I may have mentioned in previous posts that I'm quite a big fan of trains. Whatever the reason for this (blame Dublin Bus), I've been looking for an excuse to take the TGV for a while. Paris to Geneva is a decent stretch of the legs, so why not.

The name must surely be a joke: "Big Fast Train". But accurate! It's double decker, goes at 300km/h and is about six miles long. The specs are impressive...train nerd heaven!

We pull out of the Gare du Lyon (served by the very swanky, driverless, suicide-proof No. 14 metro line - deserving of a blog entry by itself) at 10.30.

By 11 we're more or less fully accelerated and it stays that way for another hour when we make our first stop.

Still in France, we take off again but never regain top speed; soon we're winding through mountain country and it's not long until we're into Switzerland. The Paris-Geneva line is scheduled for an upgrade to TGV standard but not for some years to come.

Full speed was fun (for one thing, I've never heard an electric engine make so much noise) and now it seems unbearably slow even though we're surely still doing at least 70 miles an hour. Irish speeds!

Or not...for some unknown reason we arrive in Geneva about 20 minutes late. Swiss Rail or French Rail...? Not impressed!