Coming home
Dec. 28th, 2014 03:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dormouse1953Got back from visiting my sister for Christmas last night. An interesting journey.
When I went to book my tickets on the Trailine site a few weeks ago I discovered that for the time of morning I wanted to travel yesterday I couldn't book a seat on the normal route I'd take, down the east coast line to King's Cross. (You can probably see where this is going.) However, there was a cross country train to Reading at about the same time. According to the site, this took five minutes longer to get me to Guildford, but that's because they seem to think it takes an hour to get from King's Cross to Waterloo by tube. I reckon I could walk it in less time. I booked the train to Reading.
Anyway, the trip up on Tuesday, via King's Cross, was uneventful.
Friday night, after a day spent on Holy Island, we switched on the BBC News channel and heard the announcement that King's Cross was closed on Saturday. Now I was glad I hadn't been able to get a seat on that train.
But first I had to get to Newcastle. The recommended train from Corbridge was the 9:48, getting into Newcastle at 10:27. My brother who does this trip often (he comes up for Newcastle United games and stays in Corbridge afterwards) reckoned this was cutting it a bit fine. I couldn't see the problem, assuming the train was on time, as I could certainly walk across the station in under five minutes, even wheeling a suitcase.
As it happened, the train got in five minutes early, and as the Reading train started at Newcastle, I was able to get straight on it and get to my seat.
The train started off not too crowded. They even were able bring the drinks trolley down the aisle and I got a coffee. But after Sheffield I really had to go to the loo and it was a struggle getting past all the people standing in the aisle. It was so bad I couldn't get back afterwards until the train pulled into Derby and people started to get off. By then the train was about half an hour late.
The penultimate stop on the train was due to be Oxford. The train halted outside the station and stayed there for what seemed a long time. Then the train started to move again, but the guard came on the tannoy to announce that due to an "incident" at Oxford station, we were unable to stop at Oxford station and the train would be going straight to Reading and then turning round to go back to Oxford. Of course, by then everyone who was planning to get off at Oxford were standing (if they'd had a a seat) and got their luggage ready. A lot of phone calls were being made.
I don't know what the problem was at the station. There were trains on both platforms as we went through. The Oxford Mail site says that there had been a power cut but I don't think it affected the station. However, Paddington station was closed yesterday due to these infamous engineering works so I wonder if there had been some sort of altercation involving disgruntled passengers.
After that, the train got into Reading station and I had no trouble getting a service to Guildford. I was home by about five.
When I went to book my tickets on the Trailine site a few weeks ago I discovered that for the time of morning I wanted to travel yesterday I couldn't book a seat on the normal route I'd take, down the east coast line to King's Cross. (You can probably see where this is going.) However, there was a cross country train to Reading at about the same time. According to the site, this took five minutes longer to get me to Guildford, but that's because they seem to think it takes an hour to get from King's Cross to Waterloo by tube. I reckon I could walk it in less time. I booked the train to Reading.
Anyway, the trip up on Tuesday, via King's Cross, was uneventful.
Friday night, after a day spent on Holy Island, we switched on the BBC News channel and heard the announcement that King's Cross was closed on Saturday. Now I was glad I hadn't been able to get a seat on that train.
But first I had to get to Newcastle. The recommended train from Corbridge was the 9:48, getting into Newcastle at 10:27. My brother who does this trip often (he comes up for Newcastle United games and stays in Corbridge afterwards) reckoned this was cutting it a bit fine. I couldn't see the problem, assuming the train was on time, as I could certainly walk across the station in under five minutes, even wheeling a suitcase.
As it happened, the train got in five minutes early, and as the Reading train started at Newcastle, I was able to get straight on it and get to my seat.
The train started off not too crowded. They even were able bring the drinks trolley down the aisle and I got a coffee. But after Sheffield I really had to go to the loo and it was a struggle getting past all the people standing in the aisle. It was so bad I couldn't get back afterwards until the train pulled into Derby and people started to get off. By then the train was about half an hour late.
The penultimate stop on the train was due to be Oxford. The train halted outside the station and stayed there for what seemed a long time. Then the train started to move again, but the guard came on the tannoy to announce that due to an "incident" at Oxford station, we were unable to stop at Oxford station and the train would be going straight to Reading and then turning round to go back to Oxford. Of course, by then everyone who was planning to get off at Oxford were standing (if they'd had a a seat) and got their luggage ready. A lot of phone calls were being made.
I don't know what the problem was at the station. There were trains on both platforms as we went through. The Oxford Mail site says that there had been a power cut but I don't think it affected the station. However, Paddington station was closed yesterday due to these infamous engineering works so I wonder if there had been some sort of altercation involving disgruntled passengers.
After that, the train got into Reading station and I had no trouble getting a service to Guildford. I was home by about five.
