Euro 2016 - Bordeauxing On The Ridiculous, or The Dark Nightbus Of The Soul

Part 1: Travel Sickness, Part One or "when everything that can go wrong on a connecting flight does go wrong"
Part 2: Travel Sickness, Part Two or "when one train vanishes, another one turns into a bus" 

After a day or two in La Rochelle, I knew that something was different to the last tournament in Poland, and I couldn't put my finger on it. I knew before I arrived there would be less Irish than in Poznan, and more people from other countries, so that wasn't it. I knew the town was a small seaside town, and you could walk anywhere you needed to go, so the minimal number of taxis, indeed vehicles of any kind, on the road was likewise expected, and to be honest I welcomed the absence of perpetual drone of engines on the main streets.

Watching the England - Wales game with two friends in a restaurant it finally dawned on me, the French hadn't embraced the tournament in the same way the Polish had. The restaurant we were watching the game in had the game on a big screen. Which was muted. There was only one waiter in the restaurant taking orders and delivering food to tables, which I imagined was the norm for the place. I thought it strange that no extra staff were on duty to handle the extra visitors the tournament had brought to the town. Walking around the town and I saw the same scene repeated throughout - normal service continuing. Only 50% of the bars and restaurants were showing games, and about 50% of them were showing the game with the commentary muted! None of the establishments had seemed to have taken on extra staff, an the staff that were working were taking orders one at a time, filling the orders and returning for payment. To make matters worse, some of them were closing at 2pm for the afternoon! I wondered what the same situation would be like at home if we were granted an major international tournament. All bars and restaurants would have big screens, and would go to pains to advertise the live games shown within. Extra staff would be taken on to handle the increase in trade, and they would be experienced (or at the very least trained) to handle the same increase.

And so to play Belgium in Bordeaux on Saturday. Flying out from Ireland, I had no ticket, but a friend had a line on one and texted me the day before the game to confirm that the ticket was secured, but I would have to collect it in Bordeaux city centre on the day of the game with two others he'd managed to source tickets for. The Ireland fans group You Boys In Green (YBIG) had organised a fleet of coaches from La Rochelle on the day of the game to take the Irish population staying in the town to Bordeaux and back. Which meant more travelling. But nothing could go wrong this time, right? Right?

The coaches were scheduled to leave La Rochelle at 8:30, so I arrived at the car park near the town's aquarium at 8:15 with some other fans already there and no coaches. They did soon arrive, but the organiser wasn't happy. They should have been there at least a half hour earlier, and they were misnumbered. I don't know why this was a problem, but they needed to be renumbered which took longer than expected and we left at nine. I was on coach 10, or coach two if you like. The journey to Bordeaux was uneventful, and we arrived at the stadium shortly before midday. The stadium itself was new and reminded me of the office toy of a board with pins in it, so if you push something through on one side, the imprint of it is on the other side. The stadium is like someone had pushed a cone through that toy, and let some pins fall through.

The first problem of the day hit - the tickets were in the city centre, and I was at the stadium. The other two that were also collecting tickets were also at the stadium, and needed me because I had the address on my phone, whereas the phone they had stored the address on had died overnight, and when I asked why they didn't store it on the other phone, I was told "that's just thinking ahead". Whatever. There's a tram stop at the stadium that takes you into Bordeaux city centre in about twenty minutes. We had been told that the tickets were only available until 1pm and this was midday. At 12:20 we were outside the fanzone and started asking volunteers where the address was. However, none of them knew it. I had resolved not to use my data connection while roaming unless it was an emergency. And this was one. So, data enabled, google maps engaged and the address is about 20 minutes away. And it's 12:40. The clock is ticking. We collected their car that they had left near the fanzone and, guided by Google Maps, we embarked on one manic Italian Job-esque drive through Bordeaux's back streets that included several double backs and missed turn offs, as well as some choice four letter words on my part. We arrived at the collection point at 1:05. Fortunately the lady holding the tickets had sympathy for us and was happy to supply the tickets, despite being late.

With the tickets secured, we headed back to the stadium. At the stadium, we found something strange waiting for us. The coach that brought me to Bordeaux had parked in the coach parking area on the far side of a large car park, which unbeknownst to us was being kept empty. To estimate the size of the car park, it took me a little under 15 minutes to walk from the coach to the stadium. The traffic police directed us into the industrial estate around the stadium, and we parked on a grass verge, along with everyone else. Why was the car park being kept empty?

With tickets at a premium, there were several fans outside the stadium with "need a ticket, please help" signs. Were it not for my friend, and his friend, I would have been among their number.

Before the tournament, I had ordered a custom flag from Flagman Ireland of a tricolour bearing an image of Shane Long with the commentary of his goal against Germany from Marco Hagemann - "Shane Long...BAH!". The flag conformed to UEFA's standards - size, fireproof, etc. Unfortunately this was not acceptable to the security volunteer at the stadium. Despite my protests, the protests of the other fans in the queue, and the fact that I had the same flag in the Stade de France I wasn't permitted to bring it in. So I had to dump my flag in a bin. Another strike against France, and EURO 2016. The tickets were good, great in fact, and I was sitting next to Damien Duff! But I still missed my flag. It was mine, and it was taken from me. I've never liked losing anything, and having this taken from me, without my control was gnawing at him.

You know what happened in the game. Let's skip to after that. I knew it was hopeless, but I started opening some random bins around the stadium in case I might come across my flag again, but found only had bottles and cans. I came across some other Irish fans who had the same problem, and some Belgium fans who were in the same situation as us and were happy to translate with the volunteers, who couldn't help us anyway.

During the next 15 minutes I spent crossing the empty car park again, my thoughts turned to the group games in Poland. Three games, three losses. In France, two games, one draw, one loss. Was I doomed to never experience an Irish tournament win? I was in Bordeaux, which has an airport with flights to Ireland. Should I look for flights back and save myself the pain of the final game against Italy?

Arriving back to the coach, the next travel disaster was waiting for me. The driver's union had mandated that the drivers have nine hours rest between journeys. We had arrived at midday, and the game had ended at 5:50. By the time I'd gotten back to the coach, it was about 6:30. I was looking at more than two hours in an empty car park, along with the other Ireland fans who had filled the ten coaches. Only one was permitted to leave early, so we agreed to let the women and children head back first. With nothing else to do, and two hours to kill, I walked back across the car park to a McDonald's to get something bad for me to eat.

When the coach finally left, a fan from Derry was sitting beside me, and his friends behind us. While that in itself was no problem, the lad sitting behind me was leaning over the seat to talk to his friend, and kept hitting my head with his elbow. I told him to watch his elbows at least twice, before I finally lost my cool, and grabbed his arm and told him in no uncertain terms what would happen the next time he clipped the back of my head. That was an overreaction, and I apologised.

I crossed that car park four times that day. I spent approximately an hour walking across a car park. No wonder I was thinking about leaving.

Euro 2016 - Travel Sickness, Part Two or "when one train vanishes, another one turns into a bus"

Part One here: When everything that can go wrong on a connecting flight does go wrong

Apart from the game itself, the day of the Ireland-Sweden match was largely uneventful. I made my way to the Eiffel Tower to see the fanzone to find the tower itself only open to tourists, and that the fanzone was on the far side of the tower. With time a premium, I got something to eat at a nearby café, and spoke with some American tourists who weren't really sure what was going on, before meeting some friends and taking the metro to the game. On the metro itself, some light conversation with an Irish man and his Swedish wife resulted in them selling their spare ticket to one of our party who was traveling to the game without a ticket. Irish ladies international Stephanie Roche was two rows down from me at the game, and I got a photo with her after the final whistle, which gave me the strange experience of telling someone I'd never met before that she follows me on twitter!

A day later, and having endured Hercules' first labour in getting to Paris, I figured that the second leg of my journey, a train from Paris' Montparnasse station to la Rochelle (a small seaside town about a 90 minutes drive north of Bordeaux) would be uneventful. But not so.

I arrived about two hours early to the station, both to find the correct platform and to get something to eat. The SNCF had emailed me to let me know that, despite the ongoing strike action my booking was safe, and the train was scheduled to leave on time, which I confirmed on the departures board. The station's relative quiet was periodically broken by striking workers in hi-vis vests with a megaphone to let everyone in the station know their grievances. I got a seat in one of the station's cafés and ordered a sandwich. I got talking to two Irish fans at the table beside me, and sold one of them my spare ticket for the Italy game. A friend of his was due to arrive in France later that week and had no ticket, so after a quick phone call to confirm his interest, I sold him the extra.

With 20 minutes to leave, I wandered over to the platform where the train was still scheduled to leave, and browsed on the free wi-fi until another Ireland fan in the station tapped me on the shoulder, and asked if I was also getting this train to Bordeaux, because it had been taken off the board!

After checking the board to find that, yes, it had been removed, I went to the information desk and found with my broken French that I could take the next train to Bordeaux about an hour later, and get a connecting train at Nior, instead of Angoulême as in my original plans, with the same ticket. Ok, not the worst change of plans I'd had to endure, even at this early stage of my trip, but another inconvenience.

One thing that struck me as odd was that the lady at the information desk was reading this off a printout, not on the screen on the computer at her desk. Working in the realm of realtime information has made me suspicious of printouts for a variety of reasons. How old was the printout? How did she know if it was still valid? Why was France's much-vaunted TGV still reliant on paper?

But the train left on time, with me on it, and I settled into watching one of the films I had added to my tablet before leaving. We arrived in Nior two hours later and followed the signs for the connection to la Rochelle to find it wasn't a train, but two coaches! I got on the first coach, which filled quickly, as did the second, and noticed that several Irish fans had been left standing outside the station. While I was thankful I was not among their number, I did wonder how they would continue on their journey.

The coach wound its way through the French countryside until we arrived at the train station in la Rochelle about an hour later. We were all a little surprised that there were no taxis at the station, but soon they arrived in ones and twos to take the weary travellers to their various destinations. I would learn that my hotel was actually about a 10-15 minute walk away, but after three days of traveling, broken by the self-inflicted stress of an Ireland game, I was happy to get a taxi.

The hotel itself was centrally located, and its owner cheerful with perfect English, so after leaving my luggage in the room, I left for a walk around the city centre (what I would learn is the "old" part of the town) to get something to eat and have a quiet drink.

After another day's travel disrupted by forces outside my control, surely now my issues were at an end? Not at all.

To be continued...

Euro 2016 - Travel Sickness, Part One or "when everything that can go wrong on a connecting flight does go wrong"

I'm not long back from my second UEFA European Championships in France, and while there were some fantastic moments, the overall experience has left me feeling wanting as right from the very beginning, my travel plans were disrupted.

I arrived in Dublin airport on Saturday, 11th June in plenty of time for my flight to London's Heathrow, where a connecting flight would bring me back to Paris for the first time since 2009. However, the plane itself couldn't match my punctuality. A rare June afternoon fog meant the aircraft didn't leave until two hours after the scheduled time. These things happen to flights, and it meant I could watch the first test between Ireland and South Africa on the iPad of a player from the Dublin Rebels American Football team, who was sitting beside me. While we were still in the air, the pilot had told us that Heathrow was aware of the delay, and that the connecting flight would be held for us. However this was not the case as the gate was closed in front of us, despite a desk being opened for the Paris passengers. The plane itself was still in Heathrow, was still on the tarmac, and indeed had not complete boarding. The unfortunate official at the gate had to contend with about 20 stranded Ireland fans, with no idea who to speak to. To compound the issue, the flight had been booked with British Airways, but the flight itself was handled by Aer Lingus, so the BA official in front of us didn't have any information. The group decided to stay together, and try to get some answers.

Two hours later, after some false starts, and missteps, we found ourselves at the Aer Lingus desk dealing with a manager who didn't want to know about us, and had no inclination to help us either. Fortunately, one of our group was a manager in Dublin Airport, and was duly delegated to speak on our behalf, knowing full well the right questions to ask and exactly what the airline were bound by law to provide for us. An initial solution to take us by bus to Birmingham for a flight, with the possibility of a return to Heathrow should that fail placated the mob, but while we waited for said bus we were called back to the desk to find that the national airline had agreed to put us up in the hotel in Heathrow and supply us with room service if we would return when the desk opened at 5am the next morning. So, as the clocks approached midnight, we decamped to the hotel for the briefest of stays.

At five bells the next morning we reconvened in the lobby to return to the desk. I was at the head of the queue when the lady at the desk asked for a passport, to allow her to access the system. We were told that we would be dealt with in ones, and twos, so when she found a single seat on a 1:30 BA flight, I told her to book it for me. At 9am, there was little point in doing anything other than getting some breakfast back in the hotel, where we met some more travelers from our delayed flight, three girls on the trip of a lifetime to Bali. Which they missed. While we were facing a minor delay in our trip, they were facing rebooking flights to Indonesia, and being out of pocket for the longest part of their journey. Following breakfast, I returned to the departure lounge to wait for my gate to open, so I could check in and continue on to the city of lights.

One uncomfortable hour long snooze later, I woke to find that while the gate had opened, and I could check in, the flight itself had been delayed by a half hour. Considering what I had gone though, I could handle another delay, and I was pleased to see that the same Dublin airport manager that had argued so successfully on our behalf had also been placed on the same flight. Two more of the original group joined us in the boarding queue. They had been originally booked on to a later afternoon flight, but when checking in found that one had been booked under another name, and to compound the mistake the booking was in a woman's name, and the other had been booked on a flight that had left 24 hours earlier! Luckily two more seats on the same BA flight had gone unclaimed, so they had been added to the flight roster. When we were finally in the air, I noticed that, despite our group's need for seats, there were still three empty seats at the back of the plane.

The flight itself was uneventful, other than the delay, and I finally arrived in Paris 26 hours after arriving in Dublin Airport. I estimate that, assuming no delays, I could easily have made it to New Zealand in the same timeframe.

The three empty seats on the flight were made all the more galling when, at the Sweden game in the Stade de France on Monday evening, I found myself in the same row as two of the same group. They had been booked on to a late evening flight from Heathrow, but when arriving to check in, found no record of their booking, resulting in a chase across London to St Pancras station to purchase two Eurostar tickets to Paris at a cost of STG£180, and at their own expense, although there was an agreement in place with the airline to compensate them for the cost in due course.

So, with the start of my journey ended, I had assumed that I had paid my dues up front, and the karma banked with the universe would mean the rest of my travel plans would proceed as planned. Not so.

Part two is here: "when one train vanishes, another turns into a bus".