I had a most pleasant journey home from London Paddington last night. The FGW train left more or less on time at 1745, and arrived at Bristol Parkway at, wait for it, 2315.
Yes, you read right, 2315. FOUR hours late. And that was only to BP, not Newport. I arranged for Rachel and my dad to come pick me up at BP as the train I was on terminated there, and I wasn’t going to risk waiting for another train to go the final hurdle to Newport. I got home eventually at 0035.
Why such massive delays? Well, about FIVE minutes before the 1745 train was due to arrive at BP, it stopped. Something wrong with the wheels, or the track. Could have been something to do with the sensors along the track that stop a train automatically (I didn’t know they could do that) if a fault with the train is detected. Well, a fault was detected with the train I was on, and it was stopped, and was not allowed to go above a certain speed. We had to wait for engineers to come and inspect the fault, and as we were in the middle of nowhere, in pitch blackness, they had to get the train to BP so that people could at least get off.
Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh.
Three positive things about this fiasco:
- I got a complimentary cup of tea and chocolate muffin;
- I’ll be able to claim a refund of 50% of my ticket fare as the delays were more than one hour; and
- I taught Natalie (the girl who was in the seat next to mine) the BSL alphabet.