Day 2. Travelling through France.

Arrived to Hendaye (France) at 7h30am. The idea was to take the 7h56 TGV train to Paris. Unfortunately there were no more places on that particular TGV and had to book a place in the 10h23 TGV instead. 3h wait but 1/2 asleep / 1/2 awake ...

While there, the police was very active asking for ID cards. Since I decided not to stay on the train waiting room they only came to me once. But I saw then going more then 5 times to that room and everyone had to wake up :) and show their IDs several times. Can you take a rest like this? :)

Finally I got the train and met Manuela. A 48yo nice lady from Oporto. She had a degree in history and was a teacher while younger. She had lived in Germany working as a patent translator from German to Portuguese. At the moment she has 2 children (21? and 16 yo) and owns a small decoration company. The most interesting was that she was doing an interrail, too :). Her younger son is in the Portuguese national team of under 17 European championships Rink-Hockey (Portugal is very good on this) and the under 17 European Championship is happening in Nantes. Manuela was going to travel to Paris and then to Nantes to see the games of her son. When the championship ends and her son returns home by plane she intents to continue travelling alone through Europe. This was not her first Interrail neither her first one alone :) She was an experimented interrailer he he. But this was the first interrail done after her 26 years old. Well, I can say I made a friend. During the 7h trip we talked about almost everything, from history, geography, politics, research, languages, companies (she was reading the Portuguese Exame magazine - an economy publication that I subscribed for more then 2 years once). Thanks Manuela. I was really lucky to meet you. I hope we do not lose contact. If you ever come to Lisbon please say Hello :) I'll do the same if I go to Oporto.

oh, almost forgot ... at about 100Km from Paris the TGV hit something on the track and we had to stop. Hitting something at 300km/h can be dangerous. We stayed put for about 40 minutes waiting from them to change the train flat tire :P lol or the equivalent in trains he he