Getting from Rouen to Amiens was easy. There are frequent direct trains between these 2 cities. French trains ran almost empty; I saw 2-3 passengers per car. It’s no wonder that the railway operator SNCF, France’s national state-owned company, does not make enough profit to offset its debt. Earlier this year the current government announced sweeping reforms to the SNCF that included changing the company’s status to “publicly financed” and reducing the key employment benefits. In response, the rail workers began a rolling 3-month strike and I was traveling in the midst of it.
My first and foremost task in Amiens, even before finding a hotel room, was to figure out how to get to my next destination, Reims. The distance between Amiens and Reims by road is 178 km (110 mi). According to the map of France’s railways, there was no track between Amiens and Reims. The French rail system is designed like a star with the center in Paris. When one needs to travel to a place on the adjoining ray of that star the only way to get there by train is via Paris. That would take me a whole day and I wanted to avoid Paris on this trip anyway. I thought of renting a car and driving to Reims. I did not like this idea for a number of reasons. The remaining alternative was to take the bus. That’s why first of all I walked to the bus station which is conveniently located next to the trains. The bus station was closed up tight, no sign of activity anywhere because it was Sunday.
I switched my priorities, solving the transportation problem had to wait, and went to search for a room. The Ibis was really close, but I wanted to stay in something with more local character than a chain hotel and walked past it towards the pedestrian area. The Grand Hotel de L’Univers located in a charming old building was exactly what I was looking for. My room was on the top floor. Is it a coincidence that single rooms are always at the top of the stairs as if couples could not climb that high?
My room overlooked a small park. I opened both windows and the fragrance of blooming chestnut and lilac trees filled the room. The hotel receptionist told me that her friends from Tergnier, a city between Amiens and Reims, often came to visit; so there should be something going in this direction. To double-check, I went to the train station again and, indeed, a ticket machine displayed several trains to Tergnier and Laon, the next station towards Reims. Reassured by that, I decided that it was time for seeing what Amiens had to offer.
To me, Amiens is the city of Jules Verne who wrote here most of his adventure and sci-fi books. My favorite Verne’s book is Around the World in 80 Days, have a guess why. The house where Verne lived is now a museum and, according to a tourist booklet, it was open on Sundays. I got as far as the monument to Jules Verne and struggled to find his house. A French lady looked confused when I asked for directions.
‘It should be somewhere near this,’ I pointed at the monument.
‘Oh, that,’ she studied it as for the first time. No, she did not know where the museum was. Two more passersby could not help either. I stopped putting the locals into an awkward situation and eventually found the house myself. The plaque on its wall said that it was Jules Verne’s museum. The door next to the plaque definitely was not the museum entrance because of a panel with buttons and tenants’ names. The high gates around the house corner were locked. I turned back disappointed; the museum had excellent reviews and I really wanted to see how the famous writer lived.
Amiens is a paradise for those who love Gothic architecture. It features many churches designed in this style. The finest of them is the Cathedral Basilica of Our Lady of Amiens built in the 13th century. While I enjoy viewing churches of all kind, the most interesting part of sightseeing for me is usually the old town. In Amiens, the best of the old town, in my opinion, is along the river Somme crowded with small houses whose fronts are 1 or 2-window wide and front yards are the size of a handkerchief.
Next to this area, there were many cafés that served crêpes. I chose a crêpe with sun-dried tomatoes, mozzarella, prosciutto, pine nuts, and greens, then followed it a chocolate crêpe. Needless to say, both were excellent, although inexpensive. French cuisine is known for its versatility and creativity.
It was a pity that I could not see the Jules Verne’s museum, but overall, it was a great day.
A good night sleep in a room like mine was guaranteed. After breakfast at the hotel, I checked out, went to the train station and bought a ticket to Laon via Tergnier. However, the departure board did not show any train to Tergnier. The ticket was all in French; I could not figure out what it said except for the station names and times. There were two small icons on it. When I looked at them closely it became clear that the first icon was a bus. An information officer confirmed that the first leg was to be done by bus. So my railway map was correct. Trains did not run in this direction. The receptionist’s friends came to Amiens by bus and she did not know that. The machines at the train station sell both bus and train tickets. Now everything made sense to me.
A fragile lady with grey hair sat at the bus station reading something like a children’s book. She asked me something in French. I was unable to pronounce Tergnier and showed her my ticket. She indicated that she was taking the same bus and started talking to me. Unfortunately, I could only smile and gesture in response. That did not discourage the nice lady. I did laps around her while waiting for our bus. If I wandered too far from the platform she looked worried. She did not want me, a foreigner, to miss the bus. Once we both were safely on the bus the lady opened her book again and stopped paying attention to me.
The bus left Amiens via Phileas Fogg Avenue named after the main character of Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days. The road went through small picturesque towns and farms. The driver dutifully stopped in them, but there were hardly any passengers. Tergnier was the last stop of this route. The connection time was 10 minutes, more than I needed to walk a few yards from the bus to the train that consisted of 2 cars. The train shuttles from Tergnier to Laon and back; the ride is 20 minutes. It was 2 pm when I got to Laon.
Sorry to hear about Jules Verne museum, wouldn’t it be great to visit it! As to the chaotic transport connections in Europe, I can only quote an interesting, though a little lengthy, comment I found on one of the travel forums while planning my trip to Spain in autumn: “In fact, over the past 20 or more years traveling around and living in Europe, I can state more or less categorically that, as regards international travel by rail, road, and almost as poorly by air, the EU never occurred. Each country is, with limited exceptions, in the same insular state it always was regarding surface transportation options.
It is a Euro-version of the old “down east” US (Maine) joke: “Nope, you can’t there from here…” Here in the US it is correctly pronounced (in regional dialect as ): “Nope! Yuh caaaahnt get theeeeah from heeeeah!” Of course it is hugely funny when a salty old-timer gives the advice while toying with his pipe to some young urban couple in their shiny new sports sedan who think that all things are possible.
In too many cases, there is simply no direct or convenient way to go from point A to point B in Europe if those points are in different, even adjoining countries. The primary exceptions are from major hub or industrial cities in the various countries. There is a cross-European series of “main-lines” that provide fast, efficient and economical travel between these major nodes. However, if you live far off this route, you are literally off the map in terms of direct rail or bus routes.
The problem occurs even within countries like Spain. Before the EU / Schengen treaty opened Spain and many other countries to international visa-free travel from previously unconsidered and undreamed of points. Before this, national politics, regional issues, economic difficulties and any variety of longstanding problems all contributed to keeping most of Europe “balkanized” if you will.
Consider that in the 20th Century, Spain encountered and survived three very serious existential threats. First, the reign of fascist General Francisco Franco, second, the Spanish Civil War (which many historians regard as a proxy war for World War II), followed by World War II. The economic vicissitudes and hardships, as well as necessary decisions forced by these three serious events, and in the case of General Franco, the fact that he remained in power until the mid-1970s, explains in large part why the rail and road networks in Spain are as they appear today.
It takes generations to undo these patterns of isolation and neglect. Even today, it is usually through huge cash infusions in the form of grants from the EU that enables Spain to build modern autopistas (motorways) to better link it to its European neighbors”.