Sunday September 13th
We are off on holiday today, heading by train towards Vienna, followed by Budapest, Prague and Berlin. There will be no photos today though, for reasons I shall shortly explain.
We started off well, our taxi to the station being punctual and getting us to Oxted station in good time for our train. The problems began just outside East Croydon, where there was obviously some sort of delay because the train sat outside the station for ages and it looked as if we would miss our connection to St Pancras. However, I didn't worry too much as I had expected that might happen, so I had made sure we were early enough to wait for the next one and still be in good time at St Pancras for the Eurostar.
When we finally arrived in East Croydon station, there was already a Thameslink train waiting on a nearby platform so we ran along our platform, up the long ramp and then down the other side so that we could catch it. As we approached the destination boards, it became obvious it would be a very good idea to catch it, because it was an earlier train which was being delayed as later ones had been cancelled.
We managed to jump on just before it left, throwing our luggage in just as the guard was blowing her whistle, and saw that it was really very crowded. I made my way right down the carriage to an empty seat, when the train started going out the wrong way! A woman sitting opposite saw my consternation and reassured me that the train was just moving to a different line. As I was talking to her, I started sitting down while turning to continue the conversation, and the train jerked and my knee twisted in a most painful way, making the most appalling cracking noise.
After I had managed to finish yelling, two people who said they were doctors came to help me, but my trousers were too tight round the ankle to roll up to my knee so nobody could look at it closely. The consensus of opinion seemed to be that it was probably ligament damage, and my knee needed to be rested and iced - a bit difficult given my circumstances.
By the time we reached St Pancras, my knee was swollen and very painful. I sat down to have a cup of coffee while Paul searched the station for a branch of Boots where he might buy me some sort of knee bandage. He was eventually successful, and I now have a huge elastic knee brace, without which I think I would find it almost impossible to walk.
Thus today's journey has not been easy. St Pancras is quite a big station, but both Brussels and Cologne would appear to be bigger, so I feel as if I have limped miles. Fortunately, there have been lifts everywhere so I haven't had to struggle up and down stairs with baggage. Paul has had to do the heaving of luggage on and off trains - we caught the Eurostar to Brussels, spent an hour and a half in Brussels station, then caught a second train to Cologne, so there has been quite a bit of baggage heaving. We are staying tonight in the same hotel where we stayed when we went on last year's Swiss holiday, which is conveniently just opposite Cologne railway station. It's a fine clear night so I'd like to be able to go and get a better photo of Cologne Cathedral, but I'm afraid my knee is too painful to walk even that short distance.
I would also like to have taken some photographs travelling through Kent or through Belgium (not France though, it poured with rain in France) but I'm afraid I have not been capable of getting out of my seat. I hope things improve a bit tomorrow, as we have a long train journey from Cologne to Vienna.
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