Holiday Ramblings I: "Adventure" (Day 1)

No sabbatical goes unpunished, and so it is for any readers still hanging on! For next week or two the regular posts will be alternated with holiday extracts prepared with no little effort. You have been warned. So, today an extract, tomorrow something regular, the next day an extract and so on until eight days of travelling are done.

Ah, adventure, that thrilling sense of journeying into the unknown, into the new, and exploring things as yet unexplored. It's fun, isn't it? Yes, even despite horrific three o'clock morning starts! Well, perhaps not, as those three o'clock starts are deadly but let's move on from that, and concentrate on being able to watch the sun rise from total blackness, rendering it romantic retroactively. Sometimes the best romance is retroactive, which is why we have the term 'rose tinted goggles'.

So, to the adventure, that long overland trip to Barcelona and Marseille, which are apparently distinctly different cities on the Mediterranean. The former I've visited before, and the latter never even considered, but which forms a good stopping point for an epic overland journey. It's all about adventure, or mindblowing stress, as you crawl to London in the dark hours, then cross London, ride the rail over to Paris, cross Paris, and then ride those same rails finally down to Marseille. All in all, a fifteen hour trip, with additional four hour legs to and back from Barcelona on separate days. If anyone tells you it's mad to do this, then they're right. You're reading the ramblings of a mad person.

Later in the week we'll cover Marseille, during the proper stay there, but for now let us address the question of why to visit Barcelona. In point of fact it's not a visitation so much as a revisitation, that city being the first place I went to outside of the United Kingdom. From the heights of Montjuic to the aquarium to Park Guell it was lovely, and capped by an awesome experience at the Font Magica. All these things await, as do new and interesting experiences. Also, they serve icecream until almost midnight, for those so inclined. Hopefully this time I won't be chronically hungry and avoiding restaurants the whole time.

London is approaching finally; Dr Watson described the city best and briefly in 'A Study In Scarlet', so maybe you should read that for the more interesting prose. Instead, as we approach, I note the drab tower blocks and flat suburban sprawl, and the warm sunshine of the southeast of England. If you peek over the side of a flyover as you zoom by, however, there's always a chance of seeing something very charming and very old. Such is the curious nature of old capital cities.

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Much later now, and crossing Paris was far less pleasant than crossing London, and the odd nature of France evident in the military shutdown of the Gare de Lyon for half an hour. They patrol railway stations with armed military? Eventually the super fast double decker TGV did depart and now I'm taking a break from a new story called 'The Alien Landing Centre'. Only my sister will understand that title, as she understands most things.

Here's a question: 'If an adventure goes on a long time, is it still an adventure?' Is the journey the adventure or is it the spirit of the traveller? Maybe it's both, and a healthy dose of stamina mixed in to keep it all going? The stamina is the key. Three o'clock starts, the military, multiple city crossings and an endless diet of chicken baguettes are enough to get anyone down, but yes it is still an adventure. Even if it goes without hitches it is still an adventure surely! After all, the potentially mean streets of Marseille await, in a journey that has gone from morning gloom and will end in evening gloom, to be continued in the morning to Spain.

From gloom to gloom the day did go, and from moon to moon I went alone.

O.