Corinne CrawfordI finally figured out some additional details that helped with the train travel and figuring what car I was supposed to be on. I had noticed before that each platform not only had the platform letter or number, it also had signs all along the tracks with additional letters. So you might be on Platform B and there were signs from R-Z lining the platform. I noticed that at each platform there was a digital display that showed where to stand depending on the car number. So it had a diagram of the train showing the car numbers and how it corresponded with the letters. I was in car 6 and it said I needed to stand at the sign lettered R. Ohhhh, this made so much more sense because the trains literally stopped for like 2 minutes and if you were not standing right where your car was, you had very little chance of getting to the right car.
My train trip ended in Montpellier where I stayed in a very budget hotel walking distance to the airport. I needed to spend a day catching up on work before embarking on the next portion of the trip in Greece where I may not dedicate as much time to work as I had before. At least for the portion of time that Jodi and Debbie would be with me. Jodi will have to work as well so I know there will be some work time, but I wanted to make sure I had as much covered as I could to be able to enjoy my time with my regular travel buddy Jodi and my friend Debbie, who I have never traveled with before.
From the train station in Montpellier, I had to take a bus that had a stop within a few minutes walk of the hotel. It seemed simple enough from my research, Bus 620 towards the airport with my stop being the first one from the bus station. So I easily found the bus stop indicating that Bus 620 stopped there and it showed my stop on the route posted in the bus stop overhang so it seemed like I just had to wait about 15-20 minutes. Right on time, the bus with 620 displaying pulled up and I waited for others to disembark before asking the driver how much to take the route to my stop -Emma Commercial Center. The driver said his route went directly to the airport and the next one would be the bus I was looking for. Ok. I waited another 20 minutes for the next bus displaying 620. But this bus driver said the same thing. As did the next. They kept saying the next bus would be the one I wanted. So I got frustrated and looked up information for a taxi but for some reason a $4.00, 8 minute bus ride translated to an estimated $30, 20 minute taxi ride according to my research. So I thought, hmmm, I have not used Uber yet while I was here so let’s try that. It indicated that it would be $12 so I thought, aha, this is the ticket. But I had not updated my new address to my credit card with the Uber app and it was having none of it. So Uber was not an option. Just when I thought I was going to have to pay more for a taxi to take me a few miles than I did for several days of train travel, I thought I would wait for one more bus at the bus stop for bus 620 and low and behold, finally a bus that stopped at Esma Commercial Center. It was actually one of the same bus drivers that told me before that he went straight to the airport so I wondered if there was something else at play but I didn’t question anything and got on the bus with my things for the 8 minute ride. Most people were going to the airport so I was the only one that got off at my stop and one person even said something to me in French as I was exiting that I can only guess was something like… you know this isn’t the airport, right? But who knows. I realized way too late that I should have just taken the bus to the airport and walked the less than 10 minutes to the hotel instead of waiting almost two hours to take the bus that was a 4 minute walk to the hotel. Sometimes I guess I get stuck on the plan I have researched and logic goes out the window. I walked the few minutes from the stop to my hotel and found that the hotel restaurant was not serving food at that time, not until 7pm. So I walked the few more minutes to the gas station and got myself a gas station sandwich, chips and a coke. It did the trick.
