Dylan Jones: If you ask me
If you ask me, the Bristol might just be the best hotel in Paris. Since staying there last week I’ve been told that the Paris is the best hotel in Bristol, but then as I haven’t been to Bristol in the last five years, I can’t vouch for that. Since Eurostar launched in 1994, letting le train take the strain has become as unexceptional as going to the cinema or driving to Tesco, and now that it takes less time to get to Gare du Nord than it does to drive from London to, well, almost anywhere actually, it feels almost exceptionally natural. Personally I still think it’s a genuine wonder – like a 1950s idea of the future, travelling underground and arriving in a different country – and, unlike most people I know, have never taken it for granted.