The adventure is in motion

Mum and I are finally off on our adventure. We've both been looking forward to a break from work and the mundane slog of normal life. The main destination for our journey is Morocco, but we decided to get there by land and sea rather then fly - we have a month to spare!

Yesterday we left London on the Eurostar a couple of hours earlier then our needed timing (to catch our onward train) in order to have the joy of sitting in a Parisian patisserie supping good coffee and feasting on fantastic French pastries for a couple of hours.

Alas, it was not to be.

We wandered around the grounds of the Natural History Museum thoroughly enjoying the poppy gardens, the Petit Panda (seen throught a thin veil of bamboo) and the Biturong sitting on the roof of it's little house. OK... so I have no idea what a Biturong is, and the man I asked had no English word for me, but it was very cute and it's little face looked just like a seal. If anyone should wish to enlighten me, I appreciate it - time online is limited.

After a bit we decided that we could resist the temptation no longer and headed back to the streets to find afore mentioned patisserie. There was not one to be seen.

A snap decision was made as we knew that the next train was a long journey and vegetarian/fishatarian food likely to be limited, we had to eat and we chose what turned out to be my vote for the worst restaurant in the whole of Paris - and possibley France. Salad with dead lettuce, boiled potatoes, and an old car's waste oil made into salad dressing, and salmon (probably caught circa 1969), cooked until unrecognisable and then placed beside a pile of (very) boiled rice. Both meals bland and completely uninspiring. We knew though, that the train could not disappoint anymore!

Back to the station, thinking that we would find a cafe selling something, that even if not the desired perfect Parisian pastry, would still put British food to shame - not this time.

C'est la vie!

The train arrived and we found our little cabin and made ourselves comfy. The train did not disappoint in it's delivery of cr@p food - thank goodness we had bought our NZ made butter from London to have on our toast though!!

The journey was 12hours and ultimately, painless. There were several stops most of which I was awake for but one of which I seem to have missed was the border control from France into Spain.

The train guard had taken our passports upon boarding so we didn't need to be present as some unpleasant hour of the morning - nice man.

We arrived in Barcelona at 8.30am - 12 hours from departing Paris.

PS. Just tried to spell check and all words except about 7 came up highlighted - my computer seems to think I should be writing Spanish. Apologies for any bad spelling...