I spent a couple of days in France this week on business. I’ve travelled previously from London to Paris on the Eurostar passenger train service, but this was the first time I’ve used Eurotunnel to travel by car.
You don’t actually drive through the tunnel, you drive onto a double-decker high-speed shuttle train that takes you across in 35 minutes. Cars are carefully positioned inside the carriages, which are individually sealed (excepting passenger doors along the walkway) during the journey. The carriages have been designed so that the windows are positioned exactly in line with the front car doors, allowing you to sit in your car but still to see what’s happening outside.
My colleague was driving, so I was in the passenger seat. Idly staring out of the window, I could see the freight trains passing by at slow speed outside. After a few minutes, I noticed that one of the trains appeared to be made of concrete and with a sudden shock I realised that we were on our way. The shuttle had started to move so slowly and smoothly that I hadn’t felt it.
It’s a very odd sensation. You’re sitting in a car on a train, looking out of your window at the world going by. Just when I’d started to accustom myself to this concept, my colleague in the driving seat opened the door, got out of the car and wandered off in search of the toilet. For a second or two, my brain was totally scrambled. Huh? What? How?
Recent Comments