Just had another Lumo trip, so thought best tag onto this thread, if moderators feel need to move etc then please do.
Yesterday(weds 1st December) i did my second trip on Lumo,mainly to do them before their price goes up, went out on the 10.45 Kings Cross-Edinburgh and back on the 16.12 Edinburgh-Kings Cross,
I arrived Kings cross in good time, and got some food and drink, then waited for the ECS form Ferne Park reception sidings to arrive, which it did 10 mins early, then used the time,to take some pics of the train and in the rear cab, before boarded the train, then went to coach E and found table of 4 to settle into, we left on time, with running being slow, as we were behind the 10.42 Kings Cross-Kings Lynn, which had left couple mins late, we had slow running out to Hitchin area, then picked up speed a bit, till after Grantham where we had a few TSr’s and caught up with proceeding Leeds train, then had signal stop near Ranskill, so we passed through Doncaster 15 mins late, then because York was busy, got to do the York avoider line, which was a nice bagging of rare track, and by doing the avoider, we gained back time, to pass Skelton Bridge Junction, only 6 mins late.
We continued, with on and off running to Edinburgh, staying 6-10 mins late,for the rest of the way, finally arriving Edinburgh just over 3 mins late, which was pretty good, as there seemed to have been quite a lot of delays on the ECMl, with a signal power failure in Oxwellmains area, on southbound track, causing delays of up to 60 mins approx and quite few cancellations, when i learned of this, i was bit worried, that we be heavily delayed going back, but i had no choice, so just sucked it up, while in Edinburgh, i got some food, before heading over to the 16.12 back to kings cross.
We left on time, and ahead of the 16.07 Edinburgh-Bristol, which left at 16.14, just behind us, with good running to the Oxwellmains area, where we stopped then proceeded slowly for a while, as only one train was being allowed through at a time, we lost 17 mins due to this, which was fine in the end, then we gradually clawed back some of this lateness, but with the 16.00 Edinburgh-Kings Cross just in front of us, With its few more calls than us, we got stuck behind it, till Doncaster, where we got to over take it, as we only had a Stevenage stop to make, which was good regulation, as if we had been stuck behind it to kings Cross, we would have been over 25 mins late, as it arrived at 21.12, after Doncaster we had on and off running again, but made up a little bit of time to arrive Kings Cross 20.55, just 8 mins late.
The Lumo service did really Well to run only 8 mins late on the way back, and not be cancelled, as LNER had curtailed and cancelled quite a few services this day. and For once, the faster train got to overtake a slower train, booked all the way. In front of it, so hats off to the signallers and controllers, for helping this happen, as it would have been easy just to keep us behind the slower service all the way to kings cross, I get the feeing that the Lumo service, has a pro active team looking after it, as with all the disruption going on, it ran pretty well to time, and was not cancelled or curtailed.
