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At 77, Yves Robert is not only a three-time grandfather. He is also, and above all, an outstanding explorer. In 2019, having already circumnavigated the globe without a plane, cycled across France, kayaked and hiked, the Vendéen set himself a new challenge: to stop at every railway station in France.
5 years later, the challenge has been met with flying colors, with stops at nearly 3,000 stations and over 29,000 kilometers covered using only regional trains. For our podcast Je t’offre un rail ? produced in partnership wSNCF Connect, he talks about the organization of this adventure, his travel anecdotes and his love of trains.
“I've always loved looking at maps, dreaming... Travel is a natural part of being human, curious by nature.” - Yves Robert
“Fear that one day a train will no longer move you.” These words by Guillaume Apollinaire were also the first words Yves wrote in one of his travel diaries.
Yves Robert's project was as simple as it was ambitious: to travel all the TER lines in France, stopping at every station. And he stuck to it without compromise. His achievement in figures?
A real logistical challenge: “Some lines only see one train in the morning and another in the evening.This required meticulous preparation, with timetables and maps."
But beyond the technical aspect, Yves' approach is imbued with poetry. Through this challenge, he also sought to understand the stories and lives behind each station, “from the great Gare de Lyon to the little lost station in Lozère...”.
A native of Nantes, Yves Robert (who shares his name with the famous director, you guessed it) has always been driven by a deep need to explore. Whether on foot, kayak or bike, he's crossed France and even the whole world driven by the same engine: a taste for challenge.
“But why challenge? It's a journey, it's wanting to leave home. It's like the time I went next door between Montagelli and Thoiry, and challenged myself to kayak inland to the Vendée, even though I'd never kayaked before. But I say to myself, here, this could do it, let's give it a try, and that's how you learn.”
For Yves, every station is a place of passage steeped in history. He cites, for example, Rochefort-sur-Mer station (Charente-Maritime), “adorned with mosaics, almost like an Istanbul décor”, Valençay station (Indre), which he describes as a veritable “little château”, or Bordeaux station with its immense glass roof...
Beyond the history of stones, there are those of landscapes and people. Because once the preparation stage was over, Yves spent a lot of time on the rails. From his seat on the train, he particularly enjoyed looking out of the window. And more than once, he marveled at the Vendée station at Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie, where he had the impression of arriving in Venice, to the mountain scenery of the "Train des Merveilles" between Nice and Tende. On the return journey, the journey continued through the travel diaries he wrote...
On board or on the platform, he also enjoyed observing strangers and imagining their lives. He remembers, for example, a scene that touched him in a station: a little boy passing from his mother's arms to his father's during a custody exchange.
Sometimes, stations have also revealed to him dark moments in history, such as the station at La Broque, which he discovered to be the site of a World War II extermination camp.
In the end, even taking only straight lines, this challenge took him down many unexpected paths: “I wanted to do things to get around, to get from point A to point B. So, touristically, it sucks. So, touristically, it sucks. But don't panic, you can still see extraordinary things, even between two points that are in a straight line on a map of France.”
After 5 years on the rails, this incredible journey will come to an end on May 13, 2024 at Versailles-Rive-Droite station. And it's no coincidence that Yves has chosen the oldest station in France still in its original state. A fitting tribute to French railway history: “This station, which opened in 1839, is a living witness to the history of trains in France,” explains Yves.
It has to be said that this challenge has made Yves passionate about French railway history:
“It's by forging that you become a blacksmith, and it's by taking the train that you end up being very interested in it. I discovered, for example, that before 1850, it took 6 days by stagecoach to travel from Paris to Nantes. Suddenly, the train took 14 hours - it was a revolution! It opened up whole regions and brought people closer together. Suddenly, people were on the move.”
Through this challenge, Yves invites us above all to rediscover the richness of what surrounds us. As he so aptly puts it:
“Everyone wants to come to France, but the French don't always know how magnificent it is."
Today, the septuagenarian strives to share his experience through travel journals. For the time being, he distributes them to those closest to him, but he is beginning to think about finding a publisher one day to make them accessible to a wider public. “The beauty is that my stories allow others to travel vicariously,” he says with a smile.
To contact Robert: yves-robert@wanadoo.fr. And to make sure you don't miss a single episode and get all the inspiration you need from our guests, don't hesitate to subscribe to the podcast on your favorite listening platforms. Thanks to our partner SNCF Connect, the reference application for train travel and sustainable mobility, which accompanies over 15 million users on their journeys in France and Europe.
Issue du monde de la communication et des médias, Sophie est Responsable éditoriale chez HOURRAIL ! depuis août 2024. Elle est notamment derrière le contenu éditorial du site ainsi que La Locomissive (de l'inspiration voyage bas carbone et des bons plans, un jeudi sur deux, gratuitement dans ta boîte mail !).
Convaincue que les changements d’habitude passent par la transformation de nos imaginaires, elle s’attache à montrer qu’il est possible de voyager autrement, de manière plus consciente, plus lente et plus joyeuse. Son objectif : rendre le slow travel accessible à toutes et tous, à travers des astuces, des décryptages et surtout, de nouveaux récits.
