Travelling Hopefully

I've never been through passport control at a railway station before.  The experience was slightly surreal a feeling only heightened by the frequent announcements over the public address system that property theft was a priority crime for the British Transport Police.  "Oi constable, stop investigating that murder, some woman on platform 4 has had her handbag snatched."  They seem to be taking it pretty seriously though, the police I saw were wearing flak jackets and carrying automatic weapons.  Possibly Britain has some hard core bagsnatchers.

My Eurostar train was rather shabby looking on the outside (although its possible that "dirt" was simply their livery colour) but was very comfortable within.  After a brief trip through (and frequently under) the English countryside there was a period of darkness and then I was in France.  For the record France looks very like England only more French.  Shortly after entering France I entered Belgium.  Belgium seemed much like France only more, well you know.

Brussels was only an opportunity to get my Eurail pass validated, a process that took approximately ten seconds once I had spent twenty minutes looking for the ticketing office.  Like many major railway stations (and all airports) Brussels Midi is essentially a shopping mall and seems a little embarrassed that anything as plebeian as a train should actually be mentioned.  With my pass validated I hopped on a train to Luxembourg.

Luxembourg greeted me with a massive downpour, fortunately my hotel was just down the road.  A road that seemed to get narrower and more ill maintained with every step.  Finally I found my hotel (just past the strip club and across the road from the all night kebab shop) which turned out to be simple but perfectly comfortable.

The old town of Luxembourg is beautifully preserved and maintained a situation which is certainly helped by the fact that almost nobody lives there.  It has the Chamber of Deputies, various government departments and a dinky little palacette which is the official residence of the Grand Duke (the Grand Duke doesn't actually live there, its just his office when he's in town, which he wasn't).  The front of the "palace" is guarded by about half the Luxembourg army.  I took a photo of him as he marched up and down.

Luxembourg used to be a fortress with such massive and awe inspiring defences that one noted military commander called it "the Gibraltar of the North".  Another point of connection with Gibraltar is the fact that Luxembourg used to be ruled by Spain but isn't any more.  Luxembourg's fortifications were demolished in the 1870s as a result of the Treaty of London which required their destruction in return for the major powers guaranteeing Luxembourg's neutrality.  Two world wars later Luxembourg decided neutrality wasn't really helping them much and they joined NATO and raised an army (albeit quite a small one).  They have also started to rebuild some of the fortifications particularly the ones (as my tour guide informed us only half jokingly) that face towards Germany.

One thing it is quite difficult to see in Luxembourg is any Luxembourgers.  The entire country only has a population of half a million and 40% of them are foreigners.  Your chances of seeing an actual Luxembourger are probably only slightly greater than your chances of seeing a Monegasque in Monaco.  My tour guide was a Luxembourger so I can say I've seen at least one.  Incidentally the national motto of Luxembourg is "We wish to remain as we are" which is quite laudable but in my view implies a level of uncertainty as to whether others will in fact permit this.