Thursday, September 08, 2016

Please take a moment to download and read my file Fully Funded Public Transit .

My trip from Poissy to Saint-Germaine-En-Laye out by #24, back by #5.

Well, this was supposed to be my first full day of vacation, but I have three essential errands before I can get started.

(1) I must book out of the Apart-Hotel

(2) I must book into the Hotel IBIS

(3) I must travel into FNAC-Montparnasse to buy an adapter.

Booking out of the Apart Hotel is fairly straightforward. I present a folded sheet of notepaper with two dozen bed bugs and demand a refund. After a brief verbal tussle, during which I ostentatiously make written notes in my notebook, a sheet is printed, signed by the manager, and a copy kept for his files. I will probably have to wait until I return to claim my refund from the bank.

I have already packed my shoulder bag, and so walk to the IBIS.

Booking into the Hotel Ibis is fairly straightforward. I ask for a room for the night, ask if there are special rates for long-term (there are), and we agree to talk about it in the morning. The credit card is handed over and we are done. I leave my bag in storage and head to the station to catch the RER to Châtelet Les Halles from where I will take the Metro to Montparnasse.

An overview of Poissy. The Seine flows right-to-left across the top left-hand corner of the image. You can see the hotel Ibis. I have circled Gare Sud, the train station, and Gare Nord in purple. Due south of the hotel I have circled Café Cep and La Presse.

SNCF/RER pulling into Poissy

SNCF/RER express heading west

SNCF heading in to Paris

SNCF heading in to Paris, slowly

The RER is inexplicably delayed, so I switch to Quai 2bis and hop on the one-stop to St Lazare; just like last night. Then by line 12 almost to Montparnasse where a nice lady in information gives me perfect directions to get to FNAC.

As the train slides into St Lazare I catch a glimpse of the cafe at Pont Cardinet where I sat the one day it rained before realizing that there was a train station right at my doorstep and I had a Navigo Pass. I recognize the steep wall along which I walked (on the sidewalk, silly! Not like a precocious four-year old!)

Unlike FNAC Chambourcy and FNAC Poissy, FNAC Montparnasse is catering to inbound tourists, just like me. Another €9.99 is rung up and I head back to the Notre Dame des Champs station and catch the next train to Gare St Lazare.

Normally I would take a bus, because who wants to travel underground on vacation, but I have no business being in Paris, so I take the Metro. And take the wrong exit from the station. And get hopelessly lost wandering around the boulevards for half an hour.

This day I traveled by metro. I would normally hop on a bus in the Opera area, just to enjoy watching people walking faster than we can shoulder our way through traffic, but I am not interested in Paris on this trip, and begrudge the time spent on two trips into town, time which I'd rather have spent exploring cafes and the one good bookshop in Poissy.

On the way back I was too clever, much too clever, and took a street exit from St Lazare metro station, instead of retracing my steps and following the signs for "Grandes Lignes”, ended up wandering around the expensive area of Printemps and Haussman Boulevard at lunch hour with all the rich women (please forgive me) strolling idly arm-in-arm, three abreast. Of course every time that clever-dick took a shortcut he buried himself even deeper into the labyrinth.

Finally I stumble by mistake into the right place. The train leaves in eight minutes, and by 3 p.m. I have reclaimed my bag and am in my room. A quick shower, change of clothes, and I am ready to set off on my first real bus ride.

I have spent a large part of my first two days here trying to beat The Great Plug Conspiracy .

Back at the hotel I took a shower and then wandered into the old town looking for what I used to call a “felt pen” and then learned to call a “marker” but now must call a “Sousligner”. Violent violet. I will use it to mark off my travels around Poissy town on my street map. This technique works well for me and seems to quicken my pace of mastering a warren of narrow streets and lanes.

I hop on a #24 which takes me, as advertised, to Saint-Germaine-en-Laye. All those years I hopped on to an RER train headed towards Saint-Germaine-en-Laye, but never went there, and today, I am there!

I took with me two Michelin maps of the Ile de France, a map of the route #24, a map of Poissy, and had a grand old time shuffling papers on my knee, following our route.

Arrived at Saint-Germaine-en-Laye, I am not allowed to stay on the bus and go home because the bus is to be transformed into another route, so I wait with two dozen other folks as buses pull in, crowds swarm the driver with questions, until I begin chatting with a lady who agrees that buses can be SO confusing – and then exclaims “Take the five”. A bus has doubled-parked and I thank her and board a route 5, which I didn't know existed, which will take me back to Poissy.

Just before the bus starts off, Nice Lady boards in a hurry. She lives here, she advised me, and SHE is confused!

We set off back along the same route we took to get here, tracing the precise course shown on my #24 map, and back at Poissy in the Information booth, the nice man assures me that he could not have given me a #5 booklet, because that is a Saint-Germaine-en-Laye route.

In France an establishment labeled “Bar” or “Cafe-Tabac” will sell you drinks and food, but the food will run only to a sandwich (Fromage, Jambon, Pâte), and the sandwich baguette will be from this morning's batch if you are unlucky.

So I tumble into the Turkish grill next door to the station and order an Assiette with curried chicken, salad, rice and frenched fries. A huge meal, but I work my way through it while reading a newspaper.

This is what a collection of drowned bedbugs looks like. Ugly and distasteful, but it sure makes an impact at the front desk of a hotel, I can tell you.

The hotel knew that they had an infestation; a passerby asked about them (all this in French) and I understood the manager well enough to hear him explain “Oh yes, the eggs can survive for a year”. As well the management were too keen to sign a paper and get me out of the foyer.

You can't get a free night in a hotel by carrying around a packet of long-dead bedbugs.

But you can walk across the street and ask the nice lady in the Bureau de Tourisme whether there is a Better Business Bureau in town. Turns out that there isn't, but she sends me off to a nice man at Le Service Technique in the town hall. Monsieur Guerin appears to be something like the Ministry Of Health and he notices that the bugs have released blood while traveling in my shirt pocket, so he knows that they were alive recently.

He asks me which hotel, which room, and he already knows some of the story; the Bureau de Tourisme have radioed ahead. I get a feeling that the Town Hall have been waiting for someone to roll up with soft evidence (soft as in “squishy”) and I am it. Names are exchanged and I leave with much hand-shaking. Have I been instrumental in toppling a chain of hotels?

I hope so.

Here is a train heading towards Paris. For all that the trains are noisy and the hotel is bug-ridden, I admit that I am impressed by the insulating quality of the windows. The trains pass at frequent intervals, mainly passenger trains during the day, but freight trains at night, and I had no trouble dropping off to sleep.

Of course, having trains run by the window might be marginally quieter than having fire sirens echo off condominiums twenty-four hours a day, not drowned out by the six (!) construction jobs on our street at home.

This is my exit interview of Appart'Hotels.

As I walk towards Hôtel Ibis, I pass the station and can't resist this shot. Note the digits on the clock face; most clocks in the rail system sport no digits, only marks for the hours. French children can not have been weaned on the “the big hand is on the eleven and the little hand is on the ten”.

I have often mentioned how clever the French are with their crosswalks. I'll say it again.

See how the pedestrian crossing, the zebra stripes, are not set down as a continuation of the sidewalk? To cross the street you must walk a little way away from the direct-line of travel and cross at a point where drivers are no longer worrying about “what's coming from the left”, but are re-focused directly ahead.

This means that the drivers see the pedestrian. The system works well, and I have quickly regained confidence when walking around Poissy.

Drivers and pedestrians work WITH each other to make for a smooth flow for both. I feel certain that no driver will hit me providing that I make eye-contact and cross promptly when there is a semi-decent gap. The motorist will slow down and increase the gap while I cross, and once I am beyond the contact-point, the motorist will speed up to close the gap.

Hard to describe, but it works very well.

The railings are there to encourage us not to take shortcuts.

Here is another pedestrian crossing. The curve in the railing helps indicate to you how far back we are from the intersection of two streets. The drivers coming towards me are focused on pedestrians; it is too early for them to see traffic arriving on the cross-street, which lies behind my left shoulder and extends to my right and left from where I stand.

I think the flowers are a nice touch, but I'm only saying that because they are everywhere.

I love the narrow streets of the old City Centre. This is Avenue General de Gaulle, I think. I intend to get a better photo of that building at the end of the street.

No, that's not good enough. I'll just have to go back and try to walk right past all those Boulangeries again ….

There is the church in Place Saint Louis, right by the Appart'Hotel. The church tower is still quite a landmark in this part of town, in spite of the modern buildings that surround it.

I am experimenting, not very well, with exposures on my new smart phone. Not doing so well.

I have learned to avoid restaurants of this size. Also Creperies. Unless someone else is paying!

Here to my mind is proof that Poissy knows it has a problem with Punaises de Lit. This pharmacy sports a display advertising its stock of ant-bedbug preparations.

Note the store hours – we close at 7:30 in the evening. Most stores close at seven. I have grown too used to the pampered life in Toronto.

Here I am, just after mid-day, standing on Quai 6 waiting for the RER train to take me into Châtelet Les Halles so that I can hop on the Metro to Montparnasse.

Through the gap in the hedge, centre of this photo, you can see part of a bus in the Gare Nord, the bus station on the north side of the train station.

I laugh: When I began research on Poissy I noted that many buses traveled to Gare Nord" and took only fifteen minutes or so to do the trip. Uneducated I thought that "Gare Nord" was an abbreviated form of "Gare du Nord", the grand station in Paris. Imagine! Fifteen minutes to the heart of Paris! Count me in! I'm not sure when the truth dawned on me, but it has not stopped my love of Poissy.

Here I am, still waiting for the RER train. I was thrown by the notice boards in the station lobby. I couldn't find a train that goes to Marne la Valeé or to Boissy-Saint-Legere, the two eastern terminuses of this line.

It turns out that trains from the Poissy terminus don't always go all the way. They stop at Torcy, a few stops shy of a full trip, so the announcements are for trains to Torcy. Now I know.

Here I am, still waiting for the RER train. This is a boring photo of the end of the line at Poissy. Boring because I am bored and wish that the train would hurry up and come and go, taking me with it.

If you would like to see this view from the cab of an RER trin, watch the video 4K Cabride RER A - Poissy - Nanterre-Préfecture en MI2n

Here I am, still waiting for the RER train. These other folks are about as bored as am I. We all wish that the train would hurry up and come and go, taking us with it.

Here I am, still waiting for the RER train. This is a boring photo of the schedule. The train has been delayed for some reason, and in a few minutes the loudspeakers will tell us just that and wish us all an excellent day

So instead I hop on the SNCF for dear old Gare St Lazare. I have forgone the Metro Line 4 (the first metro ride I took in Paris!) and opted for line 12. They both go through Montparnasse.

The signs in the Transilien network are intelligent. At least. I find them so. The mainline stations (such as Gare St Lazare) are enormous warrens of corridors.

Read the sign from left to right; there is a syntax and, of course, a lexical content.

The arrow reads “If you go THIS way”; the letter M says “You will get to the Metro (subway) system”; the numbers say “In particular, you will get a choice of lines twelve or thirteen”; the next two symbols say “You can also get to the RER line E”.

Note that at this stage in your journey, having just hopped off a mainline train, you don't get flooded with a list of stations served by these three lines. It is a top-down approach to navigation, and it works very well.

Well, OK, it fails me occasionally. the area is being remodeled and there is a temporary white plastic sign on the wall.

The system still works well. I missed this sign as I went by, but just twenty feet further on I found the sign for line 13 and no other metro line. The absence of the regular sign for line 12 told me that I must have missed it, such is my confidence in the logic of signs in the Transilien network.

Well, I got my adapter, returned to the hotel and plugged the netbook in, and set off on a walk, knowing that I could happily flatten my camera battery taking pictures.

Here is the Post Office, a beautiful building. I still am tempted to buy some postcards and then ask for some “timbres”, but I know we don't do that anymore. Instead we sit up late at night typing notes and send a link to a web page.

Sigh!

Beautiful isn't it? The back side of the Council Building where at least one person is deeply concerned about bedbugs. The two wings hold functional stores like dry-cleaners on the ground floor. Also the cinema.

The big square will be filled come market-day(s) whenever that is.

Here is the town hall and the Poissy Theater, another beautiful building. Those magenta blobs are flowers – see next photo.

And here are the huge flower-planters. Note the crispness of colour in the national flag. Nowhere in France will you see a faded-pink maple leaf with tattered edges. I get the impression that the flags are rotated daily through the local dry-cleaners.

Even the batteries of flags are crisp and clean. Their whites are so WHITE!

This, I said to myself, will be the covered market (meat, fish, cheese etc.) come market-day.

It used to be the “beast” market, and streets nearby are named Rue de Boeuf and Rue des Moutons - nothing at all to do with New Zealanders.

A better view, I hope, of the box-like trees. I noticed this tree sculpturing first two years ago in Dourdan on September 22nd 2014.

By the way, there's that church tower again in the background.

This photo and the one before provide a story:

I have been sitting in a Turkish burger joint enjoying a very nice plate of lamb, rice and salad. I have good view of the street which I know is one lane each way, and narrow too.

As the previous photo shows, a stream of cars is heading towards the station at the proverbial snail's.

The other lane heads away from the station, and you can just make out the directional arrow alongside the two people lugging luggage.

I sit and eat and watch the cars struggle from right to left of my view, and every now and then I see a bus flash by from left to right.

So far so good.

Then I see a bus zoom past from right to left, just flying past those stalled cars, and quite obviously flouting the traffic laws.

Do they have some extremely clever land manipulation system here?

I continue eating and watch several buses zoom past correctly, and then a couple zoom past incorrectly, as it were.

I get up from my booth and walk outside to confirm that the road was indeed only two single lanes.

Only when I left the burger place to walk home, towards the station, did it all become clear:

Just east of the eatery, a bus-only left-turn lane is provided. But buses coming eastwards note that there is no traffic approaching, so they drive on the wrong side of the road until they gain the safety of their dedicated left-turn lane.

If you look partway up the left-hand edge of the nearest black pole you will see the word “BUS” stenciled in the roadway.

I have no doubt that buses coming from the east and turning into the station help out by signaling or even blocking trailing traffic to give their buddies a stolen (home) base!

Next Day