Jamie’s Travels

Les Houches to Paris was a fairy long journey. Not least due to a 5 hour stop over in Bellegarde. French high speed trains have a way of getting very booked up, very quickly, so this length of stop was unavoidable.

Bellegarde is a pretty city but there’s not a great deal for a tourist to do – especially with nowhere to store their heavy bags. Ultimately we ended up going to a couple cafes before knocking about down at the river for a bit. In one of the cafes I practiced my use of French to zero applause whatsoever – they immediately switched to English. However we did meet a very nice man from Leeds who works as a translator in the UN. He even had a brother who lived in South Cambridgeshire. What a small world.

We arrived in Paris at around 8pm. We dashed to our hostel to drop our bags before dashing back out again to try and make out Eiffel Tower slot. Walking up the Eiffel Tower is a very cheap thing to do – I can kind of see why… It’s a fairly tiring activity. Well worth it though.

Looking out across Champ de Mars – where 6 weeks earlier I had sat looking up at the structure I was stood on – felt weirdly full circle for me.

I remember when I went to Paris with grandma and grandpa and dad. Dad and I walked to the base of the tower before his food poisoning properly kicked in. I can confirm for him now that he would not have made it up those stairs in the condition he was in. I barely did after all the walking in Les Houches.

I’ve always wanted to go up the Eiffel Tower, I’m not really sure for what reason other than it’s notability. But it always seemed unachievable for no real reason at all. I guess I always assumed it would be lots of money or too busy or something like that. To have done it feels like a big tick in the done column. A fitting way to end my trip.

We went back to the hostel after to have a bit of dinner (it was quite late by this point) and grab a last pint of the holiday. We ended up being up till about 2am chatting as per usual. An issue, as this morning we got up at 6:30 to get our Eurostar. Despite being fairly shattered I’m pleased to report it was a relatively painless experience.

There’s not really a great way to wrap up this series of blogs I’ve written. It’s been an incredible experience. I’ve travelled with so many different friends and met so many interesting people. I’ve learned a lot about the world and myself too… Is that enough cliches?

Really though, it has been amazing. And even though I am looking forward to coming back home, I’m sad to be leaving Europe. It’s been the most free I’ve ever felt. Travelling with an open ticket and no idea when you’ll come home is a freedom like no other – I hope I get to experience it again.