When I was 12, my school organised a day trip to France for my year group – ostensibly to practise our French.
All I remember of the day, aside from spending most of it on a coach, was buying a baguette in a hypermarché somewhere near Calais. And it rained. A lot.
So, when my 88-year-old Mum asked me if I would accompany her on a day trip to Paris in March, to have lunch with her oldest friend Christine, who lives there, I didn’t think much of it.
A day-trip to Paris for lunch? Yes please! Mum is a real Francophile and is fluent in French, so it was a great opportunity for us both to practise.
It had to just be a day because Mum didn’t want to leave my 97-year-old dad at home on his own for too long.
Planning the trip
I managed to get super cheap Eurostar tickets, leaving St Pancras at 9.30am, arriving at the Gare du Nord in time for lunch, departing again at 5.15pm, arriving home in time for dinner.
Mum booked a cosy-sounding restaurant a 10 minute walk from the Gare so she didn’t have to walk too far.
The main issue was how to get to St Pancras International from Mum’s home near Wimbledon, during the morning rush-hour.
Mum is pretty mobile for her age and still swims regularly, but she can get breathless when walking too far, and various joints are painful so she uses a stick.
Also, she can get a bit overwhelmed in stressful situations and rarely uses the train or Tube to go into London these days.
But being London, there were several options for us to consider:
Option 1: I suggested taking a bus and then the Northern line to Kings Cross, as that seemed the quickest way. But she didn’t fancy the bus, or going on the Tube for so long.
Option 2: taking the train to Vauxhall and then the Victoria Line to St Pancras – not a good plan; would involve too much walking.
Option 3: taking a taxi from door to door – quickly vetoed when we remembered a similar experience back in 2010, when we were going on holiday to the south of France – taking a taxi across London, getting really stuck in rush-hour traffic and nearly missing the Eurostar. Shudder.
Option 4: taking the Thameslink from Wimbledon to St Pancras – notoriously unreliable since my days of using it to commute from south to north London in the mid noughties – so I told Mum we should avoid it at all costs.
Two days before we were due to leave, I asked Mum if she wanted me to book ‘special assistance’ for her at St Pancras (I wasn’t sure what this would entail, but it sounded like a good idea).
“No, I think I’ll be fine, I don’t need special assistance,” she said, adding: “By the way, I’m going to book a taxi to Wimbledon and then we’ll take Thameslink, because we don’t have to change.”
Okeydokes, not my choice, but hey.
The big day dawned
We got to Wimbledon station well before 7am, bought our tickets and made our way along the Thameslink platform, trying to steer clear of a bustle of commuters who’d just got off a train.
With an eye both on Mum and the departures screen, I suddenly aware I was being shouted at by the station assistant. “OY! OY! I’M TALKIN’ TO YOU! KEEP BEHIND THE YELLOW LINE!!!!” (No, not at all awkward in front of so many people.)
Luckily, being Londoners, most of them didn’t make eye contact.
And anyway, my mind was on other things.
“Mum, our train’s been cancelled.”
“What?! No, it can’t be!”
“Afraid so. Shall we take the train to Vauxhall?”
“No. I’d rather wait and take the next Thameslink.”
The next train wasn’t for another 30 minutes, so I saw Mum into the waiting room and went on a hunt for some coffee.
Half an hour and an overpriced, tepid cappuccino later, the train rolled in. We found seats and settled down.
Safely on the train – what can go wrong?!
It was all going so smoothly I started to think I may have been wrong about Thameslink.
I wasn’t wrong. Soon after leaving Elephant & Castle, the train suddenly stopped and a voice came over the Tannoy, with the words no commuter – or travellers with a Eurostar leaving in 1.5 hours’ time – wants to hear.
“We’re being held at a red light. Not sure why, but we’ll update you as soon as we can.”
After what seemed like an eternity later: “We’ve received a message that there are signal failures right across central London, so there will be more delays, sorry.”
Now I was really worried. We were supposed to be at the Eurostar at 60-90 minutes before departure; we now had only an hour left and we weren’t anywhere near St Pancras.
I phoned Eurostar.
“Hello, I’m travelling to Paris with my elderly mother on the 0931 Eurostar, but we’re stuck on a train in central London, and I don’t think we’ll make it. Is there any way we can have special assistance please so we can get the train?”
“Did you book special assistance in advance? No? Sorry, then all you can do is request it once at Eurostar, but you may have to take a later train. I’ll put a note on your file. I’m sorry.”
We eventually crawled into St Pancras at around 08.45. I helped Mum off the train. By now she was, understandably, very stressed. As was I.
Anyone who’s ever made this journey will know it’s quite a way from the Thameslink platforms up to the Eurostar – and even further for a somewhat overwhelmed 88-year-old.
Thankfully, when we’d finally made it to the Eurostar special assistance booth, they very helpfully found Mum a wheelchair – along with someone to wheel it – and we were whisked through security, passport control and all the way down the platform to our carriage.
We were the first onboard as, miraculously, boarding hadn’t started yet. They also informed us that there would be a wheelchair waiting for Mum at the other end.
We got in, found our seats and settled down. There was one word: PHEW! (or “OUF”, depending on what side of the Channel you are.)
We made it to Paris!
Fast forward five hours, and we’ve met up with Christine and had lunch in a teeny-tiny bistro in the 9th arrondissement.
Mum insisted I did all the ordering to practise my French, which had already got a good airing while trying to ask the wheelchair guy who met us off the Eurostar at the Gare du Nord for directions to the restaurant.
He didn’t have a clue.
The lunch was a bit on the strange side – there were only two dishes on the menu, which was displayed on a small blackboard taken from table to table: one meat (saucisse), one fish – it seemed vegetarians/vegans weren’t welcome here – and the same number of desserts.
I chose the saucisse, which came on a bed of polenta, but when it turned up, I sort of wished I hadn’t.
Anyway, the dessert was a slight improvement: something (I can’t remember what) in a creamy sauce accompanied by some kind of coulis.
The bistro closed at 2pm so we found a café near the Gare du Nord and had a coffee there, before Christine got into a taxi home and Mum and I slowly walked the final stretch back to the station, where another wheelchair whipped us back through passports and security and right up to our carriage.
Nearly home
On the way home, Mum turned to me and asked if I’d do this again.
Not wanting to hurt her feelings, I said, “Well, if we booked special assistance in advance next time, then maybe. Would you?”
“No, I most definitely would not!”
Was it really worth all the stress?! I did manage to speak some French, and it was lovely to spend time with my Mum and help take her to see her oldest friend, so I guess, at the end of the day, it probably was.
I’d definitely choose a different restaurant next time though.
Have you ever done a similarly crazy trip? I’d love to hear about it – leave me a comment below!
Judith Zerdin 