trains

Train Trip Tips

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ONE   Buy a cardboard ticket at the ticket office, preferably in advance. There was an outcry when it was suggested money could be saved by closing all the ticket offices. Few passengers understand the complexity and pricing of tickets, so it is easier to just tell a human being where and when you want to go. At Bournemouth mainline station they are used to holiday makers, overseas students, seniors and perhaps other passengers who would try the patience of a saint. I always find a friendly face to suggest the best route and give handy tips, such as your sister from Australia can have a senior rail card as well.

TWO   Get a rail card if you are eligible, there are all sorts, from students to senior, you pay for them, but soon make a saving with a few journeys.

THREE   Travel to and from a mainline station if you can. Trains are more frequent and you may catch a faster train that does not stop everywhere. There is also a better chance of getting to your destination or back home. When our train from Waterloo was abruptly terminated at Southampton we were pondering what problem had arisen, when it was announced that the next train was for Bournemouth only. Pity the poor passengers who were heading for tiny stations in the New Forest. When I was going from Margate to Victoria we were late leaving, then somewhere along the line it was decided time could be made up by not stopping at most of the stations! Unless you were going to Bromley or Victoria you had to get off at the next station and wait for a slow train.

Apart from the above, there is also the travel experience to consider. My nearest station is dire with MPs, councillors and locals always fighting for improvements. There is a long flight of stairs, fine for keeping fit, but not with buggies and luggage. No lift, no café, no toilets, mostly no staff and a record of suicides – the visiting pastoral care team will tell you to stay away from the edge of the platform. Meanwhile at Bournemouth there can be delays or problems, but plenty of staff to ask; even if they don’t know what’s going on either you can have a friendly chat. There is also passenger assistance to get on and off the trains. For the writer or photographer there is always plenty of Life going on and passengers even weirder than yourself.

FOUR   Now you have arrived on the day of your journey you will see why it’s good to buy a cardboard ticket in advance. People are waving their phones around trying to get a signal for the ticket on their phone so they can get through the barrier. Others are causing a queue at the ticket office because their phone has run out of power and they can’t get at their ticket and their train is going in three minutes.

FIVE   Ask for help from a human. Even following my advice there can be problems. One time my ticket went in the machine, came out, but the barrier did not open. Staff let me through, but the ticket was for two train rides and the Underground, what if it didn’t work on The Tube? It didn’t, but there were staff at the barriers, cheerful staff who said that was always happening. If you are battling with luggage or a rucksack larger than yourself, they will let you through the gate.

SIX   If you are going on the London Underground check the map and the signs telling you which direction for your station. Don’t go the wrong way round on the Circle Line or north on the Northern Line when you are meant to be going south. If you notice you are going past the wrong stations, get off at the next station, looking like a cool regular alighting at your intended station. We did this on the Metro in Paris and did manage to end up in the right place… Do not panic, just make your way to the right direction platform.

SEVEN   Don’t lose your ticket. Keep your ticket and your phone in a money belt, under several layers of clothing if you are neurotic, but easily accessible so you don’t look like a nervous traveller.

EIGHT   Don’t do everything I tell you. You might well get all sorts of bargains in advance on line by booking yourself on specific trains or discovering it is cheaper to buy three tickets for one journey staying on the same train.

What are your handy tips for train travel?

Thursday Thoughts – What Is Real Life?

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If you live in a city or suburb you will probably hope to get away for a change of scenery. As you stand on top of a moor, hearing only sheep bleating, you will say to yourself ‘This is Real Life.’ The same thoughts will surface if you stand on a rocky outcrop feeling the spray from the waves pounding below, or perhaps you have visited a peaceful holy island, Iona or Lindisfarne.

Supposing you move somewhere remote and idyllic, or to the coast and can saunter down to the beach on a wild winter day, dodging waves. Sheer bliss. Then one day you go up to London to visit friends or relatives or for a cultural outing. As you arrive at a London terminus, descend into the underground, hear the rumble of an approaching tube train, then squeeze on board with the multitudes, you find yourself saying ‘Back to Real Life!’

Could it be that real life must involve cities, mainline railway stations and underground trains?

Those millions of us brought up in suburbs anywhere in the world are bound to feel we are never in real life; neither in the bustling heart of the city, nor in the countryside growing food and raising livestock to feed the nation.

When you turn on the television news real life takes on a different dimension. Why are your working on the cheese counter at Waitrose when that girl you were at school with is now a war correspondent standing on a heap of rubble?

Is real life the peace all great prophets have urged us to follow; cherishing the soil, creating harmony, music, arts, science and babies. Or is reality living on a knife edge beneath a volcano or on an earthquake fault line?  Are you likely to see your home swept away by fire or flood or do you face death every day in war?

Have you experienced real life or are you still waiting to find it?

What is your reality?

Thursday Train Tales

~ tidalscribe.com ~ 25 Comments

You can read previous train tales here.

Tuesday Train Tales

Be careful what you say, the gods are always listening.

‘Don’t come out again in this awful weather, I don’t need a lift, it’s much quicker on the train.’

It is March 2020, we are about to go into lockdown, but at Southampton Hospital it’s like entering a busy airport terminal with shops and a huge Costa Coffee and other eateries. The only precautions against the new ‘Corona Virus’ are instructions to use hand gel. We and I have been visiting my husband every day.

Now, on a miserable wet late afternoon I manage to find the right bus to the station and saunter in looking around for a window with a human being behind it, so I don’t have to bother with a ticket machine. An androgenous person in a uniform approaches, I wasn’t expecting a welcome party.

‘Can I help you?’

‘I just want a single to Bournemouth.’

‘There are no trains to Bournemouth.’

‘WHAT!’

‘Tree on the line.’

‘So when might there be a train?’

‘Not sure, do you still want to go to Bournemouth?’

‘YES.’

Luckily the platform west has a café and waiting area, now full of grumpy commuters. I am not there long when there is a sudden exodus to the exit, I follow them as they all pile onto a double decker bus, asking if it’s going to Bournemouth. No one actually says no so I rush upstairs and grab the last seat. It is dark and still raining, the windows immediately mist up. If this ‘Corona Virus’ really is so infectious, this is when I’m going to catch it.

I can’t see a thing, no idea where we are, but presumably on the motorway. After a good hour the lights of Bournemouth appear. The train journey takes only 28 minutes if you get a fast train, a fast train being one that mainly stops where I want to go.

There are many good reasons for going by train, keeping traffic off the roads, enjoying a faster smooth journey, looking at the scenery and into people’s back gardens… and of course people watching and eavesdropping.

Autumn 2024 and we are leaving the Isle of Wight. Our lovely little B&B is only minutes from the ferry. This time we have looked on line to check if the trains are running smoothly. They aren’t, it’s Sunday engineering works.

At Lymington we disembark and have plenty of time to file out to the car park and get on a comfortable replacement bus which leaves at exactly the same time as the train would have done. We enjoy a pleasant ride.

At Brockenhurst all was not going well. Confused people were hanging around outside the station waiting their turn to consult a chap with a clipboard and a phone. His jacket says ‘Bus Replacement Service Director’ or some such words. Also ‘on duty’ was a fed up South West Trains chap who wandered off at intervals and returned to make remarks such as ‘Don’t travel on a Sunday, I don’t know what they’re playing at’ and ‘Tell your friends Not to travel next Sunday.’ A young woman in a light blue tabard was trying to be helpful. These light blue people don’t seem to actually belong to the railways; at Bournemouth I had wondered if they were students on work experience as they were very young. I think they might be employed to pass on information, give stress counselling and to take the pressure off other staff.

In the meantime the Replacement Director was doing a grand job in an impossible situation with passengers going in different directions and not enough buses. He promised he would get us taxis if there were not enough bus seats. At one stage a coach turned up already full, turned round in the car park and looked like it was going straight back out again. The Director suddenly grabbed an elderly lady by the arm, frog marched her over to the coach and returned empty handed to address the crowd.

‘I know you’re all going to hate me, but that lady was traveling alone and had been waiting a while to get to Southampton, so I took an executive decision to put her in the only empty seat.’

We couldn’t argue with that and nobody did. We gradually herded ourselves into groups according to destination. A few taxis turned up and some left as The Director remembered who had been waiting longest. In the meantime more passengers drifted in or were dropped off by loved ones expecting to say farewell to them.

A black van with no windows turned up and our Bournemouth group was summoned forward, surely we were not going to be piled in the back of a van like prisoners? It turned out to be a luxury mini bus with tinted windows and curtains. There then followed a tour of the whole of the New Forest as we visited every tiny rural station and halt, seemingly only accessed by narrow winding lanes. At each one we dropped off or picked up someone. It was more than an hour before we arrived at Bournemouth station. The train journey takes 26 minutes. We got home safely, but had not even glimpsed a train all day, let alone been on one.

Did I venture on to a train ever again? Yes, but that’s for another episode…

Have you had any interesting journeys lately?

Tuesday Train Tales

~ tidalscribe.com ~ 28 Comments

Be careful what you say, the gods are listening.

‘Once we get to Waterloo we’re on the home run, we can relax and have lunch.’

How many times have I stood looking at the large departures board at London Waterloo? Generations of my family commuted up to Waterloo along with hordes of fellow office workers long before working from home was thought of. The last London terminus to have steam trains, they were still running when we lived in Farnborough in the early sixties. Nothing can ever beat sitting in a train as it builds up steam and leaves the station and what fun being totally enveloped in smoke as you walk to school over the railway bridge.

Now as I stared up at the board to check train times before we sauntered off to find lunch, I wondered if it was the board or my brain that had become jumbled up. Nothing made sense, though the words cancelled and delayed seemed to feature rather a lot. I suggested we go to the information desk.

‘When is the next train for Bournemouth?’

‘No idea what’s going on, signal failure at Winchester, you best get straight on the next train.’

‘Have we got time?’

A bloke standing beside us said ‘Don’t worry, you’ve got time, I’m the driver.’

We got on the South West train and off we went, but at Southampton we stopped and didn’t start again. We sat there for a while, chatting to someone who had just flown into the country to go and see her dying sister in Bournemouth hospital. We were apparently waiting for a driver – after rail mishaps to come we soon learned that any rail problems result in drivers everywhere being in the wrong place. Each message over the Tannoy contradicted the previous one. We were told this train was terminating and we all got off. At least we could have a comfort break. Train toilets are a subject for another time, preferably when you’re not eating your dinner. Then a message of hope for some of us, the next train was for Bournemouth only, hurrah. It was a ‘Cross Country’ not conjured up especially for us, just happened to be passing through on its normal route. And what of the other poor souls who needed to go to the other stations along the way? I don’t know.

When my sister came over from Australia for a long holiday I had suggested a trip by train and ferry to the Isle of Wight as it is pleasant and easy, all went well when I did the same trip last year with my friend. Bournemouth to Brockenhurst in the New Forest, change to the dear little train that just goes back and forth to Lymington Pier then saunter on to the ferry to Yarmouth, Isle of Wight. We had booked three nights at a B&B yards from the little ferry terminal.

At Bournemouth station that morning all was chaos, car on the level crossing at Brockenhurst, how long does it take to tow a car off a railway line? All day perhaps judging by what lay ahead. The platform was full of staff, they didn’t know what was going on, but they were doing their best to keep up our morale or their own. Then a train appeared, we got on with our wheelie cases, found a seat then heard the announcement ‘This train is for Southampton only.’ We got off again.

A train did come along and we arrived at Brockenhurst where the platform was full of confused passengers wanting to go up to London or down to Weymouth. We went over to the empty platform to check if the train sitting there was for Lymington, it was and we jumped on quickly, but it didn’t move. It was waiting for a driver. We sat and sat, no more messages came.

Then thinking outside of the box I suggested we just get off the train, trek back over the bridge to the information office and ask what was going on. They had no idea and I proposed Plan B, just walk out of the station and get a taxi to Lymington Pier. Another passenger had already found one and was happy to share. I am still not convinced that this was a genuine taxi, I could see no evidence and the driver wanted cash only, £18. The other passenger was a local who needed to get back to his house in Lymington and I offered him a free ride, just glad that I always carry real money. He insisted on giving me a ten pound note, so we had made a bit of a profit. Whether or not it was a genuine taxi, he did take us to the right place. We relaxed at the little coffee shop in the tiny terminal while we waited for the ferry. The ferry is a delight, you just saunter up the gangway in minutes, climb a few stairs and sit in comfort at the front soothed by the smooth journey across the Solent.

You will have to wait to find out if we ever returned home from that trip, but if I mention we had to come back on a Sunday, some of you might guess.

Monday Madness – Holiday Highlights

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Since early September I have often been AWOL from WeirdPress with assorted family staying and going on trips. Fortunately my sister is also a writer and always comes to my writers’ group when she stays, so we both did some writing. I took plenty of photos in strange places and we met plenty of weird people, so plenty of blogger fodder. In the meantime here are a few highlights. Can you guess where we might have been?

Thursday Tiny Tale – Have You Stayed With Us Before?

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While I have been on holiday Charlotte Charlington has been writing more about her new leading character, Lottie Lincoln.

Lottie nearly fell out of the train. The platform seemed a long way down and she had got flustered trying to work out whether her wheelie weekend case should go before or after her. At least she had arrived at the right station.

The invitation to visit had come from some vague cousin of her late husband; neither of them had many relatives and Callum had never mentioned a cousin Ruth. She had been lurking on the last page of his old address book, so Lottie had added her to the list of people to write and inform of her husband’s sudden death. There was no way of knowing if she was still living at the same address near Peterborough or even if she was still alive, so Lottie was surprised to soon receive a reply and an invitation to visit. Her writer’s mind suspected an ulterior motive, did they assume she was a rich widow? But her author’s mind also thought Ruth’s family could provide excellent inspiration for her writing. She had been relieved to hear the large blended family had no room for her to stay in comfort and had booked the recommended local posh hotel.

Lottie checked her phone again. The latest of several text messages said Si would pick her up at the front of the little station in five minutes. No other passengers were loitering looking out for lifts so presumably he would find her. When she saw a young man jump out of a scruffy white van she wished she had taken a taxi.

‘Hey Lottie, over here.’

Her case twisted sideways as she stepped off the curb. Husbands were so useful for dealing with luggage.

Si quickly appeared at her side.

‘I was coming over to help.’

He picked the case up with ease and slung it into the back of the van, setting a dog barking. Lottie winced. Si led her to the passenger door.

‘I hope you’re more athletic than Gran.’

Lottie hoped he didn’t think she was as old as his grandmother.

‘Step’s a bit high up, just swing yourself in, sorry about the mess.’

He swept crisp packets off the seat and made an attempt to move empty water bottles and drink cans out of the way of her feet. A larger fury head suddenly appeared between the seats. Lottie hastily moved her right arm away from the drooling mouth.

‘That’s Brutus, quite harmless. Hey Brute, you haven’t been furtling around in Lottie’s luggage have you?’

Lottie shuddered.

They swung out of the car park at full speed and hurtled through featureless streets till they pulled up at a straggling building that could be a pub, a hotel or an office block. Si left her to clamber out while he fetched her case and let Brutus out.

‘Okay Brute, you can get back in the front seat now.’

He strode up to the glass doors and Lottie hoped he would leave her at the steps to regain her composure.

‘Never been inside this place before, um reception this way, I’ll leave you at the desk. Oh I nearly forgot, Gran gave me a note for you, just to tell you where we’re all meeting up for dinner. Right, gotta go, see you later.’

A young woman behind the desk smiled then rattled off some questions by rote. ‘Have you stayed with us before? What was your name? Is it just yourself staying? Would you like to book breakfast, any allergies?’

Lottie supposed this was what it would be like, going on holiday by oneself. She didn’t count this as a holiday and hoped she looked like she was away on business. Lottie realised the girl was still talking and handing her a blank rectangle of white plastic.

‘It hasn’t got any writing on it.’

‘For security, just swipe it over the lock, the door is a bit heavy, fire door.. Through the double doors, turn left and you’ll see the lift, room 424.’

The phone on the desk rang and the girl answered before Lottie had a chance to say she didn’t like lifts. She reminded herself she was a successful author who had stayed in hotels for conferences, but Callum had always come along as well.

She pulled her shoulders back and tried to look blasé as other guests sauntered past. In the lift she pressed the button for the fourth floor, held her breath and closed her eyes. Stepping out she was confronted by three doors with room numbers and selected 413-429. She entered a dark corridor, squeezing past a trolley full of sheets and toiletries and cups. 414, 415… the corridor took a sharp turn and became darker and narrower. 419, 420… she was confronted by a set of steps and another corner. How would she ever find her way out again.

Once more she held her breath as she pressed the plastic card against the lock. On the second try there was a flash of green light and with great difficulty she pushed the door open, tripping over the case as she squeezed through, the door was determined to slam shut.

Inside, the décor was the latest in interior trends, grey. Lottie thought longingly of her little cottage, then reprimanded herself. Ladies her age were still out reporting in terrible war zones so she should cope with this weekend. She opened the note, wondering where or when she was actually going to meet Ruth.

Thursday Travels

~ tidalscribe.com ~ 13 Comments

How will you travel today?

Land or Sea?

When your bus escapes to the countryside…

When your moorings break loose…

…and you drift upstream it’s time to head for dry land.

…where you never know who you might meet.

Perhaps a day at the beach would be best…

…but keep an eye on the weather.

Or you may never be seen again…

Featuring Dexter, Josie and Alfie with Antipodean Stripy Stranger.

Silly Saturday – Transport Trials and Tribulations

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Everyone is worrying about transport; panic buying at petrol stations because of a shortage of petrol tank drivers, what alternative transport would you use…

Panic about empty shelves because of a shortage of HGV drivers; turns out the food does not appear in shops by magic, perhaps other means of delivery should be considered…

But it is no fun being a delivery driver; nowhere to park and rest in big cities…

…and poor facilities at driver stopovers…

They can only dream of better.

Why not continue to escape reality with one of my short story collections…