter before heading to Penrith by London North East Railways on Saturday, giving her a full week with her increasingly frail and confused mother. She would catch the night train to Paris around one in the morning from the local station, with a sole scheduled stop at Orléans, then onto Eurostar early the next morning. Certainly not bonne marché, but slightly cheaper than Ryan Air's August prices, which were off the Richter scale.

That week, the middle week of August, our estival luck had run out. Everyone around here agreed that we’d had the best summer for years, but that week the thermometer went up to ‘sizzling hot’ and stayed around the mid 30s. What with the inhuman temperature and the plague of voracious mosquitoes, it wasn’t the best advert for the Lot/Corrèze borderlands. Still, our friends appeared to have a gay old time and promised to come again.

Thursday would thus be the Good Wife’s last full day with guests. Alas, it didn’t start well. Checking her phone on the back balcony before breakfast, I heard the dread words ‘Oh no!’ ‘with a dead sound’ on the final syllable. What!? ‘They’ve cancelled my train.’ No, no and thrice no. If there’s anything worse than the French railways' incessant cancelled trains, it’s the process of trying to find an alternative. The prospect would colour fifty unsettling shades of grey a final day that was intended to be relaxing and enjoyable.

So it proved. Her first trip down to the station, in the morning, proved abortive. I took her down in the heat of the afternoon and she actually got to see someone. A human being, not a chat-bot. Not that this particular human being was much more helpful. He told her that apparently it was only the initial part of her journey from Rodez that was affected by the supposed ‘lack of materials’ (meaning what, exactly?). Theoretically, a coach would pick her up from the station and take her to Brive, there to connect with a waiting night train to Paris. As to what time it would pick her up, he suggested she get to the station for about 12.20a.m., but in his humble opinion it wouldn’t turn up till nearer one o’clock. So why, we were left to wonder, wasn’t this helpful information published on SNCF’s handy little app, SNCF Connect?

Never mind. My wife is an eternal optimist. She wasn’t going to let a little uncertainty ruin her day. It would be all right on the night. I didn’t say anything. But when the time came, I took her down the winding road to the station with a heavy heart. We got to the deserted station car park around 12.15. We sat in the car, waiting in the dark, scanning the road that double-backs on itself on the other side of the bridge over the tracks for signs of headlights. As each very occasional car passed, our spirits prepared to soar – only to sink back again. We waited. One o’clock came and went, with the husband becoming increasingly anxious. Debs checked her phone again – to find official word all of a sudden that the train would leave Brive at around 2.05. We agreed that the best course of action would be to give up on the phantom coach and drive to Brive.

The streetlights are now turned off in Brive after midnight, lending the place the air of a ghost town. Cue the Specials. The station was locked and deserted apart from a possibly homeless guy sitting against a wall, who motioned for us to try the side gate. There we found two uniformed officials, one of whom appeared to be the driver of a parked coach. The night train was waiting at platform H. Cue determined subterranean walk to platform steps.

Not one but two uniformed female controllers greeted us. The taller of the two looked through her paperwork, but couldn’t find any mention of a Madame Sampson, Deborah. The other one checked her findings. No, it was true. So was this why the phantom coach never appeared? Debs remained calm and polite and showed them the evidence on her phone. She was indeed booked to travel on Friday 18^th August. But wait a minute, said the shorter guard. That meant tomorrow. Yes, agreed her taller colleague. At which point my wife’s composure cracked – until she suddenly realised that it was after midnight. It was tomorrow! Cue merriment and a concerted effort now to accommodate our sorely tested traveller. The taller controller led her onboard and unlocked a four-berth, first-class couchette. She hadn't booked first-class, my wife pointed out, but clearly this was by way of compensation for their remarkable all-round inefficiency.

I left her to it, finally reassured that she might reach her destination. My destination was bed, which I reached just before three bells. The rest of my weary wife's journey was trouble-free. She had a lovely day with our daughter, I'm happy to report. Next day, however, she received a message from LNER to tell her that her train to Penrith had been cancelled.

She found a later alternative with no tears involved. But is it any wonder that I'm becoming increasingly loathe to travel in my dotage? I used to moan about my parents for their lack of adventure, but now I understand. Far better to stay in my nest and enjoy its features with friends or family who are prepared to brave the slings and arrows of outrageous transport in order to get here. We now have a very comfortable bed in the spare room as an incentive.