TT-ONR-NRN
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TT-ONR-NRN
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185143
Established Member
- Joined
- 3 Mar 2013
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- 4,506
I can actually start working on typing my latest reports up now-wasn't going to bother with the character limit!
Blindtraveler
Established Member
I hadnt spotted this alteration, it sneeked in as quietly well un announced as Sunday Engineering on a branch line in January. Thanks to all who helped out/did the work behind the sceens in forum HQ.
Blindtraveler
Established Member
Everyone in the trip reports section needs to buy @Mojo a pint! Top bloke. Let the frothing about windswept welsh shacks and dubious favourite traction continue!
185143
Established Member
- Joined
- 3 Mar 2013
- Messages
- 4,506
Blindtraveler
Established Member
08th October:
Making a consession to the fact that it was Sunday, I hadnt been working and was having a break from normality I decided not to jump out of bed, walk to the tower and have a spin on the early trams but instead had a lazy morning, with the acception of leaping out of bed into the shower early on before other guests got there.
Breakfast was as usual at 9 and as usual excillent and after putting a few bits into a bag I headed for North station just after 11. Bustitution days are the best ones to travel from this dump as the door obsessed out of work bouncers mascaraiding as railwaymen have little to do in comparison to the bus coordinators who today had a good 400 people to move at the time I was there. I loaded onto a Volvo decker non stop to Preston and was entertained for the next 40 minutes by a singing hen party as well as B7TL Thrash. The journey planner had said an hours journey so I was far to early for my connection meaning another chance to sit on P1/2. At 13:02 a double 156 arrived on a Manchester airport service first stop Wiggan and we were routed on the fasts!
Short wate here before Bungle and Ian turned up and we strolled over to Walgate and took up residence on a 156 so recently 2020'd that the grab handle in the bog still had its wrappings on. I had been saving this branch for day with a good supply of patients as its slow but this extra Sunday working in the form a 1 train 1 crew wonder only stopped once, not counting the trespassers on motorbikes so was a lot of fun, sprinter thrash plus open hoppers plus jointed track and a tunnel equals happy me.
At Kirkby it was a mad dash to buy a ticket and onto Mersyrail for the trip to Liverpool and onto South Parkway.
Making a consession to the fact that it was Sunday, I hadnt been working and was having a break from normality I decided not to jump out of bed, walk to the tower and have a spin on the early trams but instead had a lazy morning, with the acception of leaping out of bed into the shower early on before other guests got there.
Breakfast was as usual at 9 and as usual excillent and after putting a few bits into a bag I headed for North station just after 11. Bustitution days are the best ones to travel from this dump as the door obsessed out of work bouncers mascaraiding as railwaymen have little to do in comparison to the bus coordinators who today had a good 400 people to move at the time I was there. I loaded onto a Volvo decker non stop to Preston and was entertained for the next 40 minutes by a singing hen party as well as B7TL Thrash. The journey planner had said an hours journey so I was far to early for my connection meaning another chance to sit on P1/2. At 13:02 a double 156 arrived on a Manchester airport service first stop Wiggan and we were routed on the fasts!
Short wate here before Bungle and Ian turned up and we strolled over to Walgate and took up residence on a 156 so recently 2020'd that the grab handle in the bog still had its wrappings on. I had been saving this branch for day with a good supply of patients as its slow but this extra Sunday working in the form a 1 train 1 crew wonder only stopped once, not counting the trespassers on motorbikes so was a lot of fun, sprinter thrash plus open hoppers plus jointed track and a tunnel equals happy me.
At Kirkby it was a mad dash to buy a ticket and onto Mersyrail for the trip to Liverpool and onto South Parkway.
Blindtraveler
Established Member
We were joined here by AntoniC and at Central by 185143, Yorkie and Starmill having joined at Wallgate. From here the train ran non stop to South Parkway which was fun, much better than the similar journey on a 350 normally and here we made our way slowly over for the London bound pendo which wasnt ready so we were held up stairs wating for it until it was. Off on time and towards West Allerton JN we went, reversing there for Runcorn. 185143 left us here and the rest of us headed for dinner at a loveley Itallian place 10 mins away, great food service and value.
Returning we got the 17:54 LM service and split up at Parkway, myself enlisting staff assistance for the best route towards Preston which ended up being to Ormskirk, picking up the Pacer there for a nice fast furious rattle on another line needed and another that normallysees no Sunday service. In and out of PRE in 8 minutes thanks to dullsville Inviro decker on a stopping bustitution that was about to leave when I got to it and which did have power and WiFi though so no issue with that.
Returning we got the 17:54 LM service and split up at Parkway, myself enlisting staff assistance for the best route towards Preston which ended up being to Ormskirk, picking up the Pacer there for a nice fast furious rattle on another line needed and another that normallysees no Sunday service. In and out of PRE in 8 minutes thanks to dullsville Inviro decker on a stopping bustitution that was about to leave when I got to it and which did have power and WiFi though so no issue with that.
Kite159
Veteran Member
Sounded like a good day out 
Blindtraveler
Established Member
Homewards on Monday saw an interesting ticketing issue. At North on Sunday the TVM went offline as I tried to collect my advance and having called customer relations was told to speek to the guard on the South train who would probably be fine but if he did charge me I was to send it in for a refund. He didnt which was good as I didnt fancy sending a tatty bog roll ticket off to them. Other than that (and another enthusiastically driven bus seat 142) it was an uneventfull journey.
Thanks to @bungle965 @185143 @AntoniC @Starmill @IanXC @yorkie for company and friendship and sorry its still in short bits, I wrote it with the old limmit in mind and as we are coming up to a busy time of year in which im determend to find some time for bashing as well as playing endless Xmas songs I decided getting on with the admin was a better use of time than putting the report all together.
Thanks to @bungle965 @185143 @AntoniC @Starmill @IanXC @yorkie for company and friendship and sorry its still in short bits, I wrote it with the old limmit in mind and as we are coming up to a busy time of year in which im determend to find some time for bashing as well as playing endless Xmas songs I decided getting on with the admin was a better use of time than putting the report all together.
Blindtraveler
Established Member
It was indeed, particularly the company, something I miss now most people I know have moved away and of course no Wife any more.
Techniquest
Veteran Member
All in all a very enjoyable couple of days there, all while I was busy grafting on the Saturday and resting on the Sunday!
Blindtraveler
Established Member
With the covering of the track after holytown station used by the 1700 Anderston carstairs on Monday I can now say Scottish passenger network Tick!
This last PSUL boo wish I was stupid enough not to do before it became such has waited rather a long time to fall owing to the fact that it is a serious pain to do in the evening and until a couple of weeks ago and the introduction of 24 hour service on Scottish Citylink 900 Edinburgh Glasgow service now on impossible to do in the morning
But after months of not quite managing it for one reason or another it finally fell on a soggy damp evening and was followed by what felt like a year festering at carstairs for the 380 to return me to civilisation, giving us a demonstration of their appalling Handling of wet weather in the process.
My thanks to Alex for letting me gatecrash his central Scotland Rover
This last PSUL boo wish I was stupid enough not to do before it became such has waited rather a long time to fall owing to the fact that it is a serious pain to do in the evening and until a couple of weeks ago and the introduction of 24 hour service on Scottish Citylink 900 Edinburgh Glasgow service now on impossible to do in the morning
But after months of not quite managing it for one reason or another it finally fell on a soggy damp evening and was followed by what felt like a year festering at carstairs for the 380 to return me to civilisation, giving us a demonstration of their appalling Handling of wet weather in the process.
My thanks to Alex for letting me gatecrash his central Scotland Rover
Kite159
Veteran Member
Have you done the Mossend South - Mossend East chord from Motherwell towards Holytown? [the other part which used to have the hourly service to Lanark pre timetable change due to Whifflet getting wired] Probably harder to do than Holytown - Wishaw as the only services which I believe use it are the first & last Shotts services which go into Motherwell rather than Glasgow.
Good news on getting the Holytown - Wishaw link in
Good news on getting the Holytown - Wishaw link in
This is the only one - http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/G85456/2017/10/18/advanced
Kite159
Veteran Member
There was me thinking the last Edinburgh -> Shotts service went into Motherwell, my memory must be poor. Although it would be a one-way trip that time of night with no escape from Motherwell
alexf380
Established Member
The inward working to Motherwell, 23:13 off Edinburgh, travels via Carstairs. The only 158 booked to stable at Motherwell, as it works the psul move the next morning.
That really was a long fester at Carstairs wasnt it! More than happy to have you join me
That really was a long fester at Carstairs wasnt it! More than happy to have you join me
Blindtraveler
Established Member
This reply is not eligible for delay repay:
yes mossend East to mossend South has been covered in all directions and I did the bit referred to up thread before whifflet was electrified. Admittedly not much before gonna I think I was on one of the last trains to do it on a regular basis before the timetable went a bit wild and woolly firstly due to the works and then they recast too to incorporate electric services over a wider area
it's a long time since I put anything on here, since then a number of stations have fallen and some new bits of track have been covered. new stock has been travelled on, old stock experienced post refurbishment. the reality is however that a lot of my mileage is simply repeats of stuff I've done many times before and not very interesting to write about even if I'd been on here to write about it
of note trackwise the Windermere branch which kept getting missed due to delays cancellations changes of plan and 101 other reasons finally fell on a one-way journey for which I positioned myself using a bus from Penrith, a trip I've been wanting to do for a while.
I also managed to to travel the valley of no hope on a cheap northern advance on an unrefurbished 150, travelling it again a year later in the other direction on a refurbished 150.
One of my most interesting outings was October last year when a long wave a fellow forum member and his girlfriend I flew to Dublin on a Boeing 787 dreamliner, first time in the Republic and and later the same day went by coach across the border to Belfast for a taxi to the ferry terminal and overnight ferry to Liverpool. This worked out cheaper than overnight hotel somewhere or returning straight home with someone horrible like Ryanair
January 2020 saw me fly out with easyJet to Vienna to visit my cousin who lives there. amongst other things whilst out there I covered most of of the subway system, took a a domestic mainline service 2 Linz and back, took a short trip on the Danube, tried out various buses and trams, met the famous singing locomotives hauling some rather comfortable double deck inter-regional stock and and finally found a Siemens built unit that I like in the shape of the new cityjet stock operating on their equivalent of London Overground or crossrail. My first international long-distance Rail journey rounded the trip off as I was lucky enough to be on the inaugural nightjet from Vienna to Brussels complete with band on the platform and various other excitements. I didn't know how I would feel about 14 and 1/2 hours on it but to be fair I slept extremely well and it passed in a flash. Lovely two and a half hour connection in Brussels for Eurostar to London where I encountered another piece of Siemens rolling stock that I don't like and although I don't have the bug to conquer all of Europe by rail as many do I would certainly seriously contemplate using this option again for future trips as I have to say that on my return leg I was so much less stressed with a couple of long train journeys then with the whole airport routine especially for international passengers with additional security and passport checks. I should think this would be even more relevant now in the post lockdown world of social distancing and airport temperature checks and further waiting around and hassle, not something that I'm looking forward to experiencing I must admit
I'd like to thank all forum members and regular trip reporters who have remained friends during my long spell away from the forum. I'm certainly not back in the same way as I was previously and doubt I ever will be, my mental health is not overly stable these days and disappearing again without warning is a de strong possibility. Thank you to those who let me join in on their travels, gatecrash their hotel rooms and generally been as fantastic as you have been. Let's have as much and more of that in future. I value it very highly
Lockdown caused postponement of a number of planned trips including my eventual conquering of what was left of Wales some of which has been rescheduled for the autumn. I have just remembered also that at New year 2019 to 20 did finally make it to Bournemouth but I'm going to have to return there to get down to Poole and some of the other track in that area. getting to Bournemouth in the first place was a mission as I started from dalbeattie southwest Scotland on a bus and then travelled via Dumfries Carlisle and London as well as changing in reading on to cross country to do this trip which took just shy of 12 hours
yes mossend East to mossend South has been covered in all directions and I did the bit referred to up thread before whifflet was electrified. Admittedly not much before gonna I think I was on one of the last trains to do it on a regular basis before the timetable went a bit wild and woolly firstly due to the works and then they recast too to incorporate electric services over a wider area
it's a long time since I put anything on here, since then a number of stations have fallen and some new bits of track have been covered. new stock has been travelled on, old stock experienced post refurbishment. the reality is however that a lot of my mileage is simply repeats of stuff I've done many times before and not very interesting to write about even if I'd been on here to write about it
of note trackwise the Windermere branch which kept getting missed due to delays cancellations changes of plan and 101 other reasons finally fell on a one-way journey for which I positioned myself using a bus from Penrith, a trip I've been wanting to do for a while.
I also managed to to travel the valley of no hope on a cheap northern advance on an unrefurbished 150, travelling it again a year later in the other direction on a refurbished 150.
One of my most interesting outings was October last year when a long wave a fellow forum member and his girlfriend I flew to Dublin on a Boeing 787 dreamliner, first time in the Republic and and later the same day went by coach across the border to Belfast for a taxi to the ferry terminal and overnight ferry to Liverpool. This worked out cheaper than overnight hotel somewhere or returning straight home with someone horrible like Ryanair
January 2020 saw me fly out with easyJet to Vienna to visit my cousin who lives there. amongst other things whilst out there I covered most of of the subway system, took a a domestic mainline service 2 Linz and back, took a short trip on the Danube, tried out various buses and trams, met the famous singing locomotives hauling some rather comfortable double deck inter-regional stock and and finally found a Siemens built unit that I like in the shape of the new cityjet stock operating on their equivalent of London Overground or crossrail. My first international long-distance Rail journey rounded the trip off as I was lucky enough to be on the inaugural nightjet from Vienna to Brussels complete with band on the platform and various other excitements. I didn't know how I would feel about 14 and 1/2 hours on it but to be fair I slept extremely well and it passed in a flash. Lovely two and a half hour connection in Brussels for Eurostar to London where I encountered another piece of Siemens rolling stock that I don't like and although I don't have the bug to conquer all of Europe by rail as many do I would certainly seriously contemplate using this option again for future trips as I have to say that on my return leg I was so much less stressed with a couple of long train journeys then with the whole airport routine especially for international passengers with additional security and passport checks. I should think this would be even more relevant now in the post lockdown world of social distancing and airport temperature checks and further waiting around and hassle, not something that I'm looking forward to experiencing I must admit
I'd like to thank all forum members and regular trip reporters who have remained friends during my long spell away from the forum. I'm certainly not back in the same way as I was previously and doubt I ever will be, my mental health is not overly stable these days and disappearing again without warning is a de strong possibility. Thank you to those who let me join in on their travels, gatecrash their hotel rooms and generally been as fantastic as you have been. Let's have as much and more of that in future. I value it very highly
Lockdown caused postponement of a number of planned trips including my eventual conquering of what was left of Wales some of which has been rescheduled for the autumn. I have just remembered also that at New year 2019 to 20 did finally make it to Bournemouth but I'm going to have to return there to get down to Poole and some of the other track in that area. getting to Bournemouth in the first place was a mission as I started from dalbeattie southwest Scotland on a bus and then travelled via Dumfries Carlisle and London as well as changing in reading on to cross country to do this trip which took just shy of 12 hours
Iskra
Established Member
It's great to see that you are still out and about BT. Thank you for updating us and 'checking in' so to speak!
D841 Roebuck
Established Member
Good to hear from you.
Likewise BT good to hear from you, and I hope you’re doing ok at the moment with all this stuff going on...
I’m quite busy with various things on here these days but that doesn’t mean that I don’t think about the various people that I’ve made a connection with over the years in this section.
Butts
Veteran Member
Good to see you back BT - missed the reports of your various meanderings around the Country.
Blindtraveler
Established Member
Ok all I'm in need of some advice. The aim is to sample greater Anglia new 755 working in both electric and diesel mode as well as having a run from Norwich to London or vice versa on a 745.
Starting from Edinburgh I had thought of going to Stansted by plane and and then doing the Stansted to Norwich service throughout followed by a probable overnight stay in Norwich and then a trip to London the following day. I had contemplated going on TransPennine to Manchester and then across the valley of no hope and onwards using East Midlands railway making a change somewhere along the route to access Stansted or Cambridge to try out the electric capability of the by modes but this not only seems expensive but also a little slow and rather pointless. before anybody suggest going all the way with London north Eastern eye don't like a zoomers in any form and have had enough of of their auntie passenger attitude recently the last me a lifetime
Apologies to any of their really genuinely nice employees on here but I've had a run of bad or unsatisfactory experiences since returning to the rails post lockdown and and it's rather put my back up.
Starting from Edinburgh I had thought of going to Stansted by plane and and then doing the Stansted to Norwich service throughout followed by a probable overnight stay in Norwich and then a trip to London the following day. I had contemplated going on TransPennine to Manchester and then across the valley of no hope and onwards using East Midlands railway making a change somewhere along the route to access Stansted or Cambridge to try out the electric capability of the by modes but this not only seems expensive but also a little slow and rather pointless. before anybody suggest going all the way with London north Eastern eye don't like a zoomers in any form and have had enough of of their auntie passenger attitude recently the last me a lifetime
Apologies to any of their really genuinely nice employees on here but I've had a run of bad or unsatisfactory experiences since returning to the rails post lockdown and and it's rather put my back up.
alexf380
Established Member
Other possibilities could be Avanti down to Brum then cross country over to Cambridge, or even XC to Doncaster for East Midlands down to Peterborough? Then it would (hopefully) be simple enough to get to cambridge/stanstead/Norwich from there. That would probably net you a Voyager on the XC leg though.
Blindtraveler
Established Member
The via Doncaster idea is interesting. I had prettymuch ruled out going via Birmingham as as Birmingham to Stansted or Cambridge on a cross-country 170 is a slightly horrifying prospect
Andy Pacer
Established Member
You would need to change at Sheffield rather than Doncaster to get down to Peterborough on EMR.
D841 Roebuck
Established Member
How about:
TPE: Edinburgh to Preston
Northern: Preston to Halifax
Grand Central: Halifax to Kings Cross
Then "FLIRT" your way up from Liverpool Street...
TPE: Edinburgh to Preston
Northern: Preston to Halifax
Grand Central: Halifax to Kings Cross
Then "FLIRT" your way up from Liverpool Street...
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