"Let's start at the very beginning. It's a very good place to start."

The 20th September.  D-day had finally arrived.  After months of living in denial and a fleeting couple of weeks when I finally accepted my fate and began organising, here I was - Gillingham train station.  Perhaps not the most glamorous of starts to a journey to the South of France, but nonetheless, I was there at 09:18 with a jar of marmite, 80 Twinings tea bags, two stolen Boursin sandwiches (much to Mummy Hunt's disdain) and an eleven hour journey ahead of me:

Departing Gillingham (Dorset) at 09:18 - Arriving London Waterloo at 11:19

Departing London St Pancras at 12:28 - Arriving Paris Nord at 15:50

Departing Paris Gare de Lyon at 17:20 - Arriving Montpellier at 20:45

Th first part of the journey I did with my Mum.  With a rucksack half the size of me and a suitcase that is quite frankly twice the size of me, I didn't fancy taking my chances with the London Underground by myself.  We had just over an hour to get from Waterloo to St Pancras, but what they fail to tell you when you book online is that they actually want you to check in for the Eurostar half an hour before it departs.  I arrived at the Eurostar terminal to find that boarding for my train was closing... PANIC!! The signs were of course lying and people were getting on the train even after me with seemingly no hassle.  So, the very fleeting goodbye that I was forced to say to Mummy Hunt didn't actually have to be quite so fleeting.  Then again, it was probably a blessing in disguise - Standing at the barriers at St Pancras saying goodbye to your Mum for 3 months as you toddle off to a foreign country with no where to live, all of your worldly possessions crammed into two bags, and nothing but €100 in your back pocket isn't exactly easy.

Next stop: Paris.  Now, although I had opted for assistance across London, I had little choice but to go it alone in Paris.  It turns out that the Parisians are actually quite helpful when they see a 5'7" English girl quite clearly out of her depth, struggling with two bags.  Either that, or they're quite helpful when said girl and her bags are blocking their way and they're in a hurry to get somewhere.  With hindsight, it was probably the latter, but at the time, it was nice to have so many people showing a little bit of kindness/pity.  After a small mishap with a lift (I definitely stopped at all floors in Paris Nord station), and an argument with an underground barrier (me and my luggage definitely won that one), I arrived at Gare de Lyon and boarded the train for Montpellier...

One issue of Cosmopolitan read cover to cover, one issue of More! read cover to cover (yes, I'm quite the academic), and a short nap later, I arrived in Montpellier.  It was dark.  I was ushered into a taxi by a seemingly nice cab driver, who regretted ushering me over the moment he saw the size of my bags!  We drove through the city and all I remember being able to make out in the dark were palm trees.  He was driving in a left had drive vehicle on the right hand side of the road, through a city I had never been to, passing signs that were all in French.  We could have been going anywhere.  We weren't going anywhere though, we were going to the Centre Millénaire Hôtel Etap, for €50 a night with free Wifi.

Finally, I had arrived and the long awaited year abroad had begun.

Gare Saint-Roch.   Not my photo - I was far too exhausted and emotional to take photos that night!