French cafe - St Jean Pied du Port

A foamy cappuccino, a buttery croissant and FREE WiFi - what more could you ask for? Today I begin my walk from St Jean Pied du Port, France over the Pyrenees. The French Canadian couple at the refugio (sleeping place for pilgrims)grimaced when they lifted my backpack. They had made a portion of the trek yesterday as a daytrip- without backpacks.

Yesterday was the EuroStar from London to Paris. Here's my writing from yesterday's Parisian experience:

Paris: Le Monde headline today: Septembre noir pour Wall Street

Last Thursday there was a huge fire in the Chunnel - the route my EuroStar train takes from London to Paris. In Paris I took the Metro from Gare Nord "North Station" where I disembarked from the EuroStar and caught a Metro to Montparnasse where I catch my connection to Bayonne, France and then a local train to Ste. Jean Pied du Port, my final rail destination in France. After spending a week with the highly efficient - if not obsessively orderly - Brits, it is quit a culture shock to arrive in Paris with the aggressive, butting in line French. The train that I was on was a combination of the 8:32 am train and the 9:40 am train. Because of a huge chemical fire in the Chunnel, there was limited service. The 8:32 train - my train was cancelled and put on the later train. However, anyone with connecting trains in Paris has to stand in a mile-long cue, to get their French tickets re-issued. I stood and stood and stood. Okay the line wasn't really a mile long, it was 1.6 km long.

My tickets have been re-issued, but I will arrive in SJPP two hours après dinner… hope the door is still open. I would email them from Paris, but no free WiFi in this central station… and where I can find a plug to charge my battery, there is no pay-for WiFi. (I could get it behind this wall at this café petite, but not at this electrical plug site. Tant pis!) I used up my battery on the EuroStar from London - no WiFi, no electric outlet on that voyage.

The train trip to York yesterday had both free WiFi and electric access, but I did not think to bring my computer. Feeling rather poorly about not thinking to bring it, and looking across the isle at Keith tapping away at his work on his computer, Harry from the British Library consoled me. "Keith brings his computer EVERYWHERE."