Answers for narrative tenses (proficiency) 4: A6-06G

Answers to past/pres perf exercise

            I like travel, and I can truthfully say that I have been to more countries in my life than most people. I am particularly drawn to South Asia, and have visited India on numerous occasions. In fact, at the time I am writing, I have not yet finished unpacking from my latest trip, a walk through the Himalayan Mountains north of Srinagar. The subject of my present article, however, is a trip I made to somewhere altogether more accessible and less exotic: the south of France. In fact, this trip occurred many years ago, being the first time in my adult life that I had left my native land. It happened in this way:

            My father had an old friend who was living in a small village on a remote mountainside in the south of the Massif Central. One of his neighbours needed help to bring in the sweet chestnut harvest, at that time an important source of income for the poor farmers of that region. So, I found myself put on the boat train to Paris. There, yet another family friend was on duty to escort me across Paris and deposit me in a second train, whose destination was Toulouse.  From Toulouse, I made my way by local train and bus to the small country town of Bedarieux, where my father’s friend from the chestnut village was waiting with an ancient 2CV van. By this time, it was a grey, late-September evening. We soon left the lowlands. The rain was now falling steadily, as we began to climb into the great chestnut forests…..