Getting to Paris - French public transport.

Getting to Paris was very easy - I just took the train from home to Waterloo and then caught the Eurostar. But when I got to Paris things got a bit harder. For some reason the signs for things like stations etc... seem to be hidden or, if not, very small. I knew I had to take the Metro line 4 - and then the RER line C to where I was staying. But could I find the Metro station? Well I did but it took far more aimless wandering than I would have liked it to. Then I had to find a place to buy a ticket - I could find lots of mainline ticket machines and booths but no metro one. It was there however - down some stairs and around a corner. I then purchased a ticket - the easiest bit - though it was so cheap that I thought that I must have the wrong ticket, but then station on the ticket matched the name of the station I was going to so all seemed well.I made it onto the metro and to the station that I had to change at. But could I find a sign for RER trains? No. Could I find a train that went to the station that I wanted to go to? No. It got so bad I had to ask at an information point. They were very helpful and told me I needed to change at another station. (On examining my tiny metro ticket I did find it did have the name of the station to change at but as I don't know the names of all the train stations I didn't recognise it as such. At the connecting station there were several undecipherable screen displaying where the next train to my destination was going to leave from but I had to almost leave the station before one made sense. They seem to give all the trains four letter names like VICK and JILL - tres weird, especially as these names don't seem to tie up with any of the maps on the walls of the station. But after all that I got to my hotel safely and my reservation was ok and I made it to my fourth floor room with no further drama. Though today on the way home things stayed a bit strange on the public transport system. My colleague dropped my off at the station, but when I went to buy a ticket the lady said in very good english) (how did she know?) that there were no trains to Paris Gare du Nord from this station, or even connecting trains. She seemed very sure and said that I would need to walk to a nearby station. And then suddenly there was an announcement on the tannoy (I don't know what it said.) and she ran off into a back office. About a minute later she returned and said that there was now a train that I could catch. And that it was going from platform two. (I don't know if she rejigged the timetable just for me but it seemed like it.) I got to Gare du Nord but could I find the Eurostar terminal? You would something like an international rail terminal would be hard to hide. Especially as I could see where the train was, but they managed it. It took minutes of wandering around before I found some poorly marked stars leading up to a balcony that lead to the check in area. So all I need to do know is navigate the tube and British rail system - which even though it is expensive, dirty and unreliable - is well signposted.

Paris Nord - Can you see the signs?