Nickodell
Donation Time
Finally, the Eurostar high-speed line is up and running to schedule. Now it takes just 30 minutes from London to the tunnel entrance in Kent, once a slow trip on rails laid down in the mid-19th Century, but now on the new route, the same ruler-straight high-speed tracks as on the French side. London St. Pancras to Paris Gare du Nord takes just 2h 15m. The Eurostar trains have now taken 70% of the airline business between the capitals. Best of all, if you book well in advance, at an off-peak time, you can get a return ticket for $110!
If you've never travelled at 180mph on land, it's an experience not to be missed. Traditional railways were laid out in snaking paths to keep as level as possible, and when it was impossible to avoid a valley or hill you were forced to build a viaduct across the first and tunnel under the second. With the massive redundant power of today's electric traction, they don't bother with all that stuff; they just gallop up and down the hills.
A friend of my sister's was smart, and eight years ago bought a farm near the exit point of the tunnel in Calais, France. Now she commutes to her job in London in less than an hour. An apartment in central London would cost more than her farm did. You can't get the same deal now, as many well-paid London businessmen have done the same, pushing the price of the property in the same area of France by 10X or more. (To the chagrin of the local people, who can't afford to buy in their own villages).
If you've never travelled at 180mph on land, it's an experience not to be missed. Traditional railways were laid out in snaking paths to keep as level as possible, and when it was impossible to avoid a valley or hill you were forced to build a viaduct across the first and tunnel under the second. With the massive redundant power of today's electric traction, they don't bother with all that stuff; they just gallop up and down the hills.
A friend of my sister's was smart, and eight years ago bought a farm near the exit point of the tunnel in Calais, France. Now she commutes to her job in London in less than an hour. An apartment in central London would cost more than her farm did. You can't get the same deal now, as many well-paid London businessmen have done the same, pushing the price of the property in the same area of France by 10X or more. (To the chagrin of the local people, who can't afford to buy in their own villages).