Читать книгу One More Croissant for the Road онлайн

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Though the bike racks may be quiet, the bus is busy, and we cram on behind a great muscular man with a shih tzu in a rucksack, who tuts every time anyone inadvertently brushes against the dog, which, thanks to the density of humanity on board, is fairly often. I stack my mysteriously weighty panniers on my foot, hold on and pray that the bus moves swiftly, which of course it doesn’t, stopping almost immediately at the row of rapacious gift shops a few hundred metres from the visitor centre, where more people attempt to squash in. It’s amazing, I think, how quickly even a regular passenger on the Northern Line can get used to the glorious space and solitude of the open road.

The shuttle doesn’t take us all the whole way to the Mont; it stops some distance from it, allowing everyone to rush over to the railings for snaps with the most famous island in France, a fortress that repelled every invasion attempt during the Hundred Years War with England. How things change; outside Paris, Mont-Saint-Michel is the most-visited site in the country.