Friday Jun 11th: London Calling

We finished our packing and closed the house behind us around 1:45PM, just in time to take mom up on her invite for a quick lunch before our 2:45PM train to Brussels Midi station. We jumped in our cars, wearing our heavy travelling clothing (The weather forecast for La Paz predicted lows of -5C), and it was only then that I noticed what a generous portion of sunlight was ladled over my hometown. The thermometer display on the dashboard in the car indicated “23C”. Within 5 minutes we pulled up to mom’s driveway, where our cars would stay for the duration of the trip. As we made our way up to the living room, the delicate perfume of grilled “poulet de Landes” tickled first our noses, then our taste buds. The sliding door to the terrace was open, and Latin-American music gently caressed our ears. The table was set, colourful napkins and an open bottle of Bourgogne made the picture complete. We ate rather quick, and spoke with delight about the trip and the finalisation of the preparations. And about the cats, who weren’t staying with Blandine’s aunt now. The house cat had been rather stressed in sharing his little coin of paradise with Max and Leo, so within a few hours of feline war games, Blandine’s parents decided to take Max and Leo back to Avignon. That suits everybody apparently, especially Blandine’s dad, who had fallen in love with them over the last 3 days.
A quick glance at the clock tells us we really have to get going, so we say our goodbyes, hop in the car and get to the train station. Shucks, the 14:56 train we planned to take to Brussels Midi station is announced with 20 minutes delay!

Crisis thinking needed! Could we still make the EUROSTAR connection to London? What would tickets on the next train cost? Let’s call mom back, she can drive us. We are SOOO not going to miss this connection to London. Hello crisis management centre, the next train will still get us there in time! It would be tight, but we just have to trust the Belgian train system….pitter patter, pitter patter. Long story short, we got onto the London train just fine and pulled into St. Pancras station, as planned. After a quick rendezvous with our Spanish friend Esther in one of the train station snack bars, we head off to Wimbledon, to meet with Luba and Richard who kindly agreed to put us up for the night. Rush hour London underground traffic, being squeezed like sardines in a metal carriage is our first ethnic experience on this trip. 11 tube stops of standing up with a daypack on my belly and a 16kg backpack on my back complete the experience.

The welcome at Luba and Richard’s was great. Little Nestor was very excited to have us over and sang us the monkey song. We hadn’t seen each other for a while, so we took the opportunity to catch up and exchange gossip over drinks. After a while I let the women to their own devices as the beer in my hand reminded me there was a World Cup football game to watch. It was the opening day and France were playing Uruguay after all! If you thought this would spontaneously bring out the French patriot in Blandine, think again: the only two in the room getting warm from watching a World Cup football game were my beer and I.

Dinner is amazing: a lovely grilled chicken with a mountain of roasted potatoes, followed by a world-class selection of cakes. Luba set us up with a taxi for the ungodly hour of 4:45AM, and urges the driver to be on time, unlike last time she use the company’s services. An ungodly hour indeed, and a self-inflicted pain, but absolutely necessary if we don’t want to miss our 7:20 AM flight. With less than 5 hours of sleep before us, we cut the evening short around midnight. Tomorrow we’ll spend 24 hours travelling all the way to La Paz, it’s going to be a gruelling long day. Blandine quickly tests the alarm on the mobile phone to make sure the volume is loud enough. Yup, it works. Exhausted, but with happy stomachs we hop in the bed and fall asleep right away.