Cars to Trains
I like technology, its not a bad tool really makes life easier but some days it makes life very hard indeed. Take the last 24 hours for example, technology has made my life hell, and indeed I’m a little sceptical if a concept such as i-Travel would have been able to cope with the contextual madness that I found myself in.
The story starts at 4.30pm a slightly snowy afternoon in garden centre car park Crowland, Lincolnshire, I wasn’t hanging about to do some form of Gardener’s drug deal.
“Got any high class geraniums mate? And don’t sell me the crap you did last week, didn’t even manage to get them home before they wilted…….look out it’s the compostabulary…run for it”
So leaving the car park, in my little Hyundai Atoz, the importance of this vehicle choice will become apparent later on, I set off for Braintree Essex, a town not more than 140 km’s distance, roads were busy and the radio was constantly warning of heavy snow.
Not too bad thinks I, looking out my window……
30 Km’s away from Braintree trouble hits, white out conditions and that annoying mix of drivers that are either way way way to cautious.
Really! Honestly I know its snowing but at 0.5 miles an hour, that 1 in 400 slope is going to be hard to handle in these icy conditions to – Jesus pal, are you sure that driving still at 80 miles and hour, while even polar bears have said “you know what I’ll think give the car a miss today” is a good idea?
I need to digress to set the scene a little, I regularly return to the UK for family reasons and on such times I store my car at my Nan’s in Braintree, where I pick up the little Atoz to run away the UK dropping it off afterwards and jumping on the train back into London to get the Eurostar back to Brussels, scene set, we will continue.
And at this point I realise that in fact the old Atoz isn’t the best car in snow, with tyres no bigger than a child’s pram and with about as much weight over the front wheel as said pram it’s struggling.
The slowness of my journey has caused me to be running a little late, realising that I can’t see more than a few yards in front of the car that the 2 km walk to the train station probably isn’t a good idea, freezing to death by the side of the road on Braintree high street is not a welcoming prospect more so for the fact that in booze culture Britain, I’ll be mistaken for a drunk and not a frostbite case.
So I decide that it would be better to take a taxi, ah but no money, need to pop into the petrol station to be overcharged for using a cash machine, ten pounds and 2 quid fee later I’m skidding out of the petrol station bouncing off kerbs and at my Nan’s. Rush in, order taxi….
“well I don’t know how long it will be mate its snowing you see we are not rushing”…snowing really? I never noticed.
Taxi arrives in time luckily, and modal change onto the great British train system has been made, my need for speed at the station means that I’ve missed the engineering works notice on the overhead screen, of which, the importance will be thrust upon me later.
Bing bong bing…”The next station is Witham where this train terminates, all change please all change”
This is not unusual, sometimes the train is direct from Braintree into London Liverpool street and sometimes I have to change, again I miss the engineering works notice and jump on the next train leaving platform 1 which is signposted ‘all trains towards London.’
Bing bong bing…”The next station is Shenfield where this train terminates, all change please all change”
Ah right this is new, never had to change here before, jump off….ummmm empty train and platform where did everyone go? Check train to London….bugger.
Trains to Buses
I read the screen, ‘We are sorry for the inconvenience, due to PLANNED engineering works there are no trains to London Liverpool Street please change at Ingatestone where buses will complete your journey.’
Oh right, planned eh? Wwell why didn’t you tell me this when I booked my ticket online on Friday, only two days before? Or are engineering works only planned 1 day in advance?
I’ve already passed Ingatestone, it was the station one before.
Right next train back is in….? 40 minutes, great, at this point a lost youth asks me what is going on, I explain our predicament
“eh… oh right, well um… do you mind me following you, I’m a bit lost you see not from round here?”
Yes alright come on then, find a station employee, who was helpful in providing me and my new found 17 year old hoodie our options, actually hoodies are not nearly as scary outside of their natural bus stop, vandalising environment, they are actually quite cute all lost and lonely, I wouldn’t go so far as to say cuddly, but a little less threatening none the less.
“well you could go back to Ingatestone mate, buts that’s going to take you another hour, there is a bus leaving to Upminster soon I think, talk to the 2 blokes outside running the replacement bus service, there are the ones wearing high visibility vests”
OK, right out of the station still snowing but its not that bad, where are these high vis vest wearing guys?
Walk around the station, no blokes to be found find a bus with a bus driver.
“I dun no mate I just drive them, dun no where I’m going until they tell me”
Fine, it’s ok it’s only minus 5 and bloody snowing.
Back into station….
“Eh where are these blokes?”
“On the left in the lay-by, think they are sat in the car.”
Oh a car, right, so the high visibility vest wearing part was just a diversion to keep my on my toes, I should have known…
Knock on the window….window powers down to find a face looking at me who is a little bit upset that snow has entered his nice warm eco system of his ford escort.
“yer?”
“Are you the blokes who know about a bus?”
“Where u want a go?”
“London please my good man and don’t spare the horses”…will get, at best, a blank look.
“Eventually? Isle of dogs I was trying to get to Liverpool Street”, I look across at my pet hoody
“You?”
“Errr London”
“can you be a bit more specific?”
“Dun no not from round here”
“Yes I know that, but are you “from round” your destination?”
“Victoria”
The bus bloke by now has gotten out of the car not to be helpful, but mainly to silence the protests of his, and I use the word in its loosest sense, “work” mate complaining about the “bloody snow getting in the car”
“well if its Liverpool street you want , you can take the bus to Romford, but I wouldn’t do that, goes to all local stations see, and once there you have to take local buses into London” this appears to be the best he can do.
“And if I wanted to get to, say, a tube station?”
“Ah well if its a tube station that you want, you’re best off getting the bus to Upminster, trains are running into Fenchurch from there get you onto the district line, next bus is in 10 minutes”
All this has thrown my hoody who looks like he is going to bust into tears
“ What are no trains going to London I need to get to London my Mums’ not appy as it is”
No, I start to explain patiently, there are no stations called “London” you can get to Fenchurch and then get the tube, back into the station to get a map.
“So look its bus to Upminster then train into Fenchurch Street, then you can get the tube to Victoria”
“ah right, thanks you don’t mind me following you do yer?”
What like normally? On a dark night pass the broken windowed bus stop, yes I do scares the willies out of me.
“No no its fine” I sigh, “come on that’s the bus”
Walk out of the station, bus pulls in, the day glow vest gang stay in the car, climb on the bus to find jolly bus driver from earlier.
“Upminster”, due to his lack of knowledge of destinations earlier I’m momentary thrown into confusion, is he asking me or telling me?
I head for the middle ground with my reply
“ehhhh yer think so”
“Well if its Romford you want it’s the one behind”
“No Upminster is good thanks” you 2 faced destination hiding bus driving @!*!**.
40 minutes later, we pull into Upminster station, I gather my rucksack.
“Right” I say to the hoody, who has been mercifully silent for the past 40 minutes, engrossed in his phone texting no doubt all manner of “bitaches” about his “well good adventure”
“Oh right is this you, how many more stops is mine?”
No right if we step back only a little bit in time you’ll remember me showing you this whole map thing and talking about buses, trains and then tubes, do try keep up my dear boy.
“Eh no, train now then tube”
“Oh right yer”
Buses back to trains
I still have my train ticket, so go to pop it into the barrier
Buzzer sounds, text flashes up
‘Seek assistance’
From whom I wonder? So far my efforts have come to very little; I go to find a station employee.
“These tickets are not valid on C2C trains mate that’s only for the national express line”
Obviously he hasn’t heard about the planned engineering works either.
“Eh but we’ve just had to take the bus from Shenfield, was told this was the only way into London”
“Oh right, ok then just push the barrier there”
10 minutes later I’ve changed modal modes again and now I’m back on the train, find a seat, Ricky the hoody sits down in front of me with an inane grin.
“On our way again eh?”
I smile turn to look out the window, the snow is really coming down and despite the problems so far, snow when viewed from the warm comfort of a train does have a magical quality to it, my new found peace is disturbed by Ricky’s gangster rap ring tone.
Fu*k the police, fu* the police, yer no one knows me…..
“Hello?”
Slight muffled voice screaming at Ricky can be heard, at 17 why do I expect that Ricky is only a few year older than his charming mother was when she had my new hoody friend?
“yer well I is on the train”
Muffles
“No I dun no, some station beginning with F”
Ricky gets up to look at the map
“Errrr yer F, looks like Fien…Feen..Feencrunch…”
My god I was admonishing my 7 year last night for not knowing the word, absolutely in her reading book I think I’m being too harsh on her.
“Dun no get the tube I expect, some bloke told me”
While Ricky is hanging up, I get the map that I acquired earlier, fold it so that our train line and FENCHURCH station is showing and then draw a circle round it, then a line under the nearest tube station and then circle Victoria.
Putting on my best “some bloke” voice
“Right, what you need to do is, leave Fenchurch station, go to Tower Hill tube station, then get the circle line tube westbound to Victoria ok?”
“ehhh yer, westbound right”
I write Westbound on the map along with an arrow, handing the map over to Ricky, who then studies it intensely for the last 15 minutes of our journey; I assume hoping that the words on there will somehow eventually make sense to him.
“Right this is me”
I’m getting off at Limehouse one stop before Ricky, and while now sad that I have to send my hoody off into the world (you have to let go sometimes) I’m slightly relieved that I won’t wake at home, to find him grinning at me.
“You don’t mind me following you do yer?”
Trains to light rail
The reason I alighted at Limehouse was to get the DLR (Docklands Light Railway) to Mudchute, my final destination for the night being my friend’s house close to the station.
Actually I have a choice here I can stay on the DLR to Mudchute and walk the final 700 metres to my friends house or get off at Canary Wharf and get a bus to right outside his flat, however my host and Jacko had warned me earlier that due to the snow the buses were having some trouble, I decide to stay on at Canary Wharf.
Mistake
Light rail to foot
Bing bong Bing “We are sorry that due to a signal failure, this train will terminate at Crossharbour, passengers for Mudchute or those are wishing to travel to Lewisham are advised to alight here and walk to Island Gardens”
Right fine, it can’t get any worse.
So now instead of my final walk being 700 metres I trudge through snow and ice for 2 km, this trek is lighten somewhat by the 50 cars 4 buses and motorcyclist trying to get up a very shallow very icy hill, I get out my camera to take some shots of bus drivers pushing cars, my camera is pretty big and professional looking so people mistake me for press.
“Ere get this one over here, I’ll be in the paper, you know why the gritters weren’t out? Apparently they didn’t know the weather was coming, bloody typical!”
So there we go part one of my trip done! Only London to Brussels in the morning to do, 223 km has taken me in the region of 6 hours to complete, Looking at the snow still falling I settle in bed with my alarm set early.
Foot to light rail
The sound of the alarm wakes me from my dream about bunny rabbits, look out the window, yep still snowing.
I shower and dress quickly; some sense of foreboding tells me the 12 km trip to St Pancreas international isn’t going to be easy. I’m greeted at the bus stop from a bloke with
“No buses mate just found out they are cancelled”
“Right you know about the DLR?” I had checked the transport for London website and while 60% of tubes weren’t running nothing had been said about the DLR.
“Nah that’s buggered as well, I’m off back to bed try again later”
“I’m off to Belgium that’s not an option for me”
“Good luck” he smiles and wonders off.
Foot time again then, I start to walk towards Canary Wharf, the reasoning being that I can either get a Taxi from there or see if the DLR is running, with it being mostly under cover from Canary Wharf onwards I’m hopeful, and my reward for ploughing through half a metre snow and biting cold winds, is the DLR running at Canary Wharf, its about 6:50.
My Eurostar, if it’s still running leaves at 8.25.
Still enough time to do the other 10 km.
Now dripping wet I join a commuter packed train of people, who all look weather weary and are quietly steaming in the warm and mildly damp dog smelling carriage.
Light train back to foot then taxi
Bing Bong Bing “We are sorry to tell passengers that there is a train broken down in Bank tunnel just ahead of us, once this has been resolved we will shortly be on our way”
God it appears, has a sense of humour.
7 o’clock comes and passes, we’ve moved a couple of stations along from Canary Wharf, and I’m now arriving at West Ferry.
Bing Bong Bing “We are sorry to tell passengers that due to the broken train in the Bank tunnel this train will terminate here, we advise passengers to find alternative means to complete their journey”
Fighting to get off the train against the platform load of people that in fact hadn’t been told that this was the train to nowhere.
“No no its cancelled mate, yer can I get off? Thanks”
God has started to get belly ache from his laughter.
West Ferry is annoyingly nowhere in London, it’s not connected to any tube station nor any other DLR line, I resign my self to walking to a bus, all hope of reaching the Eurostar in time lost.
While trying to avoid the knee deep snow drifts and mud being splattered from the cars I briefly toy with the idea of hitch hiking, taxis are going past and at a time like this it seems criminal that they are going past with only one person in them, maybe I should just jump out in front of one and force myself in?
Suddenly from the gloom of snow and slush I see a taxi with its light on, I jump up and down and to my relief it stops, the bloke walking behind me asks where I’m going and if he can share.
“Sure” I say “jump in”
We wind our way through London, my new Taxi friend Tom, needs to get to Liverpool street, funny that, that’s where I wanted to be last night
We moan about British rail systems while my driver complains that even though lots of people want taxi’s in this weather those bloody mini cabs are not regulated and will charge double today, while he has to stick to the meter.
I feel he is buttering me up to give a big tip out of sympathy.
Taxi to international high speed train
I arrived at the Eurostar at around 0805, 20 minutes to spare, fully expecting the Eurostar to be cancelled, I was surprised to see that’s it was on time, only security to negotiate…
“Coat, hat and scarf as well Madam”
Nooooo, no no no, no don’t do this to me don’t argue with the bloke, look my train is only a French Gendarmerie passport controlled skip away.
“Since when”
“Since when, what ,madam?
“Since when do I have to take off my coat, hat and scarf?”
“Since we were established madam” came the witty reply
I look away to hide my smirk, however this hasn’t stopped my aged lady traveller in front of me.
“Well this is the first time that I’ve had to take them off”
No look, just take the bloody cost off will you, its not that a difficult of a concept, there are signs everywhere telling you to do this, I feel she is trying to catch my eye to get fellow upset passenger in the queue support.
My head has nearly turned 180 degrees in the opposite direction.
I think this does the trick
“Well I won’t hold up every body behind me”
Thank you.
The Eurostar pulls away on time and I settle to write this blog post, knowing that my rant and multi modal nightmare of a journey will make good reading if not; at least I feel better writing it. After a while we gently slow down to enter the tunnel, the gentle slowing turned into rapid stopping…
Bing Bong Bing…..
Oh for the love of god what now?
A heavily accented French intoned
“Due to ze bad weather condition, and ze broken train in front we have to stop ere for ebout 40 minutezzz, we apologizze for ze inconvenience , we expect arrive at 1230”
My fellow passengers start to edge away in their seats as I bang my head repeatedly off the table…..
I’m now in the office, finishing off this long diatribe, could i-Travel have helped me in this journey? There were so many on route contextual events that I doubt it, and even though I’m a fan of technology it has its limits.
I fell back on good old, map reading, asking people and luck to complete my trip to Brussels a trip of 521 km’s which has taken me in just travel time alone of 13 hours, about 40 km’s an hour not bad in the age of super sonic travel.
In this case I would have hoped that i-Travel would have told me to stay at home.
