Tuesday, September 13, 2016

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

To Morainvilliers and back to Poissy, then to Saint Remy les Chevreuse and back again via St Quentin-en-Yvelines

I haven't slept this well since the last time I had $500,000 in the bank.

I woke at seven this morning. I normally am awake at four, leap out of bed and start learning something; reading, or writing. Either this room is as quiet as a tomb, or I am better fed, or I am exhausting myself every day, or some combination of all three and anything else you can think of.

Of course, sleeping right through the night without waking at two or three makes me want to stay here forever, with or without the Transilien network.

I drop off my clothes (!) and the nice man puts an URGENT sticker on them, promising to have them ready by seven tonight. I am charged thirty Euros. I think that the cleaners is taking me to the cleaners.

Forty three dollars Canadian seems a bit much for, this time, dry-clean one pair of pants and launder four shirts. I pay a dollar to wash and another dollar to dry at home, say four dollars every three weeks. (You can do that if you have bought forty pairs of briefs and forty pairs of socks, and wear your dress shirts only when you go outside the apartment).

Every four days here I am paying for over half a year of laundry at home. Less the dry-cleaning. It is time to try the other Laverie in town.

Or another way: Every four days I pay for cleaning what would feed me each night at The Istanbul, a plate of chicken and rice and fries (too many) and a salad. I am effectively helping my clothes to gain weight.

I collect my morning paper and head across the street and buy a sweet little rosiere for my room, then off to the market for four medium-sized carrots and two large, sweet apples, and finally to the cafe. Same old same old.

This morning I make a statistical study of the tidal flow of customers. I note the time when the cafe is empty. Waves come with a period of about fifteen minutes. That is, about every 15 minutes, Madame Sylvie has a chance, as she says, to Faire La Vaisselle. I think I got that right. “Do the dishes”.

I spot a 50 bus, grab that timetable off the rack, and realize that the #50 covers ground that I have mostly covered several times. It is a short-range bus that shuttles across Poissy. I decide to give that a miss because it will not involve new scenery.

My first bus of the day is the #20 which will take me on a circular tour to the south west, the whole trip lasting about an hour. I picked a bad time on this route because it is the 11:52 from Poissy and the next bus leaves two hours later; all other times the next bus is an hour behind. I would like to spend an hour in the small town of Morainvilliers, but there isn't enough to keep me occupied for two hours.

We head west through Orgeval, well we skirt it actually, then into Morainvilliers, which is right on the edge of my large-scale Michelin. I can't be bothered getting out my other map, because in a few minutes we will be back on this detailed map. We flash through Bures, and I realize with glee that this is my second Bures. My first was Bures sur Yvette two years ago. Little did I know that I was almost going to end up there again. Orgeval proper (and again I regret the two-hour interval) and back to Poissy.

I have learned how to interpret the green arrow on the bus map. The arrow is the same shade of green as the text which describes the times for Saturday service.

We travel through green fields of corn and vines, and fallow fields, and fields where the hay has been stripped – perhaps the second or third crop this year.

I am mightily impressed by the tidiness of the streets in every town. In one small village we passed a middle-aged lady walking along with a handful of weeds, heading towards a collection of bags of other greenery tidied from her yard. I almost forgave her for not composting.

I had not thought of hopping off at Cep and transferring to the #50 as it headed out of town – why go all the way back to the station just to miss a bus and wait for the next one – but in the end I'm glad I didn't, for as noted above, there is now nothing interesting about the #50.

The 4-express looked quite appealing, except that I couldn't find Montigny-le-Bretonneux on my maps. I took that as a good sign, since most bus routes terminate in a place of some distinction. So at 13:05 I was on the #4 express heading back out of town. I knew we were going South towards and past Plaisir.

Fields of corn and vines and pear trees. Sigh!

Sitting next to me is a heavy-set black man, looks like he just “got off the boat”. He falls asleep and almost drops his head onto my shoulders, wakes up, and I understand him to say “Where are we? Have we gone past Plaisir?”. I assure him that we have not, point out the time displayed on the bus, show him my timetable, and the conclusion is that we still have five minutes to go before we arrive at Plaisir.

He turns out to be Italian, hence his broken French. We make a fine couple. It is the first time that he has taken the bus to Plaisir, normally he drives by car, so everything looks strange. I understand his confusion. We pass a pleasant five minutes and part the best of friends. I shall never meet him again.

The Gare de Plaisir Grignon is not marked on my Michelin, and I am beginning to have doubts about my maps. Later I find that the station is right off the left-hand edge, so I am directly South of where I was an hour or so ago in Morainvilliers.

We arrive at Montigny-le-Bretonneux which is an alias for the HUGE station at St Quentin-en-Yvelines. And I mean huge (see photos below). I worked at Trappes-la-Verriere for Cap Sogeti in 1979 and there is a slight temptation to toddle off and check the place out, but the day is hot and for what would I get out of it? Not much. Sad memories, perhaps.

I check out one of the main digital boards which shows a blended view of everything that is leaving this complex – local buses, long-distance buses (that's me) from two different bus stations, RER trains, SNCF trains. St Quentin-en-Yvelines doesn't have bus stations at either side of the tracks, like Poissy, it has bus stations at several levels on different sides of the tracks, and on the subterranean levels there are separate sets of platforms. I make the mistake of wandering into Quai “K” in the Station Souterraine on the south side of the tracks, instead of Quai “J” in the Station Souterraine on the south side of the tracks. You have to be on the correct side of the tracks, at the correct level, and then on the correct platform in order to find your (correct) bus stop.

The signs are pretty good. I got confused on the way back, pushing past a couple on the two escalators that take me up one level, only to find I was wrong, and almost waved at the couple as I scooted back down the stairs to ask a security chef where I should be, and he happily directed me back up the two escalators.

This is why nobody wants to travel with me on holidays, I guess.

Woo-Woo I am on the 464 southbound from Montigny-le-Bretonneux aka St Quentin-en-Yvelines heading for Saint Remy les Chevreuse, in the beautiful valley of Chevreuse. As noted above, I was here on Wednesday, September 24, 2014 , almost two years ago, and nothing has changed, except the cows are no longer grazing in the pasture.

I trot across to the cafe, order a sandwich Gruyere and a cafe double and a glass of water and sit still for half an hour trying to make it look like I am unrelated to the boorish triplet of Anglos enjoying their fourth or fifth beer of the afternoon.

Back to the bus station where I make inquiries about routes and see TWO lady bus drivers – the first ones I've seen in a week, and I've seen a lot of bus drivers, not only in the buses I've ridden, but also in the buses that head towards us on each route. I ask a couple of male drivers, and they explain that acceptance is coming, but that it is a slow process and they have a long way to go. I think that Toronto boasts about 25% female drivers, but I will have to conduct a survey when I return home. Gives me something to do …

The #464 is due to take me north at 16:17. At 16:16 the driver starts the engine and opens the door; at 16:17 the bus pulls away. You blink, and you miss it! There is no five-minutes idling to allow people to saunter across from the cafe.

Many of the villages – see Romainville for an example – are off the road. We see a bus shelter, and that's it. Travelers must walk up to half a kilometre from their house out to the main road. I guess that this makes for a very quiet village at night time.

I now begin to recognize what might be a problem for me. I get a bus in Poissy and it drops me in front of a dozen other buses all offering new places to see, and before you know it I am twenty kilometres away and fatigued.

Two big laughs at the end of the day:-

Big laugh (1) The bus pulls into Gare Nord. I am tired. As is my wont, I wait for everyone else to get off the bus before I stand up to leave. The lady sitting in the aisle seat next to me also waits, and she is chatting on her cell phone. Too late, I remember as people start to board the bus that this bus runs from Montigny THROUGH Poissy to Cergy. "Pardon!" I say and start to rise to indicate that I want to get off the bus. Lady apologizes, goes to stand up just ahead of a flood of passengers coming down the aisle and remembers too late that she is buckled into her seat belt, so she is flinging herself, rag-doll-like, into the aisle while clutching her cell-phone and telling her husband how you boil pasta, or whatever essential thing is going on. Passengers are blocked, I am desperate, lady can't undo her seat-belt because right now it is under pretty good pressure from her body ...

Big laugh (2) I drop by my little newspaper shop to ask if they stock Michelin maps. I am convinced that mine are stale. No, says the man, but they are stocked up at La Librairie across from the cinemas. Oh, I say, that's the store that your lady sent me to last week. Yes, he responds, with a big grin coming over his face, "From the Gare Sud you take the #12 bus .... How grand it is that he segues into a playful punch at my habits. Everyone in town knows that I am spending my days riding buses across the western part of the Ile de France.

Well, I found them funny. Perhaps you ought to have been here ...

Fun and games this morning. A couple of workmen have parked their van in the spot where buses come to catch their breath. The men have picks and shovels, so something will be dug up, a job of several hours by the look of it.

During my perambulation I came across this man pulling a vacumn cleaner. Unlike Toronto where they sit on motorized scooters and terrorize pedestrians, this scheme has the man walk around and actually suck up the debris from the street. Slow buy steady, and perhaps that's why streets remain so clean. It is a genuine effort at cleanliness, not a contract awarded to some city councilor's brother-in-law's nephew.

I learn a bit more about Poissy every day. This little lane leads towards the back of the cafe. If I weren't dropping in for my paper each morning, I could take a shortcut and dart in the back door of the cafe.

Say what you like about the French; but they ARE artistic. Note how the post matches the cars colour!

Already I am on the #20 heading out to Morainvilliers. Perfect weather, countryside, what's not to like?

Through the fields we go, past cozy little farms.

These are rows of pear trees that I assume are meant to act as wind-breaks in the fields.

The driver's blind runs between two vertical rails. Each rail is mounted L-wise to a small black bracket with a suction cup (or flatly glued to the windscreen). Except on this bus the mount has disappeared and the right-hand rail is fixed to the windscreen with several layers of adhesive tape, difficult for you to spot, but trust me, Sellotape(TM) works!

Here we are dropping through Morainvilliers; or somewhere else. I am losing track, I just sit and enjoy the scene.

Here we are rising through Morainvilliers; or somewhere else. I am losing track, I just sit and enjoy the scene. The lanes are narrow but scenic but hell to drive IMHO.

Within the villages the streets are narrow, and the corners tight and blind.

This, very roughly, was the route of my #20 bus, running just off the end of the map.

I am so impressed by the orderliness of the streets, the trees and hedges so well-trimmed. There is a real pride in each town and village.

This, for example, is a relatively untidy hedge. You can spot individual branches that are struggling free. Tut-tut!

Another tidy tiny town. Bures, I think.

This picture gives an idea of the narrow lanes, but the experience when the bus is rolling and you can feel all the motion as you approach the corner is something else.

And again ...

We cannot barrel down the straightway because of the speed bumps.

I think the thin white line in the distance is the heights of Poissy.

This was fun. The truck crew are patching a small piece of road. The bus had to be driven onto the footpath to get around the job.

Once in Poissy I scurried round the back to Gare Nord and hopped on the 4-express to Montigny-le-Bretonneux.

We barrel through what I think is the north-west tip of the forest of Marly-le-Roi.

Not a good shot, but it's a lot prettier than some parts of Carlton Street in Toronto.

Likewise the fallowed fields as we approach Feucherolles.

Neat little hedges edge the roadway in Feucherolles.

Traffic is calmed by reducing the road to single-lane traffic.

The villages retain their twisty lanes.

The church used to dominate the village, I bet. Now it appears as a landmark from about a quarter-kilometre away.

Back into the narrow lanes. Car drivers are pretty well disciplined. The oncoming driver has stopped to give the bus the right of way; the bus driver reciprocates by slowing to a crawl or a stop alongside the cars, to allow them to move forwards out of our way.

The journey so far.

You can obtain the original map here (2016-09-Plan-General-A3.pdf). I crossed the top edge of the map on my way South from Poissy. The kink near the top is Plaisir-Grignon where I said goodbye to my Italian Buddy. The kink in the middle in St Quentin en Yvelines, and at the foot of the map is Saint Remy les Chevreuse.

Here we sit in Gare de Plaisir Grigny, for about thirty seconds. I say goodbye to my Italian buddy. The young lady sitting opposite gave us both a filthy puzzled look. I didn't waste any time giving her a look. We men have to stick together, even if we are total strangers! After all, we could understand each other's fractured French, even if she couldn't.

Here is an excerpt from a small fiche-horaires, or timetable for a single route. I have reproduced a part of one of the many panels – this panel is for weekdays on the 464 route southbound from St Quentin towards Saint Remy. Look at the digital clock at the front of the bus. The clock reads “17:35”.

You left St Quentin at 17:16, so locate that column, scan down until you get to the first entry after 17:35 – that would be the 17:36 time spot. Now scan to the left to find “Magny - Parc d’Activités de Gomberville”.

You will roll up to the bus stop titled “Magny - Parc d’Activités de Gomberville” within a minute. Guaranteed. And note that Magny - Parc d’Activités de Gomberville is a bus-stop, not a village or town. Buses run to the minute at every bus stop on every route on every trip across the Ilê de France. Phew!

Then it is off again through the open fields of the country side.

Note that the fields have no fences, so this is crop land, not grazing land. The livestock, if any, is housed in barns.

Riding through the outskirts of Plaisir.

We are heading for the auto-route A12. My Michelin map doesn't have an A12 anywhere near here.

Yep! We are heading for the auto-route A12.

The last part of the tunnel into St Quentin en Yvelines

Here I am about to descend into the bowels of Saint Quentin-en-Yvelines.

The time is 14:07.

The left hand panel shows bus departures from the ranks outside in the open air on the northern side of the tracks.

The centre panel shows bus departures from the underground bus stationS(!)

The right hand panel shows bus departures from the ranks outside in the open air on the southern side of the tracks.

I have circled my Daily Temptation. How can I resist a quick trip to Saint Remy. Every thirty minutes. But that's in off-peak hours!

Oh, by the way, there were more routes than could fit on the right hand panel.

The #4-express dropped me off at the double-circled area top left. I walked into the complex, down a couple of levels, ended up on the wrong quay, back up one level, then down to the double circle lower left. A nice little walk after lunchtime.

The signs are really good and have a syntax, just like the ones in Paris. This shot makes it all look murky, but that's me and my camera. In real life the signs are easy to read, and they are all above head, so even in a crowd you can navigate by signs.

There was a nice little commercial centre here, had I had the mind to wander on foot.

Leaving St Quentin we travel in our own bus lane down the centre of the road. In the foreground is the pedestrian pavement, beyond that the southbound vehicular lane for those unfortunate enough not to be in a bus.

Of course, on the other side we have the northbound dedicated lane, pedestrian walkway, cars in their own space, and the lout we see in Toronto, occupying four spaces, one of them with his feet.

Chop 'em off at the ankle, I say.

Check it out. Even the leaves fall neatly!

I think this is the route we took, but I won't swear to it.

I have pretty well stopped taking photos. The towns are always neat; the fields fallow or full of corn. Or Vines. Or Pear Trees.

A view of the far side of the valley of Chevreuse. We are descending the north side of the valley, and Saint Remy is nestled in the foot of the valley.

This is quite a drop, as you might guess from the view of the far wall.

Back on Wednesday, September 24, 2014 , there were cows in this field.

The Office de Tourisme is closed. Otherwise I'd have entered and greeted the lady who has probably replaced the one I approached two years ago. Retired on medical grounds probably after trying to understand my French.

Here's the railway station. Same as ever.

The cafe continues to welcome Australian tourists in its whimsical manner.

Now you must admit that this is clever.

You've seen the roof-scoops that can be opened to scoop in air mid-bus in hot weather? Well, this bus has a scoop on its roof, and the scoop is opened to scoop, well, air, into the bus.

But the bus has a grille AND a screen that prevents the largest leaves and twigs from messing up my hair.

I wouldn't be surprised if the grill and screen include heating coils.

I said I was through with photos, but I'm not. I am struck by how different this trip is from my all-trains trip of two years ago. Riding the buses is way more fun, although the trains did take me across almost all of the Ile de France.

And what would a holiday blog be without the traditional accidental photo of my shoes. Yellow/orange this time, with dark blue socks, of course.

The small copses (I think they are) intrigue me. I wonder whether young farm boys take off and use them as hiding places, or for games of cops and robbers.

The bus displays and orates a running commentary of where we are headed, our estimated time of arrival, the next stop, the name of this stop. I am glad to report that it does not have a twitter account.

Much of this must be done via GPS, and I contemplate that while GPS was developed for geographic measurement (in three dimensions), here that spatial data is being converted to data about time (the fourth dimension, if you must), and I I wonder whether it was foreseen when it was fully implemented t wenty years ago that it would be used to tell passengers whether or not they were going to connect to the #4-express at 17:12, or whether they should aim for the 17:30.

How these neat hedges astound me. You see only the occasional photo of twenty feet of hedge; I see miles of it every day.

Now this is a bus shelter I could learn to love. Note the spy-hole of adequate dimensions cut into the wall facing the oncoming bus.

The bus stop is at Villeneuve. Now where have I heard that name before?

You can't make it out because the dreaded stippled glass screen hides it, but we are crawling along behind a farm tractor. This truly is a rural road.

Ah! That’s got rid of him! We are ALL glad to see him go!

Yes. More beautiful buildings Sorry!

There are two overlapping bus sub-systems here. STIF is, I think, the Society of Transport in Ile de France. SQYBUS ("squee-bus"?) is the sub-system for Saint Quentin-en-Yvelines.

For all that this is a modern building, I like its muted maroon colouring. At least it isn't poured concrete.

As we approach Saint Quentin-en-Yvelines we wait at the lights to enter the reserved bus lanes in the centre of the roadway.

Alongside of us a car driver tries to squeeze in ready for the green light.

I used to think of things I'd do were I driving a bus, but a Toronto streetcar driver soon set me right, shaking his head slowly and saying "Yabbut, think of the paperwork!"

We zoom along, and let the cars do their own thing.

Did I tell you about the miles of neat hedging?

This giant tube thing tells me that we are one stop away from Saint Quentin-en-Yvelines

A blurry shot taken on-the-trot walking through the underground from one side of St Q to the other side.

A view upwards, partway up from the second level underground. Escalators take you up, but stairs take you down.

A poor shot. I didn't like this sign. The down-pointing arrow suggested to me that the station I'm aiming for is downstairs. I returned downstairs where the signs re-directed me upstairs.

Now had this arrow pointed upwards I would have taken it to mean "keep going, straight ahead

I am tired and it is late in my day. Another lousy shot.

This sign shows my bus route number in black. Until now the route has been in blue, the colour favoured for express routes in the region.

From a distance I can make out that a number is blue, even if I can't make out the value. I, of course, am looking for a blue "16". This one is black.

We are on our way out of St Quentin, northbound on the 16-express. I spotted a low-flying plane and theorized the presence of an airfield. Sure enough, here's the strip.

Lessons in riding the buses number 373: be careful where you rest your elbow on the window ledge.

Say what you like about Poissy, there's not a great many cities paint their lampposts in Easter-egg chocolate wrapper colours?

This is why I think that the cleaners is taking me to the cleaners.

Another reason why I like Hotel Ibis: I have not yet dropped a cake of soap in the shower cubicle.

My office in Poissy.

My office decorations in Poissy.

Next Day