I know Eurostar will be leaving/ arriving St Pancras starting Nov 14, but I was just reading a short entry in an email and it seem to say that the intermediate entry point to England will be Ebbsfleet in Kent. Will this be replacing Ashford? We've often taken the train from France and picked up our car in Ashford to make a quick getaway to the countryside. I hope , if this is so, that Ebbsfleet is as convenient.

It looks as though some trains will serve Ashford even after Ebbsfleet opens (just by doing a timetable check for dates after the 19th, when Ebbsfleet opens).

I've managed to get myself a slot as a guinea-pig for their passenger handling systems at St Pancras and Ebbsfleet in the week before the transfer - I hope there'll be something useful to report back on.

Would you really think Gravesend/Dartford convenient for countryside?

I saw Ebbsfleet International station last Feb - it's out in the middle of nowhere but right by the motorway - tons of parking for commuters and Eurostar riders - should be as convenient as Ashford and even closer to London

Ebbsfleet's convenient to nowhere except bits of North Kent you really don't want to know about. It's about 3 miles from J2 of the M25, which means it's a few dozen miles further from the bits of England south and west of London Ashford is really useful for.

However, Ebbsfleet's a lot handier than Ashford for getting to the frozen wastes of Norfolk and Cambridgeshire.

Some - but fewer - trains will continue to stop at Ashford. I understand - and this is a national disgrace - that the ski train won't be stopping at Ashford, though.

Would you really think Gravesend/Dartford convenient for countryside?

well i believe if you take the tunnel or bridge or whatever at Dartford you'd be in bucolic East Anglia in a few miles?

I'm being unfair.

Ebbsfleet actually involves fewer motorway miles to most of England west of Gatwick than Ashford.

The real problem is that getting to it from either north or south means getting stuck in queues for the Dartford Crossing, so we're all going to have very fraught journeys trying to hit the train we're booked on. This isn't a problem when you're collecting a car AT Ashford.

We've usually stopped at a friend's house near Southhampton after picking up our car, so Ashford was convenient for us. All except the last time we did it on a lovely Autumn Sunday morning.. first we ran into a bicycle race, then the London- Brighton Antique Car thing, then an accident that held up traffic for over 2 hours..but that was a one off.