Inter Rail 1984 Day 19 and 20

Thursday 20th September/Friday 21st September 1984

 Woke up when the Arabic types got out at Marseille. The run from Marseilles to Monte Carlo is very pretty as the railway follows the coast for the majority of the time. Nice to see a bit of sunshine on the Med again. The train stopped at Antibes, Cannes, Toulon, St. Raphael, Nice and then little stations all the way to Monte Carlo.

Monte Carlo Harbour We put our rucksacks in the left luggage lockers and got our tickets stamped. Headed straight up the hill towards the museum. Stopped for a quick look at the Royal Palace (looking particularly pink in the sunshine) and had a 10 minute look in the Cathedral. Princess Grace's grave has still got flowers on it but not as many as last time I was there. Then headed off to the Oceanographic Museum. Spent an hour or more looking at the skeltons, bones, shells and other biological specimens, then realised we hadn't had any breakfast and it was now lunchtime.

Went up onto the museum rof and had a long baguette sandwich and a large Coke. There are good views from the roof so took some pictures before heading back down to the Aquarium. It was as good as I remembered it, and if anything had been extended slightly to include more Meditteranean/Atlantic species. Jon was amazed because I'd played down how big it was. We were in the Museum until 2.15pm.

Next stop a bank so Jon could get some money to afford to buy his duty free. We walked along the main shopping street and found a rather pricey wine shop. Decided not to give them our custom and headed off up the hill towards the Hotel de Paris and the Casino. We actually managed to get in as yucky as we looked. We also managed to circumvent the bag storage fee by going into the main salon one at a time.

Once outside we were asked for directions to "the other casino" by some Amwerican type. Walked back down the hill and found a supermarket which was ideal for our duty free shopping. I bought 2 bottles of Cahors (14F), 1 of Listel Rose (11.60F), 1 Provence Rose (12.40F) and 1 Muscadet (13.05F) plus a 25cl bottle of white wine to bring me to within 2cl of my limit. Also bought a melon and some cheese to bring home.

Having made our way back to the station I rang home. Only Gran was in so I left a message, eventually! Next task was repacking the rucksack so that the duty free could be carried inside the packs protected by the dirty clothes. Got on the train which would take us via Nice all the way to Calais. Discovered after it had left that it was a sleeper/Couchette train only, with no sitting compartment and it was fully booked! We learnt that a party had missed the train in Monaco but the train guard, who looked a lot like Charlie Chaplin, wouldn't let us have their couchettes in case they caught up with the train. If they didn't make it by Marseilles, we could have them. The trip then became a little bizarre as the train staff started to change the comparments into full sleeper or couchette mode, and all the people were standing in the corridor. That was OK but then the refeshment cart arrived and we had to clear out of the corridor to make way for him. It is quite a crush getting 8 people and 2 full rucksacks into a compartment with all the couchettes down!

The party never caught up with us so we got they couchettes. I ended up in a middle bunk with Jon in the top one on the other side so he could put his feet into the luggage space. We were sharing with a newly married Anglo-French couple plus an English hippee and an Aussie. I had a wonderful nights sleep, sleeping right the way through Paris. Jon was awake and said I didn't miss anything. When the train got to Calais we had to help the newly weds get their luggage to where the bag carriers were located.

Bought our boat tickets and our train tickets to London Victoria combined. Bought some duty free perfume on the boat. Had enough spare francs to buy a cup of tea and a cup of coffee. Sat next to a lass who had only just discovered what day it was. She thought it was Saturday. She'd been interrailing in Spain for a month. We swapped some of our runny Camembert cheese for some grapes.She helped Jon bring 3 lots of cigarettes and tobacco in duty free. I was carrying the tobacco.

The train to London was a straight through one. We were late leaving because the boat was late docking as there was a boat in our designated berth. Jon and I split up in London and he was going north from Kings Cross and I was going west from Paddington. There was a large ticket queue in Paddington and by the time I got on the train I had no seat. I used my newly acquired experience to find a place to sit that was comfy and nowhere near the loos. I eventually got a seat at Reading and after a signals failure, arrived in Cardiff 45 minutes late. Mum and Dad were waiting to take me home to have the first decent cup of tea in three weeks

Jon Monaco

Monte Carlo