Archive for De Gaulle airport

Rome’ing around (& around &…)

Posted in Books, pictures, Statistics, Travel with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 5, 2024 by xi'an

My trip back to Paris from the 4th Italian Meeting in Probability and Mathematical Statistics was somewhat horrendous, with a much delayed Transavia flight, due to technical issues in Orly that set us back more than two hours. That I could have spent at the conference or strolling through Rome…

Instead, I waited at Fiumicino, indulging into a cannolo (dinner) that was reasonable for airport standards. Then, as the repaired Boeing plane had just left the gate in Fiumicino, the staff informed us a passenger has had a vasovagal syncope and needed be evacuated, which proved relatively efficient, but nonetheless setting us back another two hours and cheery on the cake!, forcing the plane into rerouting to De Gaulle airport as Orly airport closes earlier at night for being in a denser urban area (and much closer to home as well).


When we arrived after midnight, there was of course no train home running and as usual very few taxis or Ubers around. I eventually got into one that had trouble managing the overnight road closures that plague Paris prior to the Olympics and ended up reaching home by 2am…. Resulting in an overall trip duration of 11 hours, longer than flying to Seattle or Réunion Island!

While this long trip allowed to finish in one go The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik, and hence the Scholomance trilogy, which was definitely below par when compared with the previous novels, maybe because it was taking place out of the boarding school, and hence barely sufficiently engrossing to cut the airport noise and visual pollution at bay (but with the side effet of me believing I had lost my wallet for a few minutes), I was still tired enough the following day to fail to finish a local evening 10k, dropping out after 5k (and 19’26”, which was a great time but impossible to sustain for another 5k…) The Athletics Championships were definitely and already far away!

travel woes

Posted in Travel, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 29, 2024 by xi'an

On my last trip to Warwick, the local (RER) train I boarded broke on its way to the CDG airport, after hitting something in a tunnel just three stops short of the airport, with so much delay and misleading communication that I missed my flight. While a minor issue for me, since I managed to work (and blog) in an airport lounge for most of the day—where I crossed path with Numerobis—, while waiting for the only flight to B’ham, this made me to reflect anew on the very poor state of the transportation network in Paris and its suburbs, with such incidents (power failures, broken rails, vetust engines, stolen cables, idiots on the tracks, &tc., even without mentioning the strikes) more and more the norm. And to wonder at how the ancient and bursting network is going to cope with the incoming flow of visitors attending the Olympics this summer… Actually, when compared with the other cities with a fairly reasonably efficient airport connection I experienced, it remains a mystery to me why the Greater Paris conurbation—whose president, Valérie Pécresse, was apparently deemed the main culprit for our train break by an incensed fellow passenger that morning!—has kept for years postponing the construction of a dedicated rail line between the airport and central Paris, as the unpredictable and uncomfortable suburban train is not delivering the intended message to Paris visitors and their still-growing contribution to the French GNP. But with the growing public opposition to any new infrastructure, incl. trains, this is unlikely to happen!

travel madness⁺⁺⁺

Posted in Travel with tags , , , , , , , , on July 4, 2022 by xi'an

day zero at ISBA 22

Posted in Kids, pictures, Statistics, Travel, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 28, 2022 by xi'an

Very smooth trip to Montréal, esp. when considering the global trend of travel disruptions. Nothing lost (except for a tea thermos filter), nothing broken or stolen from my bag, no delay, no queue at De Gaulle for once. I even got a front & window seat in the plane, with a quiet neighbour who slept most of the time (and kept her mask, thanks!), no disruption from other screens, and a six hour run for processing as many Biometrika submissions, with an almost instantaneous reply from one AE (or AE⁺⁺⁺!), solving a riddle from the Riddler, and booking a few things in Montréal like the local Vélib (biXi!!!) and a slot at the only pool that opens at 6:30 (thanks Amy and David!). Funny that the flight attendants came and checked everything was fine because I declined food and beverage for the entire flight (my habit nowadays).

And, despite a very hot day in Montréal, equally smooth access to my Airbnb, incl. the episode with a good Samaritan calling after a passenger in the [747] airport bus leaving without his bag! Enjoying kimchi dimsums at Harbin Dumplings while waiting (with no xiaolongbao on the menu!). And sampling later my first Montréal bagel of the trip (which was only OK!), while being surprised at the high cost of food in the dépanneur where I bought them.

me no savi [travel madness]

Posted in Statistics with tags , , , , , , , , on June 1, 2022 by xi'an

Today, I left home in the wee hours, after watering my tomatoes!, quite excited to join the Safe, Anytime-Valid Inference (SAVI) workshop in Eindhoven, which was taking place after two years of postponement. I alas did not check the state of the train traffic beforehand and when I reached the train station I found that part of the line to De Gaulle airport was closed, due to some control cables being stolen last night. Things quickly deteriorated as the train management in Gare du Nord was pretty inefficient, meaning that the trains would stop for five minutes at each station, and that there was no rail alternative to reach Roissy. The taxi stand was a complete mess, with no queue whatsoever, and the Parisian taxis kept true to their reputation, by refusing to take people to the airport, asking for outrageous prices (60 euros per passenger), and stopping anywhere. I almost managed to get one but he refused to take me on top of the Swede family I had directed to this stand from the RER train, and this was simply my last opportunity. Über taxis were invisible and I soon realised I could not catch my flight. Later flights were outrageously expensive and there was not train seat whatsoever till the day after, so I gave up and returned home from this trip to nowhere…