I had a nightmare trip from Milan to Brussels once. The taxi driver from CGD to Gare du Nord contributed to the pain.
Our producer in Milan said there was no need to reserve flights to Brussels, just rock up and get tix at the desk on the day. What he forgot was that there had been ginormous conferences/exhibitions in Milan, ended the day before, everybody was going home, everything was booked out but we could fly to Brussels from Milan via Copenhagen!
This was about 10 a.m. We hired a car and set off north. Seeing a sign, ‘Geneva’ my boss said, “Kid, head for the airport. Let’s see if we can fly from here”
We could fly - but not to Brussels but Paris. Well, a lot nearer Brussels, save a lot of driving, so we gave the car back to Hertz and flew to CDG.
No flights till next day from CGD to Brussels but there was a train leaving in about an hour.
I asked the cabbie to “Go like Concorde to Gare du Nord!” But en route he pulled into a service station to gas up! “My brother in law is the manager”
We got to Gare du Nord to see the train pulling out of the station …
There was another train - the ‘mail train’ - at past midnight.
We were lumbered with a load of light cases of photo kit … “OK kid. Get rid of the gear and we spend the rest of the evening at La Coupole. You don’t get to choose, you will have choucroute.”
La Coupole was fabulous. The choucroute was wonderful. All the women looked like Catherine Deneuve.
We got to our hotel as the cleaner was mopping the front steps at about 5 a.m.