St Pancras Station

Dramas followed with cancelled credit cards, impossible connections and major disruptions.  In the end we managed to book the 9.00 a.m. EuroStar to London and flights to Dublin from there.  But wait... there's more...

We dashed to the metro to get to Gare du Nord and had been on the train or 10 minutes when all trains in Paris came to a halt due to a death on the rail track just out of Gare du Nord.  More stress.  We managed to make an Uber contact and got picked up from some random station. Another 80 Euro ride got us to Gare du Nord only an hour late through gridlocked Paris, but the rail offices were wonderful about changing our tickets at no cost because of the train stoppage.

We cued to board the later Eurostar, got through customs, only to be turned back because of an abandoned suitcase, which they had to bring the bomb squad in to dispose of.  It was starting to feel like we were in for another night on the floor of an airport/train station in Paris!

Finally boarded the Eurostar and arrived in St Pancras Station after an uneventful two and a half hour train ride.  More problems ensued with booking the connecting flight to Dublin, including a dash to Heathrow but we finally crossed all the right t's and made it to Dublin.  

It felt like a true homecoming!

This photo was taken at St Pancras - and encapsulates my entire experience of England.  Britain was never intended to feature on this holiday at all and the hour and a half we spent there (on a train platform and in the nearest Costa) was not fun!