trains suck
i used to be a great fan of this form of transport. it served me very well going from aberdeen to edinburgh and back to meet up with jimmy and go to races. i felt quite chuffed, it was cheap, it was pretty quick, and it was apparently saving on my carbon footprint, or something. i think that may be some new sort of cycling shoes but im not sure, i hear the media banging on non stop about “carbon footprints” so they must be pretty trick!
disaster struck on saturday, when i decided to venture alot further on the train than i ever have before, and go from aberdeen to london. it turned into a long long drawn out day. i kicked off at about 9am, to head to edinburgh to get onto the a bigger train to get to london. pretty easy i thought, i had a bike, a massive bag and a laptop bag, so wasnt to hard to get about.
my issues first started when i got on my train and they informed me that the forth bridge was shut, so my normal 2hour 20min train turned into a 3 hour one, which made my connection in edinburgh bloody tight.
i got to edinburgh with 12min before my next train kicked off, so had to go through some security gates, walk about 1km down to the other end of the train (it probably wasnt a km, but it was a stupidly long train, and i hate walking. its very prehistoric, and im over it) and drop my bike and my big bag into the guards van, then go all the way back down to the other end to get into my carridge. after that i felt pretty content that things were ok and nothing else was going to stop me making all my connections in london, to get to the flat, and go race the next day.
all i can say is everything seemed to break, the points on the track, the train for a while, my mental stabililty, my will to keep breathing both in and out, it all went to pieces. safe to say i got into london pretty pissed off, and late. so late infact i couldnt really make any connections to anywhere, so couldnt get to the flat, and therefore, couldnt race.
it sucked, and it was just one of those occasions where i had to just grin and bear it, and go stay somewhere in london for the night.
i have now decided that i dont care about my carbon footprint, and am going to fly. for the same trip it would have cost me 10quid more, and i wouldve got there in an hour and a half. im sorry mother nature, but you need to speak to british rail and tell them to pull their socks up, then ill trust them again, maybe. its nothing personal, and i really do like having you around, cause your rather important, but until trains become reliable i just cant do it. also if you could do something about the rain, that would be tops. cheers!
