"when you see your life flash..." a France Travel Page by Pounder73

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Carie (chicago), me, Claudia, Eliasa (Arg)

Goodness Gracious Great Balls of Fire

Story 1:

Well, I didn’t plan on stopping in France, and after my two experiences, I am not too sure I ever want to. I don’t have any travel tips, per say, but instead two experiences while traveling thru. So if you want to sit back and read… be my guest.

After almost being stranded in the Swiss Alps, I walked into a Geneva hostel at midnight, soaking wet. I busted out the map and decided to head to Barcelona. The following day, I found out that the next train to Barcelona left at 10:30pm. So I had a whole day to kill. This was the day where the local Swiss people decided that they would play a game; lets get the American not sober. And they succeeded. One chap ended up buying me 3 bottles of wine, 2 of which I drank while talking with him, and the other was for the road. He also gave me 30 franks – how random? Not too mention the other things that was given to me during the day (read in my Geneva local customs).

10:30 rolls around and I stumbled on train and end up sitting in front of about 20 teenagers who had cases of beer and a stereo playing some Zeppelin. They were amazingly well behaved, more so than you would see in the states, that’s for sure. I didn’t mind sharing a car with them at all. About 30 minutes into the ride, the train made what appeared to be an emergency stop. We all looked confused, and soon after that, we saw and smelled smoke. After about 5 minutes the smoke became more intense. An official came thru yelling something. A couple of the kids translated the announcement for me, “leave your bags and exit that way!” I listened.

In the next car sat 6 people my own age, a guy from Wisconsin, a gal from Chicago, 2 Argentineans and 2 Brazilians. No one told them anything, so I chilled out with them, since Chicago-gal could speak French, and seemed to be willing to help. At this time, the smoke was getting more intense. Stupid me, I was talking with these people while standing and I began to get very light headed from the smoke. I sat. 10 minutes later, another official instructed us to exit THE OTHER WAY NOW. So we all left our bags, and followed the person in front.

It was about 11pm and dark out, so it was not till we exited the train we realized that we were in a tunnel with very few lights. We still have no idea on what is going on. We walk along side the train, and skip a couple cars and hop back on. This time we are on a sleeper car, as the line stops. I am in the center of the car, where the windows only open a couple inches.

Paint the picture: I am in a tunnel on a train that did an emergency stop, stuck in the middle of a sleeper car, with no way out, when SOMETHING is on fire, and NO ONE knows anything! New paper headlines were running through my head – “train stops in tunnel, cause head on collision” or “train goes up in flames in tunnel x-number of people dead” After the slight panic attack that subsided once I realized there was nothing I could do, it became very surreal to look at a group of strangers who might be the last faces you see. I do have to admit, certain perverse thoughts did crossed my head, “Well, what do you want to do the last minutes of your life?” Need I say more? Anyways, after about 30 minutes the train finally began to more. The passengers cheered, and although everyone was very calm, I found out later, I was not the only ones with these thoughts – headlines and the perversions. LOL

(continue below)

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Me, Ben (wisconsin) Linda & her friend (brazilians

goodness gracious (cont)

At the exit of the VERY long tunnel, was a station that we stopped at. We all got off cheering, but I looked back at where the rest of the train was supposed to be, but wasn’t. You know, the portion of the train with our bags on it. (I did have my passport, credit cards, and tickets on my person – not to mention my life) We did what any Europeans would have done… PARTY! It took all of a couple minutes to bust out the beers and wine and started to pass them around. The news crews came and were not interested in the 100 people drinking, but instead focused on the 2 elderly women with blankets, only because they were cold. The partiers demanded that their pictures be taken as well.

To gather my information, I either went to Chicago girl or Argentines who talked to Chicago or thru the Brazilians, who passed info to Wisconsin-boy, then to me. First piece, “the whole train went up in flames” Second, “only a few cars engulfed” Third, “hop on the busses back to Geneva, and they will take care of you there, if your bags are not ashes, they will bring them to us.” Fine – on the buss we all went, at 3:30am!

By the way, a man who fell asleep while smoking caused the fire. You would think that in a society where 90% of the people smoke, the trains would be a little more fire retardant.

Back in Geneva now, and the 7 of us were the only ones on the buss that were not from there. Needless to say, the official there had no idea on what to do with us. Great. After some more confusion, they finally took us to a VERY nice hotel (about $400.00 a night I think) It was at this point, when they told us WE had to pay for it. Why? Because the train fire was in France, we are now back in Swiss, two different companies, so Swiss was not liable. It was at this point, when the Brazilian fire rose to the surface. No one really knows what they said, they began yelling and screaming and crying in Portuguese, but it worked. After that, the official threw down the plastic and paid.

The Argentines and Chicago-gal where going to Lyon, their train left at 9, while the Brazilians and Wisconsin were all going to Barcelona. Our train left at 11am. We showed up at 10:30 and all 4 of our bags were there in the station with reserved tickets all the way to Barcelona! Sweet.

The four of us had nothing to do but drink, tell each other’s fortunes, and practice our languages. We arrived in Barcelona that night got a hotel room and went out in typical Spanish Style…. hmmmmm... first night in bcn....

story 2: