Leaving Troyes - Thursday 9 July 2009

Today we left Troyes to drive to Paris sud to drop off the car at the dealer. We were abit frazzled about the whole process. When we finally found the place the guy spoke as much English as we speak french but Andrew liaised by phone with the English agent and then signed an agreement which was in English for them to sell our car. We just have to trust that they’re all above board and it’ll be ok. I was sad saying goodbye to the little Renault. It’s been a great car.

After organising the vehicle we got a ride to the Gare where we had to finally face up to the nightmare that is our luggage – 11 pieces in all. Very difficult to manage and going up and down stairs is the worst when there’s no lift. The lovely man at SNCF was tres helpful with Eurostar tickets to London but the two next Eurostar trains were fully booked and the first available train didn’t leave till 9pm that night which was way too late for us. We decided the best thing to do was stay in Paris overnight and leave the next day. The SNCF guy booked us a night near Paris Gare du Nord. So we stayed the night in Paris and then booked the Eurostar to London St Pancras at lunchtime the next day.