Thursday 11 October - Travel London to Paris and on to Torino

1025 London St. Pancras to Paris Gare du Nord 1347
1524 Paris Gare de Lyon to Torino Porta Susa 2055 (actual 2130)
The worst part of the journey was the short ride on the Hammersmith and City line from Paddington to St. Pancras.  People were waiting ten deep at the platform and we were unable to get on the first train but were successful on the second.  London Transport only provided four car trains.  People have to do this every day!

Eurostar from London to Paris left on time and arrived a couple of minutes early into Paris Gare du Nord.  We found RER line D quickly and were in Gare de Lyon within 20 minutes of arriving in Paris.  There was just not enough time to have a sit down meal so we munched sandwiches on a bench near the departure board.  I looked longingly at Le Train Bleu but that will have to wait until Christmas.   SNCF is building a big new circulating area on the northern part of the station.   Gare de Lyon was giving people lots of time to board the trains, mostly about half an hour, in great contrast to Gare Montparnasse which makes people run after waiting an inordinate amount of time.  The TGV going to Milano left on time and was only two minutes late into Milano but extended stops, no reason given, meant that we were about 30 minutes late arriving into Torino.

This line is pretty tortuous after leaving the main high speed line south of Lyon.  There was double track until we branched off the line to Grenoble and then single line to Chambly.  The small villages were reminiscent of Switzerland with large houses and many shutters. 

Waiting for the French customs to clear at Modane.

Luciano was waiting for us on the platform at Torino and quickly brought us to the hotel where we crashed.  The room had a lot of lights and even more light switches.  It was pretty confusing trying to work out which worked what and it was quite an effort walking around last thing trying to ensure that all the lights were out.

The hotel is located on the main street close to the main railway station, Torino Porta Nueva (we arrived at Torino Porta Susa), and there was a tram route right below our window which had three windows/shutters to keep out the noise.