Patrick, the first TGV ever built, has retired.
With one thing and another – strikes, work, Coronavirus – I haven’t been able to do any travelling since I arrived in Saint-Etienne. Yesterday I learned about Patrick’s farewell tour, so today – as the weather was beautiful and I had nothing better to do – decided to have an afternoon out. Also, I missed the Orient Express when it was in Lyon in September, so I was a man on a mission.
In December 2019, the SNCF retired the original TGV train sets in favour of new, shiny ones. The first TGV ever built, TGV 01, then embarked on a tour of SNCF Technocentres before making one final journey from the Gare de Lyon to Lyon Perrache.
I took the 14:04 from Chateaucreux to Lyon Perrache, where Patrick was sitting on platform A, resplendent in his original orange.
Lyon Perrache was his last stop after 41 years of service and with some 13,478,014 km on the clock before being taken off to the great train shed in the sky.
TGV01 – affectionately nicknamed Patrick after the son of the first driver – was built in 1979 and entered service in 1981 on the newly-inaugurated high-speed line between Paris and Lyon. Since then, he has effectively been round the world 337 times, or to the moon and back 17 times.
The SNCF had a welcoming committee on the platform and it was possible to board at the back of the train and walk through the various displays which were set up in each of the carriages. These included technical drawings, interactive displays and memories from people who worked on the first TGVs.
At the front, it was possible to have your picture taken with Patrick – of course I did – and climb into the cab, where one of his drivers explained what everything did.
I’d intended to spend some time wandering around Lyon after a quick look at the train, but the whole experience took a couple of hours – from boarding to climbing out of the cab – so once I’d done, I hopped on a train back to Châteaucreux, and that was that.
