Britain is an island: from London stations until recently you could catch trains only to other parts of the island. But from Paris you can catch trains to places thousands of miles away. Most English people arrive at the GARE DU NORD. From there you can go to the Channel Ports, Holland, North Germany and Scandinavia. Down the street is the GARE DE L’EST; Trains to Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Athens, Istanbul, warsaw, Moscow, Vladivostok and Peking.

From GARE DE LYON you can go to Switzerland, Italy - on the Orient Enpress if you like - or to the South of France on the TGV, the world’s fastest train. From GARE D’AUSTERLITZ trains go to Spain and Portugal; from GARE SAINT-LAZARE to Normandy, Brittany and the rest of France. 

There are many other SNCF stations in Paris, serving the towns and villages of the Paris Region. These are gradually becoming part of the R.E.R, a brand new suburban commuter service, with more lines being built all the time. At the moment there are three lines, with four or five more due to open soon . The two main North-South and East-West lines meet at CHATELET LES HALLES, a hundred feet under the centre of Paris -ultra-modern, streamlined, no-expense-spared, all stainless steel and bronze. Trains come about every 5-10 minutes on each line: the busier the time of day the longer the train. 

The METRO is older, but here too new lines are being built, and every station is being modernised. In the whole of Paris, you are never more than 500 metres from a metro station. The fares are ridiculously cheap, as the price is the same wherever you go. Tickets can be bought singly or in CARNETS. A Carnet is a set of ten tickets, costing the same as six bought singly. Once you have your ticket you need to know in which DIRECTION you’re going. There are maps everywhere, on which you find the name of the station at the end of the line. If you are in the centre of town and want to get to GARE DU NORD, you follow the signs reading DIRECTION PORTE DE CLIGNANCOURT, because you want to go towards Porte de Clignancourt and get off at Gare du Nord. Following the signs, you’ll come to an automatic barrier. Put your ticket in the slot, it’ll let you through and hand your ticket back at the other Side. Hang onto your ticket; there are heavy fines for travelling without. When you reach the platform, no problem. The next train is going your way: it’ll come from the left: there’ll be a train every two minutes at rush-hour, and you ’ll never have to wait longer than ten minutes.

When you get off, follow signs again: CORRESPONDANCES if you want to change trains, SORTIE if you want to go out. You can ride around all day on one ticket, but once out of the SORTIE you can’t get back without another. 

A Metro ticket entitles you to travel anywhere in Paris by Metro, RER or Bus. Long Bus journeys, however, cost two or three ticket. Buses are as frequent as trains -every two minutes at busy times; there’s a machine to check your ticket inside the Bus. The system is cheap because it’s simple and everybody uses it, though it is subsidised as well. Every year the RATP carries as many passengers as there are people in the world. Basically, however, The Metro is cheap because everybody uses it; and everybody uses it because it’s cheap.