The name Train à Grande Vitesse translated into English means high speed train, may seem to some to be rather unimaginative.
But who cares, this thing rockets through the French countryside at around 200 km and is comfortable, clean and inexpensive.
There is no single TGV as such; there are many generations of TGV, each generation consists of many trains (but I will leave trainology to the anoraks!).
The TGV project started in the 1960s where SNCF realised that if it was to compete against the ever growing automobile and air transport it had to offer seriously better speeds (unlike British Rail in the 1960s which was virtually elimiated by Beeching et al).
Eurostar is cramped, fast and for some reason the last train is at 21.01. Why? Who knows. It would make sense to run the Eurostar until midnight because then you could have breakfast, lunch and supper and some cultural event in a day for as little as £12 return.
Then we arrived in the UK. Peter and Steve showed us a short cut to St Pancras and off we trotted. We looked at the board 'King's Lynn' - no platform number but reassuringly there was a time indicaed 22.15. So we looked for some staff - we found a lot of policepeople - and then we found one staff member lurking behind a post and we pinned him down and said 'Which platform for King's Lynn'. 'Six' he lied through his teeth. Having already nearly been in an altercation with four yobs in Avignon (not Albanians or Gypsies) but French this rather short official was not going to intimidate me - 'Are you sure?' I growled. 'No' said he 'I'd better ask' and he hauled a walkie talkie out of his pocket 'King's Lynn which platform' he gurgled 'Fucking hell Joe I've told you 4 times - 10'. So then we had to zoom all the way to platform 8, hobble right down to the end and go over to Platform 10. Here, waiting patiently, was a Black staff member who was fending off questions by the dozen. I said 'Where's train for King's Lynn'? 'Dunno mate'. 'What's that train then?' I ednquired pointing at a dark and empty train on Platform 10. 'Dunno. We don't have a driver and it hasn't been allocated yet'. Crackle, crackle, George can you put 3 up on the board, the 10.07 to Throgmorton should have gone at 10.03 but no-one knows which train to get on so we are holding it up. 'Time to sit' I thought. Whilst sitting an inebriated and well-dressed chap slid over to the staff member and said 'Where's the tube mate' and then over to me 'Hello Princess'. 'Hello Prince' I retorted. For some reason he thought this hilariously funny and tried to sit on my suitcase. Not a good idea after four French yobs, two stupid staff members 'Get off the suitcase - this is your final warning'. He lurched to his feet, saluted and said 'Sorry Princess' and inebriated himself away. By this time the Black staff manager had managed to round up a driver and then it was dash for the train. Off we rattled through places unknown and I closed my eyes and dreamed of my bed only to be awoken by 'Ely. This train terminates at Ely. All passengers for King's Lynn must get orf and take the coach'. My feet were covered in blisters and I just wanted to collapse on my seat and go to sleep. We walked to the coach - coach - bus - it was the coldest, smelliest, noisiest, slowest bus that trundled its way around North Norfolk for another two hours and we arrived shell-shocked in King's Lynn at 3.30am to be greeted by two robins singing their heads off. I didn't care by now if the car had been clamped/stolen/or set on fire. I could no longer put one foot in front of the other and all I remember from then on is being half unconscious in the back of a Renault Megane - whether hubbie hit me with a brick or I was rendered unconscious by a lurking Immigration-escaping French-speaking Albanian Gypsy I will never know.
