Part Two: I Slept on a Train

Currently, I am sitting on an Air France flight back to the states. I have three and a half hours left until we touch down in Atlanta. Then make our way to Denver soon after. My lovely, lovely bed that I haven’t slept in for almost two weeks. Here I come. My back missed you.

Reverse to twoish pm the previous day. We were making our way downtown, walking past blah blah blah and we’re homebound….daduh dum dum da dum) from the hotel to the shuttle stop. It was blizzarding.

Gosh, I’m trying to focus right now on writing my thoughts but all I want to do is sleep for hours. I will push the yawning aside for the duration of this blog. Jk. I’m exhausted.

Anyway- back to the shuttle station. Piles of people hopped on the next to the last station where were planning to get off and wait for another bus to the train station. That bus was late as the mountain pass was causing a bit of a delay due to the snow.

I also fell into the snow in my jeans. Then proceeded to sit in the waiting hut for almost an hour with partially wet pants. That’s real fun.

So we’re making our way down the mountain pass in the bus. The bus driver radioed the station to inform them that she had a bus load of people and the pass was taking longer than expected. The train waited for us.

Jeff and I high five because we made it onto the train that was supposed to take us to the Lyon airport with minutes to spare. Key phrase: supposed to. The train begins rolling onward and then stops about five minutes down the line. Electricity is cut to the train, and it gets a bit cold. We sat in question for about an hour and a half until they informed us that they can push the train somehow back to the station. BUT some of us must exit our carriages and proceed to the two carriages that still have a decent amount of electricity. So- we drag all of our luggage through the snow again and onto number eleven.

And we sleep on the train. By this point, we’ve made some friends on the train and combine forces to help each other out in different ways. “A Frenchman, a Brit, and two Americans are stranded on a train…” sounds like a good lead into a joke. But I assure you- it was only fun for the first few hours of being stranded on a train. It’s a good memory though. All we could do was laugh in the situation. A situation that came out of nowhere. I guess the moral of that story was we shouldn’t high five until we get to the final destination. We jinxed it.

We booked the 5:30am train out of the same station for the next morning. So- a solid 11 hours chilling on a semi heated train. They gave us food packs and a silver blanket.

The reason for the delay was that a tree had fallen on the train line and it’s an electric train- so they had to repair it.

Cancelled. The train we had booked was cancelled. I wake Jeff up at 4am local time and point out this unfortunate happening. We found a lady in the train station that informed us that the train had turned into a bus. They would pick us up- take us to another train station and that would take us to our final destination.

By this point, my nerves were shot.

Jeff found an independent bus facilitator at the station. Within twenty minutes- Jeff literally saved the day. It only took us two and a half hours by bus to the airport from where we were stranded. We got to change clothes, see the hotel at the airport we would’ve stayed in if we had not gotten stranded, and found food. We’ve made all but one connection so far. We’re doing good.

We saw one of the guys we spoke to while stranded on the train, at the Lyon Airport. Apparently, he took the bus they had for everyone. They dropped them in Chambery, took the train to a stop that was a couple of stops from the airport. He said the train stopped working and they had to shut it down. He Ubered to the airport from there. I sure hope he got to Amsterdam.

We made all of our connections. Except- two of our bags spent the night in Atlanta.

It was 6am on Sunday. Jeff and I woke after only getting about six hours of sleep. The service that the airline hires to deliver lost bags- called Jeff and needed him to identify his bag.

This van… should not have even been on the road. The guy exited the van with its door almost to fall off. Headlights falling out. We couldn’t even open the doors of the back because apparently, they did not work. It looked incredibly sketchy. Our neighbors probably thought there was some Breaking Bad stuff going on with us.

I was bummed because it was just Jeff’s bag to arrive. Mine would not arrive until 2am on Monday morning. Fortunately, they left it on the porch.

Takeaways from the trip:

1. I am buying new ski boots
2. I am redoing my ski form
3. I learned about the France healthcare system from French citizens.
4. The US has wayyyy too many additives in our food. It is not that hard. Just knock it off.
5. Wool blend peacoats or “Mottos” as they call them in France- are much cheaper than in the USA. Cashmere is too.
6. Pick someone in life that you can be on a ten-day trip with.
7. Budget for the letdowns and be ready to be flexible and adapt. Plans don’t always go as planned.
8. Slowdown. Relax and savor the moments.

This trip was an incredible one. We did enjoy all the good food. Though we found ourselves missing our own homecooked meals.

Slow down, savor the small moments.