Another day of indulgence

When I travel by sea I usually find a couple of glasses of wine and a sea-sickness tablet ensures a good night’s sleep. We certainly had the wine - in the form of champagne - but without the travel sickness tablet sleep was not forthcoming for either of us. We had the odd doze between 12 and 6.

It was a tight squeeze to get washed and dressed so that the attendant could then come in to get the top bunk put away and the cabin put right for daytime habitation. Then he brought us breakfast which I must say was disappointing - I did not expect cornflakes and tinned fruit salad! There was also a croissant each. Certainly the food seemed better on the British Pullman yesterday.

By now we were in Switzerland so we watched the mountains and lakes go by till it was time for lunch. This time we chose to eat in the Oriental
Restaurant car. It was very golden! The starter was a poached egg with a variety of mushrooms, watercress sauce and a sweet appley crumble topping. The white of my egg wasn’t cooked. This time we asked to have a few veg with our main
I had sole on a bed of leeks and some green beans, fennel and a carrot. Jenny had Guinea fowl and gnocchi. The pudding was a concoction of apple sauce and a creamy custard topped with a sweet crumb. All washed down with more champagne. We could get accustomed to this!

Belmont, who own the trains, really looked after us. Our cases went ahead to the hotel and a young woman cabin attendant took us to the water taxi with another couple of people. She even took us in to the hotel Metropole and got us signed in etc. (you can tell I’ve never been on a package holiday - I expect that’s all standard).

The hotel is very plush but it was dark when we got here so we’re just going to bed as we certainly don’t need any food!

This is a collage of the lunch and the Oriental restaurant.