All aboard for the Med

THE last thing you need when you are trying to promote a new holiday train service is a rail strike. But that was precisely the situation Rail Europe media relations manager Peter Mills found himself in as he took a party of journalists on a weekend break to look at some of the towns and cities which will be served by the new TGV Mditerrane route.

The new line, which opens on June 10, will complete a 300 km per hour rail link from the Channel coast to the Mediterranean, a total distance of 1,075 km or 672 miles, enabling people from this country to do the journey from London Waterloo to Marseille, including a change from Eurostar to TGV at Lille, in six hours 53 minutes, a saving of 97 minutes on the present journey. The journey time from Waterloo to Avignon will be six hours 35 minutes (six hours 50 minutes at present) while the journey time for Aix en Provence will be six hours 40 minutes (eight hours 50 minutes at present).

From June 10 until July 15 there will be a special offer on Eurostar Plus fares which means that the return price from London to any of these three destinations will be £105 in standard class, and £155 in first class including a meal on Eurostar. Tickets have to be bought at least 14 days in advance and must include a Saturday night or two nights away.

I had travelled down to London on the Thursday evening, the first-class journey by GNER to King's Cross taking about two and a half hours despite speed restrictions. A taxi across London took me to the very comfortable Days Inn hotel, opposite the Imperial War Museum and a short walk away from the Waterloo International Eurostar terminal.

Our Eurostar train left on time and the itinerary for the day included a transfer at Lille to a TGV for Avignon. But as we neared Lille the train manager advised us that industrial action meant there would be no TGVs for Avignon that day. So we remained on the Eurostar until we reached Paris where we used the RER (fast underground) to transfer from Gare du Nord to Gare de Lyons in the hope we could pick up one of the few TGVs travelling from that station to Avignon.

We were unable to get on to the first TGV, but managed to squeeze into the next and soon we were speeding along at 300 km an hour. The last part of the journey between Valence and Avignon is at present on the slower standard tracks, but dinner at our hotel had to be delayed by only half-an-hour.

After one night and some local sightseeing in Avignon we went on to Aix en Provence where a carnival was in full swing. Here we spent two nights and enjoyed a walking tour of the city and a guided minibus tour of the area.

Our final day in France included a morning touring Marseille and a quick lunch down by the old harbour. Then it was off to the station to board the 13.12 TGV. With a change at Lille we were back in London before 9.00pm and I was back in York soon after midnight.

It was a great way to see a part of France I have never visited before and, despite the complications experienced on the outward journey, a rail holiday like this is always my preference. The comfort and the speed experienced in Eurostar and TGV trains is something to be enjoyed.

ALL I knew about Avignon before this trip was that there is a broken bridge there, made famous by the celebrated children's song, Sur Le Pont d'Avignon.

Of course, I soon found that the city had much more to offer. To begin with, it is a beautiful walled city set beside the River Rhone. But it also has a huge palace - the biggest Gothic palace in Europe - from which the Popes governed the Roman Catholic Church in the 14th century.

The palace also includes a Boutellerie, or wine bottle room, where visitors can take a wine-tasting break.

Admission to le Palais des Papes is 56F each, but there is an Avignon passion passport available which cuts the price to 45F, and offers similar discounts on a range of other tourist attractions in the city, including museums.

You can go on to the famous bridge, more correctly known as the St Benezet Bridge for a fee of 20F, but the Avignon passport cuts this to 16F.

Construction of the bridge started in the 12th century and parts of it were continually swept away by the raging waters of the Rhone until reconstruction was finally abandoned in the 17th century.

The hotel we stayed at was the Hotel Clarion Cloitre Saint Louis, a former monastery, which has been converted to provide some very spacious and comfortable rooms, ranging from 760F to 940F a night, and a restaurant offering some lovely meals.

AIX-EN-PROVENCE proved to be a bustling holiday centre with plenty to see in the city itself and across the region known as Provence. We were there for the carnival weekend which provided colour and music as brass bands appeared on street corners, almost as if in competition with each other.

The city is full of fountains, museums and art galleries and has a large cathedral.

There is no shortage of restaurants or hotel accommodation - we stayed at another former monastery, the delightful Hotel des Augustins, where rooms were available from 650F a night.

One of the culinary favourites here is asparagus and some of the stalls in the vegetable market were piled high with this succulent delicacy.

A guide map of Aix incorporates pictures and brief details of places to visit and also gives details of a whole series of daily excursions into Provence.

From Aix we were able to call in at the studio used by the painter, Cezanne, and visit a quarry which featured in a lot of his paintings.

We also visited the beautiful villages of Merbes and Lacoste and see some of the typical "perched" villages on the hillsides, taking in a tour of the Musee du Tire Bouchon featuring a display of more than 1,000 corkscrews dating from the 17th century and call in at the Maison de la Ceramique in Les Beaumettes where the work of 26 potters was on display.

Back in Aix dinner was served at the restaurant Chez Maxime, where Maxime himself was very much in evidence as he carved the meat and talked with customers.

MARSEILLE was not quite what I expected. For one thing the mistral was blowing so it was bitterly cold up at the ornately decorated Basillica although down by the old harbour it was so warm that we were able to have lunch in the open air.

The cathedral was close by and from here we were able to explore the old town which was surprisingly quiet and virtually free of traffic. In this part of Marseille, small businesses and craft shops were being encouraged to open up.

There were also a number of small chocolate firms operating there, including one which offered novelty chocolates containing pieces of onion and the like. Personally, I will stick to traditional chocolates.

The city is also home for a variety of museums, including a motorcycle museum, a transport museum and a marine museum.

For more information, contact Rail Europe Ltd, French Railways House, 179 Piccadilly, London, W1V OBA, tel: 08705 8448 848.