DID THOSE POSTERS ABOUT FARE DODGING ACHIEVE NOTHING?

Poor Grace Jones; there she was enjoying first class travel on the Eurostar, thinking life could get no better than the three-course meal and swanky carriage, when she discovers that there's actually a Premium Class as well. Where they get a four course meal. And she wanted in. Yes, we know this sounds like the set up from a late period Frasier - "it's not knowing there's an extra course, Niles. It's not knowing what the extra couse is..." - but it really happened. Grace decided to go and sit in the Premium Section anyway. And, as is inevitable, the ticket inspector came to see her. What happens next is disputed, but it ends up with Jones leaving the train in Ashford. The company line is that Jones said she had no money to pay the upgrade, and when asked to return to first class attacked the train manager. So they threw her off in the middle of Kent. Jones, for her part, says there was "definitely no physical confrontation" and said that she asked to be let off the train (yeah, in Ashford) because the ticket she'd been issued had been "incomplete" and didn't show the price she had paid.

Mind you, what's the point of Premium class on Eurostar? Surely if you've got more money than the cost of a first class ticket, you'd be flying anyway?

music grace jones eurostar