A couple of days in the small Belgian village of Bornem, where one of my colleagues lives. Not much to do there, but the journey did give me the first chance to have a look at the new St Pancras Eurostar terminal, albeit at an outrageously early hour in the morning. Much of it seems not to be properly open yet, the business lounge for example has walls that are in fact black curtains. The St Pancras departure lounge has nice brown wooden floors, and apart from that, I was too tired to remember anything about it. When you go up the ramp to get onto the train, though, the inside of the station is an incredible sight - I'm looking forward to seeing that magnificent roof a few more times.The journey went a bit downhill from there really, as the train got stuck behind a broken down freight train inside the Channel Tunnel - and stayed stuck behind it for just over 2 hours. Not good, especially when I had got up at 5am to get an early train, so that I could get a full day's work. We eventually rolled into Brussels 2 and a quarter hours late - most annoying, but just one of those things.
After a couple of days where I didn't leave the hotel I was sleeping, eating and working in, the journey back was altogether better - an hour and fifty five minutes is pretty impressive to get back from Brussels, and the high speed line in the UK is just that - the train absolutely hammered along, through endless tunnels, until we glided back into St Pancras. Definitely the way to travel now, if you manage to avoid the perils of the broken down freight train.
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