Trains are a big part of our journey. Not only will they get us from city to city but also around within each city. Today, we took a train from London to Brussels, which means we went through the Chunnel! It only took 20 minutes to travel underneath the English Channel to the French countryside.
Eurostar trains go very fast and feel almost like they are floating. I loved looking out the window at the countryside. I tried taking pictures but they just didn’t at all match the beauty of seeing the small English, French and Belgian towns and farms whiz by. As we got in to Brussels, farmhouses became apartment buildings and rolling hills became concrete walls covered in urban art, a different kind of beauty.
Once in Brussels, we got on the Tram, where two out-of-the-ordinary things happened: 1. a really nice guy gave us his extra metro ticket so we only had to buy one. 2. on the platform, a bunch of youths ran across the train tracks to get to the other platform. The first was very nice and only temporarily made me think of the movie, Taken. The second was particularly outrageous because I thought the tracks were electrified (like the third rail in the U.S.) but apparently here they aren’t. The youths just ran right across with no issue.
Many more trains are in our future on this trip. Riding them today made me thankful for my experience with different types of metros. I understand how confusing it can be even when the signs are in English. It also made me wish for a larger and faster city-to-city train system in the U.S. I would probably never fly again.
year of fun 