Juliano's World Frenzy/Tech's Trip Reports

[Clip]

Just finished reading the last day - good stuff. The Maccy D's in Waterloo is easy to find but the bad thing they took away from there was the bar at the other end from it on the concourse - how much coffee do people want to buy in that place!! Mind you any excuse to pop into the hole in the wall outside will do for me

 

[ChiefPlanner]

[Mind you any excuse to pop into the hole in the wall outside will do for me[/QUOTE]



One of the most unreformed boozers I can think of - and the toilets are of "Trainspotter" class

Good bear - sticky floors - 465 etc rumbling overhead...

 

[Techniquest]

Morning all (or at least it is when I start typing this)! It's time to start banging out the trip report from the latest adventure, and I hope Clip will be happy that I've included photos this time Managed to get onto a laptop which can manage Flickr so got on with the job before the rest of the household get up and demand every minute of my time...

31st October 2014 - Techniquest's Fury of the Bash, Day 1

Trip title inspired by Dragonforce's Fury of the Storm. After some rather tough shifts at work, I was rather glad to get onto this trip, even though there was pressure to cancel the trip and work instead, I stood my ground and kept my time off! I get a lift into town unexpectedly and have absolutely ages to kill, so I end up in Morrisons for a while before festering at the station. 170517 is on the 0940 Hereford to Birmingham New Street this morning, and we're off on time. It's time to get cracking with the biggest outstanding bit of bookwork, bringing my moves book up to date. I've been putting it off for ages, but I make excellent progress with it on the trek to Birmingham. The only other thing to note was 37175 and 37219 on Kings Norton getting a wash after being on RHTT duties, the filth coming off was unreal!

It's dud 350104 on the 1133 to London Euston, and I find myself a table seat to continue with the moves book on the way to Milton Keynes Central. Nothing of interest happened this morning, hence lack of any real detail in this trip report. Well, I finally scored the track through platform 6 at Rugby which was a nice surprise. Of course, the long fester at Northampton had to be endured, but I did also score a 350/3 for sight on Kings Heath depot so it's not all bad. The WCML comes back into view before I was expecting it, and by now the moves book is less than a month out of date.

377707 at Milton Keynes Central by 43002, on Flickr

Now I'm onto the main event of the day, a Southern DaySave 377707 is a winner too and I'm charging my phone straight away. Fortunately my phone isn't flat yet, as I've been using an A6 notebook for my observations and not been on Twitter much today yet, however I still need a fair bit of charge. It's a weird experience travelling down the WCML on a 377, it must be said, for me! The weather's also come out quite nice now, weather being as booked is a surprise!

I'll be back later, or tomorrow, with more

 

[Blindtraveler]

Excillent, look forward to more!

 

[Keith Jarrett]

Like the photo. Just look at the train crew and where they are looking. I've yet to sample a 377 at high speed on AC. Something else on the "to do" list. Will be interesting to read the rest of your report in due course.

 

[Techniquest]

Like the photo. Just look at the train crew and where they are looking. I've yet to sample a 377 at high speed on AC. Something else on the "to do" list. Will be interesting to read the rest of your report in due course.

I'm honoured I got a reply from one of the forum's legends

The woman in the photo had just got up from the bench to ask if it was the train she was waiting for, hence why they're both looking at her

It's certainly different being on a 377 down the WCML, I was in the front coach so unless that was indeed a motor coach you don't get much noise out of them. I'm determined to go for some more fast 321 action next time I'm on a Great Escape though, because as some of you will remember from my previous one's trip report (Techniquest's Time To Bash) I thoroughly enjoyed the Cheddington to Bletchley run I did on 321411+321412!

I'll be back in a bit with more of the trip report, been rather busy since the rather short first installment!
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Some of the observations are now done, and it won't be long until pressure to stop doing stuff I need to do mounts up, so let's see what I can get done in the meantime here!

31st October 2014 continued

Passing Bushey and entering the London Travelcard zones puts a big smile on my face, and I get my first proper view of Hitachi's depot at North Pole. Seems like forever since 373s used North Pole and my looking out of the window on passing HSTs trying to find 373s I needed for sight! By now I'm seeing why everyone moans about the seats on the 377/7s, I've been sat down for well over an hour and I could do with getting off now. I always forget about the big gap between train and platform at Clapham Junction's platform 17, and I appreciate the walk about. I see there's an East Grinstead train at 1459, so plenty of time to soak up some sunshine. Coming back to the platforms, I see there's a fast train to Brighton due shortly, and I have enough time to get a Caffe Nero coffee in. I couldn't find Costa, before anyone asks! Much to my surprise, it's double winners 377160 and 377109 on the 1436 London Victoria to Brighton, and I manage to find a table seat to add the sugar to my coffee. My fellow passengers at this table leave at East Croydon and are replaced by a mother and two kids, the latter spend virtually the entire trip telling each other Halloween stories. 48 minutes after leaving Clapham Junction, I arrive at Brighton at 1530.

313219 at Brighton by 43002, on Flickr

No time to hang about, winner 377427 is due out shortly on the 1533 to Southampton Central! After Hove I manage to get a table seat, and I spend a few minutes deciding where to alight. West Worthing gets chosen eventually, and the lovely weather is still going. 23 minutes later I'm off the train again and have just a few minutes before heading back east, this time on a Bus Stop Bash (thank you Keith Jarrett for that!) to Worthing for another shack scratch. Winner for everything 313220 is up next for a trip east to Fishersgate. Of course, I get into the motor coach for obvious reasons, although it must be said it's rather different cranking 313s on third rail and not on AC power! Nothing of interest noted here and I join 313219 for a winning BSB to Southwick. That's now almost all the smaller stations on the West Coastway out of the way, except for Aldrington. It's now getting quite dark and we're definitely into evening peak time, so I head back east to Hove to position myself as well as I can for it. Winner 313201 takes me there, at least my NREA is starting to look a bit better now!

Fishersgate station signs by 43002, on Flickr

Onto dud 377152 leading winner 377105 next, and the platform suddenly becomes rather busy as it pulls in. Off west to Durrington-on-Sea for a required shack, and I figure there's got to plenty of stuff coming down yet. Nothing I need for ages, and I give up and return to the shack attacks with dud 377438 after a while. Off next down the road to Goring-by-Sea, which appeared to be vice 313. It's not a long wait here thankfully for the next service west, and to my surprise it's double winners 377150 and 377441. Excellent news for my books! Off to Angmering now, and 377124 is a winner a few minutes later going west. By now I was absolutely starving, and I think about going all the way to Portsmouth and Southsea to find somewhere to eat, same for Chichester where I know there's a takeaway not far away. However I settle for bailing at Barnham, as Bognor Regis has a better choice from memory.

313220 awaits the off at Barnham by 43002, on Flickr

377124 and 313220 at Barnham by 43002, on Flickr

It's dud 313220 on the shuttle to Bognor Regis, and I end up waiting to see what's on the Littlehampton. It rolls in with winner for everything 313213, so I run like mad down the ramp, through the subway and up the other ramp for it! I am of course, at this point, assuming that I'll find somewhere acceptable to eat at in Littlehampton! A few minutes later I've found the local Wetherspoon, The George Inn, and it's Fish Friday so I go for that. £5.15 with a pint, not bad at all!

313206 at Littlehampton by 43002, on Flickr

It's not a long wait (less than 10 minutes) for the food and during that time, I check the time of trains heading back east, as it's getting on now and I want to get to base camp! The meal is OK, not the best I've ever had but it did the job of fuelling me up. A stop at Morrisons Local first before heading back to the station for supplies gets me some snacks and Dr Pepper to get through the rest of the trip. Much to my surprise there's still the Red Star logo on the station sign here!

Littlehampton station sign by 43002, on Flickr

313208 at Littlehampton by 43002, on Flickr

Winner for everything 313208 is on the 1949 to Brighton, that'll do nicely! I get on with updating the Baker and NREA on this 42 minute trip to Aldrington, which is over before I know it to my surprise. The map is brought up on my phone, and the walk is fairly straightforward to my base camp tonight, Adastral Hotel. 15 minute walk and I'm checked in quite quickly, always a plus. My room is not massive, but plenty big enough for me. En-suite bathroom, a good size TV, fairly comfortable bed, tea/coffee could have been a little more plentiful but I managed, and the bathroom could have done with being a little bigger but it was still fine for my requirements. The usual evening stuff gets done, and while waiting for The Big Bang Theory to start I decide I might as well get the de-rancification done now. The bag also mostly prepped for the morning, alarm set for a most leisurely 0800. Been an enjoyable day for sure, just wish I could have got here quicker!

Unfortunately guys, I'm going to have to leave it there for now. I'll try to get Day 2 done later, but I have severe doubts as to that happening. I would attempt to type up Day 2 tomorrow on my commute, but 1) I can't include the photos that way and 2) I have a lot of my commuting log to get updated which is a priority! Hopefully it won't be a long wait to get this finished!
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Alrighty then, I have some time to get cracking again this afternoon, much to my surprise! Let's go then:

1st November 2014 - Techniquest's Fury of the Bash, Day 2

Rudely awoken by a PNB at 0630, I try sleeping again until 0800 but give up with that again by 0700. After a brief foray on Twitter, I'm wondering what to do until 0800 when breakfast service begins. A coffee is devoured while sorting out other stuff in the bag and ensuring my room would be left presentable and not a pigsty (I'd hate to walk into a major mess if I was the cleaner, so feel it's only fair to leave a room tidy on leaving), then walk down to the seafront. It's only about a 30 second walk and I spend a while soaking up the sea air before returning to the hotel to finish preparations for departure. I'm downstairs just before 0800 and service begins a little late this morning, the lady was more than apologetic about it but I was in no real rush this morning so it was all good.

A most enjoyable breakfast is devoured, freshly cooked too so it was even better and I left the breakfast room most satisfied. After returning to the room to pick up my bags, I return to reception to pay the £45 which I considered quite the reasonable rate for my stay. I now have two options, walk to Aldrington station and pay £2.60 for a single into Brighton or walk to town. I decide to go for the walk as this will allow me to enjoy the sea view as well. It takes around 45 minutes to do the walk according to my rough calculations, along the way a visitor from Dusseldorf asks if I know of any taxi ranks, which I don't, but I offer to show him the way by foot instead. He seemed most grateful for this and we part ways at the station. I still have quite a while until my train to London, so I make some observations and watch the world go by. No Costa coffee outlet in sight sadly. Before I know it, the time's flown by and I'm boarding winner 377472 with dud 377114 on the back on the 1024 to London Victoria. Wish I'd booked the 1019 though, as that was 377604 and 377605! The 0949 was also a pair of 377/6s as well!

377604 and 377472 at Brighton by 43002, on Flickr

I also manage to score a few 313/2s for sight this morning, which is excellent news and now only need a few more. Next time, Tech, next time! (This is a reference to Dr Claw in Inspector Gadget, for the unaware) I spend most of the journey working on the moves book again, and I'm now nearly caught up. I'm also looking out of the window to try and ID 377s I need for sight, and for 450569 when I get to Clapham Junction. No such luck on the latter, but I do manage a couple more 377/6s so all is good. We're 6 minutes late into Victoria this morning, due to waiting for what felt like quite some time south of East Croydon. I see there's a VSOE in on the Eastern side, which I was only made aware of by the sound of a GM engine. I couldn't be bothered to go and see what was on it though, instead settling for claiming my free McDonalds coffee and eventually heading for the Victoria line.

What I wasn't prepared for was the extreme crowds both sides of the barriers on the Underground! There's a closure in part on the Circle/District, but surely that wouldn't account for this amount of people?! Just over 10 minutes later, winners 11040+11039 roll in after seeing off at least 4 pairs that were all dud, that'll do nicely as they're also required for sight! I still haven't seen any of the lower numbered sets today, do they actually work much or am I just unlucky with those? A 7 minute ride gets me to Euston, and the barriers don't like either the guy in front of me with his Oyster or me and my contactless debit card. I honestly can't tell if it touched out or in OK, maybe I will stick to using my Oyster card in future. I must get in touch with TfL and try to find out if they charged me the correct fee or not!

I still have just short of an hour to kill by the time I get to the surface, so I go wandering about, ending up at Euston Square (not the station!) watching the world go by and catching up on Twitter and Facebook. This kills quite a bit of time, and on my return to Euston I have a look at my Oyster balance, just £1 left on it. I get a large Costa coffee here (first coffee since breakfast time over 4 hours ago by now!), and stand by the departure boards waiting for the 1313 to Birmingham New Street to be announced

Departure board at London Euston by 43002, on Flickr

Eventually it's announced as platform 10, and I go charging off. I still get overtaken by quite a few people, although they could easily have been late for the 1305 to Tring which had gone by now. I find a seat on 350116 and settle in for the long trek back to one of my spiritual homes of cranking, Birmingham New Street. For those who haven't heard what these are yet, they are Swansea, London Paddington, Birmingham New Street, Crewe, Hereford, Cardiff Central and Bristol Temple Meads. I might have missed a few out but they're the main ones anyway. Basically they're based on where I've spent a lot of time spotting and cranking in the past, or they're where it all started, or in the case of London Paddington especially they're a favourite station.

We're off on time for a belting run up the WCML up to Ledburn Junction where we have to take the slows all the way onwards. Nice while it lasted though! The moves book is out again, but I do also make several observations on the way north too. These included 70804 and 70805 at Queens Park on an engineers train (thanks fishquinn for the gen!), 804 being a winner for sight! By Northampton I've finished updating the moves book at long last, and the rest of the journey to Birmingham is spent just chilling, playing music and making observations. We arrive 1 minute early at 1516 (yes we had a good path into Birmingham! hock and I go for my usual wander before the train home, getting another large Costa coffee in before joining 170630 on the 1549 to Hereford. It's the usual mundane journey, a highlight though being the count of the winners I've had this year. I hope I've counted it up correctly, a re-count is due I suspect, but I find I've had a massive 564 winners this year! This count does include trams and the Underground, but not any road vehicles.

Front of my NREA 2012 by 43002, on Flickr

Rear of my NREA 2012 by 43002, on Flickr

The above two photos are of my NREA 2012 edition, which show just how much I needed to get the 2014 edition recently! Arrival back into Hereford is at 1716, 3 minutes early, and I'm getting a lift home tonight. I have to endure a food shopping trip first though, but I get to have chip shop tea which is a tidy little bonus! I'm still home well before the bus would have got me in (as that leaves at 1815), and the end of another successful trip is here. My mileages came out at 287m24c for Day 1 and 223m21c for Day 2 in the end, not bad at all. I've now also cleared 10,000 miles for 2014 which I'm very happy about! October 2014 got me 1,887 miles too which is almost my best amount for the whole year!

Total winners were 10 377s, 2 LU Victoria line sets and 5 313/2s, not bad at all!

 

[James Wake]

I'm boarding winner 377472 with dud 377114 on the back on the 1024 to London Victoria. Wish I'd booked the 1019 though, as that was 377604 and 377605! The 0949 was also a pair of 377/6s as well!

Those two trains are booked for 377/6s so remember for next time, I had 377605/4 on Saturday afternoon on the 1636 VIC to BTN, after doing 377610 from Horsham via Dorking, I then caught the 1744 to Hove (313203) then 1751 to VIC (377409 to begin with then swapped into the front unit of the 12 coaches, 377406 to Gatwick to finish)

At least you got 377472, the leading speed run set 9 years ago.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Thanks techniquest, another good read that, lots of interest there, I would think with the withdrawal first of GatX 442s and 313s in the next few years we'll be seeing quite a few Daysave trip reports on here as the masses try to get them all in!↲

 

[Techniquest]

Those two trains are booked for 377/6s so remember for next time, I had 377605/4 on Saturday afternoon on the 1636 VIC to BTN, after doing 377610 from Horsham via Dorking, I then caught the 1744 to Hove (313203) then 1751 to VIC (377409 to begin with then swapped into the front unit of the 12 coaches, 377406 to Gatwick to finish)

At least you got 377472, the leading speed run set 9 years ago.

I'll try to remember that Still, I can always get them on Metro services anyway, but it would be nice to get some proper distance in on the sub-class. We'll see what the next DaySave brings, but I suspect it'll be a lot more 313 cranking!

Sounds like you had a good trip too Didn't remember 472 was the lead 377 on the speed run!
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Thanks techniquest, another good read that, lots of interest there, I would think with the withdrawal first of GatX 442s and 313s in the next few years we'll be seeing quite a few Daysave trip reports on here as the masses try to get them all in!↲

I'm still looking at it and thinking "I've written far, far better ones before" though! Still, every writer has his off-day!

Aye the 442s will be off soon enough and I'm considering making an effort for them. Thing is, I don't know where to bother or not, after all they're not exactly a class I enjoy massively and never really have been. The 313s, though, I do have a soft spot for and will quite happily hunt them down massively. With regards to the 442s, if they turn up I'll not flag them but I'm not about to start going crazy with them!

No doubt over the next year or so I'll have, from a rough guess, another 3 DaySave reports coming to the forum but we'll see what 2015 brings. After all, one day I'm going to have to make an effort to clear out my requirements on SWT (163 MUs needed over there IIRC) and that's a giant PITA with so few rangers and rovers covering SWT's network at all! Particularly I'm looking at Portsmouth to London and the area around Ascot...

As things stand, right now my list of options for #30thbirthdaycrankspree boils down to this lot:

Merseyrail Saveaway
Lancashire Day Ranger
West Yorkshire Day Rover
Greater Manchester Rail Ranger
Cheshire Day Ranger
South Pennines Day Ranger
Tyne and Tees Day Ranger
Finishing the Tyne and Wear Metro (and scoring a ton of the trains!)
Manchester Metrolink
SPT Daytripper
Glasgow Roundabout
East Midlands Day Ranger
East Midlands 3 in 7
North West 4 in 8
Devon Day Ranger
Ride Cornwall
Blackpool Trams
Sheffield Supertram (only need one tiny bit, but a ton of the trams!)
Anglia Plus Day Ranger
Anglia Plus 3 in 7
Kent Rover
Southern DaySave
FoSS
WMDR
Mega bash in London (and I do mean mega! I could have a massive clearout in 3 days! )
Central Scotland 3 in 7
Cumbria Day Ranger
North Downs Day Ranger

Each and every option (granted, some of them could be combined over the 3 days I have off for the trip, like the SPT Daytripper and Glasgow Roundabout) would reap big results both in red penning and shack attacks. Without a doubt I've missed a few good rangers and/or rovers that I'd like to do, so the above list should not be treated as exhaustive (if I find the equivalent for Great Northern/Thameslink as exists for Southern, I'm there!), but it should provide a good insight into how much I have to choose from! I aim to have everything booked by the end of 18th November 2014, just 15 days to go!

Finally for now, expect a trip report from Sweden on the same day!

 

[Kite159]

A well used book that.

Good report as usual

Issue with the 442s is some Southern guards not liking the use of Southern Daysave tickets on a Southern service.

---

I think the old FCC Thameslink rover got redrawn (the one you had to buy at a small number of shops) which could have been useful, but you could probably cover a lot of the Thameslink units with a travelcard (just a shame the stations in the core section are a bit of a pain to get from one platform to another)

 

[Techniquest]

Shame about the Thameslink one, would have come in handy for shack attacks north of Elstree and Borehamwood!

That book has been made to keep going for ages, very well used indeed! Glad you enjoyed the trip report

 

[Kristofferson]

Another cracking read, wouldn't mind spending a day on the rails myself (WCML,WLL,LUL,GEML...) - not so much for spotting but to experience different classes and scenery on a grand day out!

Maybe one for when the missus is away for the weekend...

Looking forward to the "crank spree" - bring back the "Ed" notes!

 

[Techniquest]

Looking forward to the "crank spree" - bring back the "Ed" notes!

Glad you enjoyed the read

Yes the 'Ed' notes are sadly missing from this one, which I blame on not being in the best of moods when I was getting it done. If I'm not happy, or constantly distracted while doing these reports, it is near impossible to get the right frame of mind for the humour that is the 'Ed' humour!

I suppose it doesn't help I wrote none of the trip report into my notebook or anywhere else (the laptop I bought second-hand from Cash Generator early this year is beyond saving now, clearing my stuff off it asap and scrapping it), plus with the rush to get it all done it wasn't my best trip report.

The crank spree is for my 30th birthday, celebrating big style with a multi-day trip although I'll have to be back on the day itself to celebrate at home too. 14 days until I can get it all booked, and 10 days until the Stockholm trip!

 

[Blindtraveler]

Gumtree often good for some cheepo laptops, this from the man in need of one too!

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Outstanding - you need to do Thameslink north on an evening like tonight - heavily loaded 319's getting to grips with wet rails and leaves , slipping all over the place. Great driving skills as you can sense and feel the drivers getting the feel of the road. Will miss them when they finally go

 

[Techniquest]

Aye it will be mighty odd not seeing 319s on Thameslink At least I can still get them,soon enough, in the North West

Bet it's great fun in the motor coach when there's epic slipping going on!

 

[Clip]

Nice read and pics techniquest. Those coastway 313s look really good in the liverly I must say.

 

[Techniquest]

Aye they do like much tidier than the GN 313s! Glad you enjoyed the read!

 

[Techniquest]

Just to say I haven't forgotten the trip report, I am rather busy at the moment!
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Trip report is all typed up, photos are uploaded and captioned on Flickr, however as it's now very much into the small hours of the morning I'll finish this later as I'm tired and need some doss. Taken several hours to write it all up and do all the photos, so I'll post it with photos at some point later today or whenever I can during the week.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Looking forward to it!

 

[Techniquest]

I've got the RA to get this posted, so let's get the formatting finished and add the photos! Going to take a bit of time mind, but here we go!

14/11/2014 – Techniquest’s Anglo-Swede Bash, Day 1

I know this trip report has been rather delayed, and it’s going to take a while to get done in its entirety, but bear with me! It’s been a long and hard going week at work with another such week (actually a tougher one) coming up it means updates to this may be infrequent but it will be done before my next trip! [Which is not far away now, 13/12/2014, and it’s a big trip too. But we’ll get to that nearer the time – Ed]

This trip officially started the night before, and I had thankfully managed to get the day off work which was just as well, the final prep took much longer than originally anticipated! After a lift into town, it’s time for a bit of a social before going to my fellow colleague’s house ready for a ridiculously early departure in the morning. After some food and other bits and bobs, it’s time to attempt some decent sleep. Of course, I’ve got the usual pre-trip excitement going on so it’s hard to sleep, in the interim I pop onto the forum to try and catch up on recent postings on the forum on threads I’ve posted on, it having been several days since my previous visit [and it’s been 10 days since my last proper visit on the forum too! – Ed]. Eventually some amount of sleep comes around but only a couple of hours’ worth. Still, it’ll do and I’m up and about slightly ahead of my 0245 alarm [the earliest I’ve ever set one for on a trip! – Ed] at 0237 and it’s time to go over everything one very last time. By the time we’re both ready to go, the rain starts coming down very hard, and it’s off on the long drive [he was driving not me, in case you thought I was suddenly a qualified driver! – Ed] to Essex at 0321. It’s not long until the first can of Rockstar Xdurance Blue gets cracked open, after the ATM stop in Hereford I believe.

The sat-nav is already driving us both mad, and we start ignoring it as we know where we’re going. He knows our planned route for the first few sectors anyway, and we’re still on local and/or familiar territory for just over half of this morning’s drive for me. It still makes us laugh later on how it suggests doing a U-turn on a dual carriageway in several places, and other silly things. I’m more than capable of reading an atlas [one benefit of being a travel nerd I suppose! – Ed] and I’m armed with BBC Motorway Updates so we don’t need a sat-nav! Onwards still in the heavy rain towards Ledbury and over the most lightly used motorway in the country, the M50, before reaching Gloucester. By now the weather was better so less stressful driving conditions, so we both managed to relax a bit. The time was already getting on by now though, which was becoming a concern. Storming up Birdlip Hill [ah yes, I remember doing a Megabus Olympian up here some years ago, fun times! – Ed] and we’re soon onto very familiar (but modernised and dual-carriageway’d) territory for my fellow colleague James. All still familiar for me too except for the Blunsdown avoider sector, then it’s onto the M4. By Reading services I’m in dire need of a break, so we have a 20-ish minute stop which also gave us time to find some of the required paperwork for later on. £3.35 for a large Costa coffee at the service station, ouch! Soon enough we’re back on the M4 and getting ready for the most stressful sector of the drive, and the reason for leaving earlier than we would otherwise have done, the M25. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you how manic this motorway can get!

Fortunately for us, the sector we were using (J15-J27) wasn’t too bad but the rain was soon back and made it more challenging. We stop at a services on the north side of the M25 as another break was needed by now and I knew I’d not make it to Stansted Airport otherwise. James was in need of a break too after dealing with the less than sensible drivers in this weather, so it turned out to be a wise idea. After re-consulting the map and BBC Motorway Updates, we’re off again for the last sector of the drive, the M11. It’s still raining for most of this drive, but thankfully stops before we arrive at the car park at around 0745, and after making sure everything was sorted and the relevant paperwork handy it was onto a shuttle bus to the terminal itself. A few minutes later we were there and the excitement level was building inside me. After all I’ve not been on a plane since I did the Waterford and Kilkenny avoider bash [November 2013 – Ed] so I was keen to get on one again!

Security is cleared in no time, thanks to having the fast track security passes included in the car park price. It probably would have been fine through normal security too, but it was definitely a handy-to-have thing, in case of delays getting here. It’s also getting pretty busy around here now, which I found slightly surprising for mid-morning on a Friday in November. We’re still a little ahead of the train by the time we’re through security [0851 we were due to arrive I believe by rail – Ed], so not a long way ahead but the ching would have been most significant on the train anyway. Not that I looked at how much it was though, but certainly more than it would have been by road for both of us! Stansted Airport, post-security, is having a lot of new shops, restaurants and seating being added to it so not a lot of choice there yet. We find some seats and listen to some music before discovering we need to go to gates 81-88. I find an Est Presso here, so grab a coffee as the earlier caffeine is wearing off now. Queuing for boarding commences fairly soon afterwards, but we have to wait for ages for everyone to get off the plane before we can board, so we’re stood up for what felt like decades. Eventually we’re on, and it’s a winner plane for me, EI-DCZ which I’m more than happy with!

EI-DCZ at London Stansted Airport by 43002, on Flickr

After waiting for ages for everyone to get on, and hearing that really annoying J2O advert 3 or more times in a row, we finally get pushback at 1113, 23 minutes late, to finally get into the air about 10 minutes later. Take off didn’t disappoint and was nicely smooth, just as well for James as he doesn’t like take-off or landing! I’m absolutely starving by the time the hot food order comes, and I get a cheeseburger for €5. Be warned all, if you don’t like onion, relish, tomato, some of the many herbs and something else I’m forgetting, steer clear as this burger has all of it in there and more. Not that the menu warns you of any of these things, and I only discover it after tucking in. It’s also a very small burger, and not worth the money at all. However it filled a hole and will do for now. Landing is also smooth, and James survives that too although I think it took a few minutes for his nerves to settle again!

Stockholm Vasteras Airport building, airside by 43002, on Flickr

EI-DCZ at Stockholm Vasteras Airport by 43002, on Flickr

Arrival is at 1416, 11 minutes late at Stockholm Vasteras Airport, and I am getting concerned the coach to Stockholm Central will leave before we all have time to buy tickets and board. Credit to Flygbussarna though, they did what they say they do and waited for everyone who needed to buy tickets to get them and board. We leave at 1449, 14 minutes late as a result but I’m now breathing a sigh of relief, we’re on the way to Stockholm itself.

Flygbussarna WGK 391 at Stockholm Vasteras Airport by 43002, on Flickr

For those of you not familiar, Vasteras Airport [sorry, I haven’t got all the pronunciation marks on here. I have on my phone believe it or not, but not on the laptop which I’m using to hammer this out! – Ed] is not exactly near Stockholm. Quite, it’s around 100km away by road. So it’s a lengthy coach journey, and it’s incredibly boring too, with very little of interest to see out of the window. Stockholm itself has a LOT of major roadworks going on, so it takes quite a while to get through them to Cityterminalen. We arrive at 1627 and we’re both glad to have a stretch of legs and finally arrive into Sweden’s capital city, having been travelling for just over 13 hours! After a bit of an explore, and my noting some numbers down of stuff going to/from Stockholm Central from the overbridge, we find a pizzeria for tea. I get a very decent size pizza for SEK70, James gets a lasagne for SEK85. I might have the name of it around somewhere, it’s certainly worth a visit as the food’s all freshly cooked and very delicious. Having looked at the conversation rates, 1 SEK works out around 9p, but for ease of calculation we rounded it up to 10p, so if we needed to work out the price of something in GBP, it was much easier to divide the price in SEK by 10. This means my pizza, which I would estimate to have been around 14” wide, cost £7 and James’ lasagne £8.50. Exceptional value in a capital city and well worth a visit [I will try and find the name of it, assuming I still have the receipt in my wallet – Ed]

It’s now back to Cityterminalen while we figure out exactly where we need to go. We follow the route towards the Tunnelbanan [also referred to more commonly as T-bana, or on these shores as Metro – Ed] and find all manner of food and drink places down here. Eventually we find the tourist information point and talk to them, but I must first point out how grand the concourse is. My photos won’t do it much justice I’m afraid, but the main concourse hall is both massive and grand in equal measures. I suppose if I was to find a UK equivalent, I would say London Paddington for the grand-ness and Victoria for the massive-ness. We can indeed get our tickets at the tourist information point, and I get my 72 hour transport pass for SEK230 (£23), while James gets a 48 hour Stockholm Card for SEK675 (£67.50), the final part of his travel we would organise at the time and would still work out cheaper than buying a 72 hour card. It’s now off to the T-bana and to the Red lines. By now it’s a little gone 1800 so we’ve missed the heaviest part of the evening peak, although it’s still busy. 2196, 2097 and 2178 are my first T-bana trains in the book for our trip to Skarholmen, the nearest station to our hotel.

1348 at Stockholm Central by 43002, on Flickr

I must also point out at this time that everything was running beautifully smoothly here, despite the system being rather heavily used there were no issues and trains were comfortable, clean and frequent. Miss one train at this time of day on the Red line? No more than 10 minutes to wait for the next one. The system even runs during the night, although goes down to every 15 minutes for a while after midnight then every 30 minutes during the rest of the night. Even so, that’s a darn fine way of doing things! We arrive at Skarholmen in just 23 minutes, only just over my original estimate when we first booked the trip without looking at the timetable! A supply visit to Lidl is had, then we need to get moving to base camp. We’re not comfortable with walking to the hotel this evening, so we initially consider a taxi but I point out there should be a bus running that way so investigate it at the bus stops nearby. My remembering of bus route numbers worked out well, as the 173 went nearby our hotel. 7079 takes us down the road on route 173 and I had mis-read the map so we ended up getting off at Ikea instead. Fortunately that was only a 5 minute walk away and we now knew where we were getting on and off the bus. I do like the PIS on these telling you what the next stop is, although it still took me a while to get used to which bus stop was which around here [but we’ll get to that later on in this trip report!- Ed]

Base camp for this trip, Hotel Dialog, is reached and check-in is nice and simple. The room is also of a decent size with comfortable beds, which admittedly they didn’t look like they’d be from first sight. It was by now more than welcome putting everything down and getting to base camp, it being rather late in the evening now. It’s been a good day but tiring too, and we’re both still hungry so we go to Heron City shopping centre with the goal being to go to McDonalds for a cheeseburger. We end up instead in Pizza Hut for a rather decent size meal. As you do! Most satisfied stomachs now, it’s back to the hotel to go over the maps, information cards and leaflets. We decide, after much planning, to do the Old Town first then go from there. Eventually sleep hits after a long and tiring but good day. The only bit I’d change would be not losing my map with all the numbers written on from the evening, a lot of stuff is now missing sadly. Oh well!

15/11/2014 – Techniquest’s Anglo-Swede Bash, Day 2

0830 and the alarm’s going off. It might be considered a little late for a holiday day, and normally on a solo trip I’d have been up by 0600 to maximise the day! However this trip is different and it’s also my first trip to Sweden, indeed to Scandinavia as a whole. My map of Europe certainly has a few countries ticked off now [Norway, Finland, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Denmark and much of Northern/Eastern Europe left now. Might actually make a proper list one day! – Ed] and will only get better in 2015. Well, that’s the plan at least! After de-rancification with a majorly powerful shower [I’m not joking, it certainly did a brilliant job! – Ed] it was time to head to the breakfast room. As we’re in Europe, it’s a continental breakfast and this is a proper job of it, unlike the version of said breakfast you get in the UK! I tuck into some rolls filled with turkey, ham and cheese as well as a couple of small glasses of highly rateable orange juice [seriously, I’d rate it higher than the stuff I’ve ever bought in the UK! – Ed], and some most reasonable filter coffee fills up 2 or 3 cups. Filled up most happily for the next few hours now, we both return to the room to pick up the bags and make sure we have what we need for the day. The walk to the bus stop reveals it’s only a short wait for a route 173 bus to Skarholmen, and 7084 takes us there on the 10 minute journey.

SL Metro 2012 at Norsberg by 43002, on Flickr

SL Metro depot construction works at Norsberg by 43002, on Flickr

There’s no way I’m leaving that gap from Skarholmen to Norsberg on this branch of the Red lines un-covered, so we both head down there and get it done. It’s only a 14 minute journey on the trio of 2131, 2101 and 2012, and we see what looked like an extension being built. I didn’t note the other two EMUs in the formation, so I only have 2123 logged for the trip to Gamla Stan. This journey takes 35 minutes and it’s a very busy station, with trains from both directions every couple of minutes if not more frequent. I have to stop myself spending ages here and we head downstairs to head into the Old Town. I can’t help myself but go for a small coffee though at the Pressbyrna (I think that’s right, if not it’s close!) shop as I see a sign saying it was just SEK10. I realised afterwards that was the student price though, and it cost me SEK18. Still, it was extremely nice for machine coffee and although it was a pretty small cup, it’s still much bigger than those I’ve had from the likes of Belgium [I’m sure most of the long-term readers of my trip report readers will remember my dislike of those coffees, but let’s not go there again! – Ed] and well worth the money. A large one would have been SEK23, and a significant different in size but I didn’t fancy having one of that size at this time.

Crossing the river on the SL Metro by 43002, on Flickr

Old Town, Stockholm by 43002, on Flickr

Old Town, Stockholm by 43002, on Flickr

SL Metro trains crossing the river, Gamla Stan, Stockholm by 43002, on Flickr

The Old Town is pretty much just across the road from the station and we spend a lot of time here going into the many shops, most of this was present buying for those at home. However it was still a fascinating place, and the science fiction shop was well worth spending a decent bit of time in. I could easily have spent a fortune here myself, and I’m not even close to as nerdy as James is with this stuff! The Royal Palace is seen from the outside, and we have more of an interest in the boats on the river. I’d like to know where those Viking Line ferries go, one day I’ll have to look it up. Heading back towards the Old Town itself, we see a police escort coming down the road and wonder what’s going on. Turns out there was a reception in one part of the Royal Palace and we, amongst many other tourists, stop to take photos and so on. After standing around for quite a while, it was good to get moving again and we take in the majority of the rest of Old Town before darkness lands and stomachs start rumbling. We see a few nice restaurants, but I have only one place in mind for eating at this evening! Much to James’ disappointment, we head back to the T-bana station at Gamla Stan for a train to T-Centralen, in this case I note the formation as 2182 and 2252 (might have been one more on the back, not sure now) for the journey which took only 1 minute.

View of the river, Old Town, Stockholm by 43002, on Flickr

SJ Stockholm Central station building by 43002, on Flickr

So where am I going to? Burger King! It’s such a staple of my trips and I’ve not been in ages [well, if you can call it ages when it was a bit over a month ago. I’d forgotten my visit to one in Edinburgh! – Ed], and I know full well they do food I like there. Well, they do in UK outlets, the one we visited here didn’t do my usual meal of a Bacon Double Cheeseburger XL meal, so I settle for the nearest thing, a Whopper with no salad. I didn’t take into account there’d still be mayo and onion in it, so I rip out the onion and put up with the mayo, which was surprisingly OK. Still, I’m not as satisfied as I am normally on a Burger King visit, disappointing as I spent SEK74 on it! As we’re at T-Centralen now, we agree to do the Subway Art bit of the trip now, and after a long way down to the Blue lines I note 2149 on our trip to Kungstadgarden, using one of the information cards we picked up in the hotel as a guide for where to go. It’s quite an impressive scene, and both of us liked it and felt it worth the effort to get to. The next one on the list, as it’s also on the Blue lines, is Hallonbergen and we jump onto 2154 and 2147 to Vastra skogen where we need to change for the Akalla branch. 2164 and 2024 take us onwards to Hallonbergen and while it’s still art-y, we don’t spend too long with cameras. We do however visit the supermarket upstairs [I didn’t really note the name, but it can’t be missed anyway! – Ed] for supplies for both later on and tomorrow, before we continue up the line with 2151 and 2152 for an 8 minute journey onwards to the terminus at Akalla, although how long it’ll stay a terminus is anyone’s guess at the moment, as the proposed extension is still just proposed. Same for the extension from Kungstradgarden, that’s been talked about for a long time. This is what I’ve gathered from a website I found during the trip, I think it was urbanrail.net but not 100% sure now.

T-Centralen artwork by 43002, on Flickr

SL Metro 2149 at Kungstradgarden by 43002, on Flickr

Kungstradgarden artwork by 43002, on Flickr

Hallonbergen artwork by 43002, on Flickr

2152 and 2151 take us back down from Akalla to Fridhemsplan where we change for our first use of the Green lines, taking 2031, 2001 and 2222 onwards for the Bus Stop Bash to Thorildsplan. The bit of artwork here is worth a look, yes, but not the most exciting either. It’s still worth a few snaps though, and I do something I’ve never done before, use mobile data abroad. We can’t find the one place we wanted to see the most, the one we saw on Google when we first looked for the Stockholm Metro upon booking the trip, the art entitled “Belly of the Beast”. If you’re curious, search for Stockholm Metro on Google and you’ll see the red and black art and why we wanted to see it! Apparently it’s at Solna Centrum, and we came through there earlier. Right, back we go to Fridhemsplan on 2221, 2037 and 2005 for the interchange back to the Blue lines and onto 2150 and 2077 to Solna Centrum. We can’t find it here [although once we found out where it was the next day, we were kicking ourselves for not finding it! – Ed] and I’m back on mobile data to research it. Having major issues with my data signal, we give up and ask some staff downstairs. The one guy reckoned it was Radhuset, and the photo we were looking at was heavily photoshopped. Still, onwards we go to Radhuset with 2077 and 2150 [the first repeat EMUs I believe of the trip – Ed] in search of it. It’s definitely not here, having spent ages looking around. We give up for today on it, deciding to use the WiFi back at the hotel tonight to look it up. We still have a wander around and see the impressive sight of the police station. 2152 and 2151 have returned to take us back to T-Centralen, and we’re both really annoyed we couldn’t find the one bit of artwork we wanted to see.

Thorildsplan artwork by 43002, on Flickr

Thorildsplan artwork by 43002, on Flickr

Radhuset artwork by 43002, on Flickr

Radhuset Police Station by 43002, on Flickr

Time’s now getting on, and we wanted to get back to Skarholmen so it’s straight to the Red lines and onto 2106 and 2171 for another 23 minute journey to there. 7082 takes us onwards on route 173 but I get myself confused and get off at Pyramidbacken and not Kungens Kurva. Oops! To be fair, I was distracted by the girl from Africa who lives in Sweden! We were going to go to McDonalds at the Heron City shopping centre, but by the time we were ready to do that it was closed so it was the long walk around to the 24 hour McDonalds a little distance away. I didn’t think I was hungry until I got there, and both of us end up getting a meal and not just a cheeseburger and drink after all. Mind you, I realise when I check the receipt it had been around 7 hours until we had last eaten so we were bound to be hungry! After a most delicious meal, it was back to the hotel to plan bits and bobs for the next day, by the time we’d researched the artwork, called both Belly of the Beast and Exit from Hell on the internet, it was getting very much into the small hours of the morning!

16/11/2014 – Techniquest’s Anglo-Swede Bash, Day 3

Today was James’ 40th birthday, the reason for coming over to Sweden in the first place, as he wanted to visit somewhere completely different to home, Norway had been the original plan but we settled on Sweden at the last minute in the booking processes back in September. After a good de-rancification, it was breakfast time and I have the same as I did yesterday. Eventually it’s time to get moving and this morning we get on route 710 to Skarholmen instead. Bus 7138 takes us on the journey, and it’s soon enough onto 2191 and 2140 to Slussen. A very short wait there gets us onto 2217 and 2263 to Globen, where we would alight and have a brief explore before going to the Skyview Globe. We divert into the shopping centre first for some supplies, then James does some Christmas shopping before we find that the Skyview Globe is indeed running, somehow we didn’t see it at the right time from outside then! SEK145 later, I had my ticket to go on it and we’re shortly in the little room for the safety video and introduction into how it came about in 2010. I think it was 70 tonnes of concrete were needed to be added to the globe with 42 tonnes of rails for the two globes to run up and down as well, and this was being done to an existing globe-shape structure. I don’t do the feat any justice here, but it’s definitely something fascinating if you’ve even a slight interest in civil engineering! It’s also a unique piece too, with nothing else like this in the world.

SL Metro trains heading north at Globen by 43002, on Flickr

View from the Skyview Globe by 43002, on Flickr

View from the Skyview Globe by 43002, on Flickr

Skyview Globe, Globen, Stockholm by 43002, on Flickr

Up we go shortly afterwards and it was a very smooth ride. The views of the city were definitely unrivalled for anywhere else around, and I thoroughly enjoyed the views and the unique opportunity to do something completely different. If this had been a normal trip, I’d have been on ground level scoring off the many stations on the T-bana system and red penning as much of everything as physically possible, before moving onto the trams and suburban railways! That sort of trip I do enjoy very much normally, so to enjoy this was a nice surprise. It’s soon over though, but well worth the money and I would recommend it to anyone as a priority to do in Stockholm. If you only have one day there, you have to do the Skyview Globe, it’s very easy to access from the city centre, or indeed anywhere else in the city. After taking some photos of the globes going up and down the tracks, we head back to Globen and get 2267 and 2021 back up to Slussen for an interchange onto the Red lines again. An easy and short connection again provides us with 2193 and 2095 to take us to Universitetet [and yes, I did have to check the spelling of that several times! – Ed], next destination being the Natural History Museum, after lunch that is. Ham rolls with Pringles it is, which together was surprisingly tasty! A short walk later and we get to the museum, and it’s SEK150 for me, SEK80 for James with his Stockholm Card, to get into both the exhibitions and the Cosmonova, which is what we came up here for most specifically.

Natural History Mueseum, Stockholm by 43002, on Flickr

Natural History Mueseum, Stockholm by 43002, on Flickr

We’d gone for the astronomy films in particular as they were the ones we both wanted to see the most, and I must say I wasn’t disappointed. I have no photos of this bit as they were banned, but it’s well worth seeing pretty much anything on the screens here. Yes, English translator devices are available too, which were just as well! The museum, well it’s fine and much better from a child’s perspective, but we both agreed there was no “Wow!” factor. For a national museum, this was disappointing and in our eyes it wasn’t entirely worth paying the money to go in. The Cosmonova, yes absolutely so but I reckon even James would have preferred to be on the Metro! As he’s not a crank at all [he does understand the passion, but not why I enjoy the scene, if that makes sense – Ed], that would have been something!

Dinosaur head at Natural History Museum by 43002, on Flickr

Coloured rocks at Natural History Mueseum by 43002, on Flickr

Quartz crystals at Natural History Mueseum by 43002, on Flickr

After the trek back to Universitetet station, it’s onto 2192 and 2132 back to T-Centralen and we have one final look for the artwork we wanted to see [see the section on artwork in day 2 – Ed], and make our way down to the Blue lines again to join 2141 and 2161 to Solna Centrum. This time I make absolutely sure we go to the other exit, this one is on the southern end (when coming up from the Stockholm city centre I must mention) and sure enough, we find exactly what we’re looking for. How we didn’t end up here the other night I’m not entirely sure, certainly the brain wasn’t working properly! The images on the internet (apart from mine!) are definitely PhotoShop’d which is disappointing, but we do our best to recreate the scene, especially with escalator works on the central part of the exit. Still, it’ll do and I only have photos on my phone as that’s all I tend to use these days. 2143 and 2162 take us back to T-Centralen, and after a bit of shopping that James needed to do, and a wander around, we need to get him a 24 hour pass to cover the final travel for SEK115 [this means the 72 hour pass is effectively 3 days for the price of 2! – Ed]. I’m adamant a Zone A single for SEK36 would have covered the bus too, but I had no way of being sure, plus there would have been the issue of getting a ticket in the morning for the return to the city centre, so while this ticket works out more expensive than 2 Zone A singles, it’ll have to do.

20141116_173312 by 43002, on Flickr

Belly of the Beast/Exit from Hell at Solna Centrum by 43002, on Flickr

Main (southern) exit at Solna Centrum by 43002, on Flickr

Up escalator at Solna Centrum by 43002, on Flickr

Next up is 2186, 2190 and 2119 for the trip back to Skarholmen, and once again it’s a 23 minute journey. I do like how it’s the same journey time in both directions, all day long, which does suggest a much more robust timetable than on other Metro services around Europe. And this is not just timetabled journey times, this is actual journey times! The bus we get back to Kungens Kurva on route 710 is the same one as this morning, and it’s another nice and smooth journey on modern buses, the quality rivalling London and Edinburgh’s buses. Back to the hotel to drop everything off again, and it dawns on both of us that in the morning the trip is near enough over, which is a disappointing thought. After a while, we return to Pizza Hut as we wanted to have a decent meal to celebrate James’ landmark birthday, however by the time we get there it’s closed for the night. So we have a look at the other places, and we find a place called Amazon Restaurant, also in Heron City. After struggling with the Swedish menu for a while, we go in and ask if an English version exists. Fortunately it does, and after much temptation for me to give up I eventually settle on BBQ spare ribs and chips, passing on the coleslaw. It’s here where we find drinks are definitely expensive, and I’m used to an average price up my way for a pint being around £3-£3.30. I’ve also never had a pint in London that costs that much more than that either, but here we do find a place that lives up to the reputation of Sweden being expensive. A pint of Carlsberg cost SEK69 and my pint of light beer (chosen for the cost reason!) was SEK42. That’s roughly £6.90 and £4.20 in GBP!

Stockholm Central station concourse by 43002, on Flickr

Stockholm Central station building by 43002, on Flickr

Meal I had on the Sunday night by 43002, on Flickr

Having been nervous like mad about the meal I was about to have [I could have found much more I liked on the kids menu! – Ed], I find after a while I had no reason to be concerned as it was absolutely stunning! The first time I’ve had spare ribs, and they were pretty darn good it must be said. I wouldn’t have them too often of course, and the chips that they came with were simply divine. This is something else I would never normally do on a standard solo trip, fast food does the job for me normally [as long-term readers of these trip reports will no doubt know! – Ed], and I don’t normally consume anything alcoholic either unless it’s a special occasion on a trip. So this was a rather different experience for me, and I can see why I don’t do it very often, it’s not cheap!

After a most rateable meal, it was time to settle up and start the large amount of prep for departure in the morning. There was much to pack and get ready for the morning in general, and I consider de-rancification ahead of the morning to give me a head start. I decide against it though, and set the alarm for 0700. It still takes ages to settle into a sleepy state, and I get on Facebook and Twitter for a while before transferring numbers from my sheet of paper onto my phone. Eventually sleep is forthcoming and it’s silly o’clock in the morning before it arrives.

17/11/2014 – Techniquest’s Anglo-Swede Bash, Day 4

Gosh darn it, I can’t believe we’re on the final day already! 0700 and the alarm’s forcing me out of bed. No time to hang around, there’s a tight schedule ahead of us today. De-rancification is most welcome and James doesn’t join me for breakfast this morning, as he’s not had a good night’s sleep and doesn’t feel up to the task of eating. He does eventually join me though, only for an apple juice, while I’m fuelling up for the next several hours as I have no intention of eating much at all before I return to UK shores. It’s about 0800 by the time I finish filling the stomach and fuelling up on coffee, 0805 by the time we leave the hotel so we’re 5 minutes ahead of schedule by some miracle. It’s route 737 this morning to Skarholmen Bussterminal, and bus number 6339 takes us there. We both want to soak up the Swedish air as much as we can here before we join the T-bana, it’s the last chance we’ll get to do so here on this trip. 2132 and 2167 take us to T-Centralen and we leave Skarholmen at 0846, only 6 minutes behind schedule.

It’s a rather depressing scene on the train this morning, everyone’s as miserable as sin today and that’s including me and James. So we’re rather glad to be off and up into the fresh air again after what I have recorded as a 22 minute journey [but was probably nearer 23 minutes in reality, depending when the time ticked over! – Ed] and there’s now no more T-bana journeys on this trip. I’ve enjoyed the experience a lot, although I must admit I was kicking myself for not joining that train of 1974 stock at T-Centralen on a Frunangen service from T-Centralen on the first night, as I never got to sample any of it in the end. Quite, we didn’t see much of it all weekend and the last set of it I saw this morning I didn’t have time to note the numbers or do a short trip on as it’s already 0910 by the time we leave the platforms, now we’re 10 minutes behind schedule [I had planned to spend at least 30 minutes on the bridge over Stockholm Central station spotting, but that didn’t happened! – Ed]

We leave the T-bana from an exit we hadn’t previously used, not sure at all how we managed that! Still, it’s worked out nicely as it meant James found a shop to get the last present he needed to get. It’s only around a 5 minute walk from T-Centralen, although I can’t remember the name of it now. It’s a tourist-y shop anyway, of which there are loads around Old Town and no doubt other parts of Stockholm! We check with a security guard the directions to Stockholm Central, and it was the way we expected in the end but I felt it far more sensible to double-check with someone who’d know the area far better than us! By the time we reach the entrance, it’s around 0940 and I didn’t really have time to do my spotting now before our booked train out of Stockholm, the 1006 Stockholm Central to Hallsberg (via Vasteras Central). A few minutes later we go looking for platform 7, which takes longer to get to than I expected. Loco-hauled stock is in the platform next to our train, which makes me jealous, but we have one of SJ’s X40 double-deck EMUs this morning, obviously the first one I’ve ever been on, and they’re surprisingly nice inside. We stick to the lower deck as James has a large case so it’s easier not to try going upstairs. I do peek a look later and I would have loved to sit up here! There is another X40 on the front but I never did get that number, our one at least is 3716.

SJ X40 EMU, number 3716, at Stockholm Central by 43002, on Flickr

Aboard the lower deck of a SJ X40 EMU by 43002, on Flickr

We leave 1 minute late at 1007, and it’s a slow journey for the first few miles, with a lot of stuff being noted for the day I get myself a book for the Swedish railways [I already have one for Western Europe trams and another for Metro systems – Ed], and after a while the journey becomes more swift and our first call is Sundyberg. Worth noting that this station is within the Greater Stockholm area and covered by the 24, 48 and 72 hour passes mentioned earlier [there is also a 7 day pass if memory serves correctly – Ed] which might prove useful for future trips, as there is an easy interchange with the T-bana’s Blue line to Hjulsta here. There are power sockets on these trains, much to my surprise and definitely worth noting for a future trip! Just as usefully, there’s free WiFi too with a 200MB limit, but this would take some going through on a daily basis and on an average journey! The journey goes quickly, and I can’t resist some Pringles on the trek, which according to my Thomas Cook European Timetable it weighs in at 107km. Arrival is at 1111, 4 minutes late, at Vasteras Central.

SJ 3716 at Vasteras Central by 43002, on Flickr

SJ 3716 at Vasteras Central by 43002, on Flickr

Vasteras Central station by 43002, on Flickr

9068 at Vasteras Central by 43002, on Flickr

After finding where the bus stop is for later, we then go back to the station to get our tickets for the bus, SEK25 (£2.50) each which is most reasonable for the 15 minute journey in my mind. Certainly there’s a lot of airport routes which have a MUCH higher premium, quite there’s some Travelodge shuttle buses [Manchester Airport Travelodge, I’m looking at YOU specifically! – Ed] that charge at least double that for a much shorter journey by both distance and time! We don’t need to leave until around 1245 so we go and have an explore of Vasteras. I didn’t think it would be much of a place, but it’s quite the big town, if not a small city, and we enjoyed a wander about for a while. It’s getting a little nippy this morning, so by 12 noon we stop at a Pressbyrna [again, not sure if I’ve got the name right! – Ed] for a coffee, as the other coffee shops didn’t look too cheap or inviting to anyone with luggage. McDonalds had been our fallback option, walking past there later on it would have been heaving so just as well we didn’t go there! We get our coffee and sit on a bench on the main street, and this was James’ first time trying the coffee from here but he knew I loved my last Pressbyrna coffee [seriously, this stuff’s good for machine made coffee! – Ed] so wasn’t concerned about the quality beforehand. With his cappuccino and my regular coffee for SEK41 (small cappuccino is SEK23 and regular coffee SEK18), it’s not the cheapest place for coffee really either, for the amount we got, but it sure warmed us both up and we had a good natter while people watching. It must also be said that, considering we both have different interests and significantly different views, for the conversation to still be flowing rather well on the 4th day of a trip in each other’s company, well I was surprised. Pleasantly I must add, and my paranoia before the trip was dying off significantly by now. Not altogether gone, as we still had a fair bit of the day to go!

Park at Vasteras by 43002, on Flickr

Vasteras Central station, from the park by 43002, on Flickr

Vasteras by 43002, on Flickr

Vasteras by 43002, on Flickr

It’s soon time to leave Vasteras behind and return to the bus station, although with route 3 running every 10 minutes we weren’t concerned about the time at this point. After all, if we were to just miss one, it’s only 10 minutes until the next one! VL bus number 295 is soon with us to take us to the airport, and we’re there in just 14 minutes. Considering it’s a 5km journey and not by the most direct route by the looks of it, that’s not bad. A comfortable and modern bus, like a lot of them we’ve seen in Sweden it runs on biogas. It’s shortly time to offload James’ case on the bag drop desk and we go through everything to make sure we have nothing in our bags like food or drink, so it’s a case of finishing the Pringles now, as much as I didn’t really feel like eating them! Security is passed without issue, as expected, and I must add here that this was the least stressful airport used since my Isle of Man trip [I believe that was in 2012, so a while ago! – Ed], although this one is probably the quietest I’ve ever been to, as even the Isle of Man airport had more planes there than Vasteras did! Mind you, Waterford was also rather quiet, so perhaps a tie!

Vasteras bus number 295 at Stockholm Vasteras Airport by 43002, on Flickr

Stockholm Vasteras Airport building by 43002, on Flickr

I find free WiFi which puts a smile on my face as I can get onto Twitter again, and it’s soon time to head to the gates for boarding. There’s a LOT of people waiting to board the plane, which is winner EI-DCY, which I didn’t look up at the time but when I did I was most pleased! I must also moan about the new way of boarding Ryanair’s got now, I used to like the rush for the window seats! Now seat reservations are compulsory [when did this start? – Ed] and if you want to make sure you get seats together, or can’t wait until the random seat allocation a week beforehand, you have to pay. Wasn’t expecting that extra £20 to have to come out of the bank when we first booked the trip! If I had been travelling on my own, I’d have definitely waited for the random seat allocation to save money! Unlike on the outward flight, I manage to find a copy of the in-flight magazine, a tradition of mine on a Ryanair flight as I like to look at the route map and see what’s new. I also discover the Twitter channels’ existence as well as about the Ryanair app, which sounds incredibly useful [after a bit of playing about with it since then, it does seem useful and I’ll cast a final opinion on it in a trip report after I’ve made full use of it, but it looks good so far! – Ed] and definitely worth a download.

EI-DCY at Stockholm Vasteras Airport by 43002, on Flickr

View from the plane by 43002, on Flickr

Push back is at 1446, 16 minutes late and take-off is nice and smooth again. Not that James was less concerned about it of course, but after a while, once we were above the clouds, he was OK. It didn’t help I’d accidentally booked him by the window on both flights, not sure how I managed that! I’m in dire need of caffeine by the time the drinks trolley comes around, and it’s again thanks to the in-flight magazine [I don’t know why they couldn’t be bothered to hand these out on out outward flight on Friday! – Ed] that I see it’s now Lavazza coffee in their new specially designed cups, these ones filter the coffee as you drink it. It’s a funky idea that’s for sure, and I’m amazed the price hasn’t yet gone up from £3, but no doubt this will happen now! James gets a chicken Cup-a-Soup, also £3 but is the first proper food he’s had all day [he did have an entire pot of Pringles Sour Cream and Onion to himself on the SJ train, it must be added! – Ed] so it must have been well worth it! The coffee sure looks weird if you take the lid off to add milk and sugar, and still didn’t look much better afterwards, so I was ready for my face to turn funny upon tasting it. Much to my surprise, it was rather reasonable! It’s still gone way too fast for my liking, and after some music the time had gone like nobody’s business and it was soon time to shut everything off for landing. James is sure not keen on the banking around to get onto our required flight path into Stansted, and during landing he was nervous again but it went rather smoothly again. I’m not convinced he agrees with me on that one though! I also note they’ve changed the music that’s played on an on-time flight, sounds rather weird!

Arrival at the terminal is at 1549, 6 minutes early and I see they’ve stopped saying we’re X minutes early when we’re actually only Y minutes early now too, well on this flight at least! It’s a long wait to get off the plane due to an issue with getting the steps to the plane it appeared, then a long walk from the 50-something gates to the passport control. We go to the e-passport gates and it’s a long queue. It doesn’t take all that long to get through though, about 15 minutes all in, and that was with James’ passport picture not scanning properly. Not bad but the gates need staffing better and not the one guy on them making a massive fuss over all the women only, everyone who needs help should get equal help. Fortunately I had no issues with mine, and there’s a short wait for the baggage reclaim boards to update with our flight details. James’ case is recovered in no time to my surprise, and we’re soon through to the concourse again. After getting outside to make phone calls, send texts and so on [going outside for one main reason, and that was to be properly back on UK territory again! – Ed], it’s soon back inside to go to Burger King as proper food is now needed! I get my usual meal, Bacon Double Cheeseburger XL, supersized for £8.79 and it was money well spent!

As lovely as it has been to be away, it’s also nice to be back on home shores and spend British Pounds again [I could never move away on a permanent basis! – Ed], getting food I know I like and knowing the language inside out. I also know the railway incredibly well too so I’m settling back in nicely. Now I think back on that evening, while I type this bit up around 0208 on 24/11/2014, I should have made an effort to pop to the platforms at Stansted Airport to see some UK trains again! A most delicious meal devoured, it’s not long until we head to the Mid Stay Car Park bus, but I make sure I repay James for the spending money first, as he got both batches in one go to make things easier. I do still owe him some money as I overspent when I was away, but we’re going to get that sorted before too long. A short journey on the bus and we’re back at Bus Stop 17 again, and it’s back to the car ready for the long journey home. After filling up bottles of pop and so on for the drive, it’s off we go at 1755. We’re definitely not touching the sat-nav tonight, I have the atlas and I know the planned route almost by heart without needing the atlas. Navigating is my main job tonight, James can deal with the driving and I’ll do the other important bit, keeping an eye on road signs, motorway updates and so on.

We had purposefully not left Stansted Airport straight away as the traffic was likely to be heaving on the M25, looking at the queuing traffic going the other way in one mile-long spot in particular this was not a bad idea at all! The conversation is still flowing well between us both, and we both have road rage with some of the less-helpful drivers on the roads tonight. I suppose it makes a change from train and bus/coach rage which I will freely admit I suffer from! We eventually get away from the M25 and join the M4, and the fuel is starting to run rather low. By Membury Services, there’s no way either of us want to carry on much further without a break, and it has been about 2 hours by now of constant driving so it’s not a bad idea anyway. Starbucks rules the roost here, and while it smells lovely, I can’t stand their coffee and we go for the Costa Express coffee instead. I swear it’ll have been cheaper than Starbucks anyway (£2.85, or SEK28,5), especially considering it’s a motorway location! After about 30 minutes it’s time to get shifting, and after a fuel stop [not cheap at £1.339 per litre here, but the risk of running out was too great – Ed] at the BP garage we’re soon back on the M4 and it’s not that much further until we leave the motorways alone for the last time now, joining the A419 at Swindon and the interchange is smoother than expected. Another smooth journey up, and we’re still continuing the conversation started almost 40 minutes ago about 2015’s trip. Yes we both enjoyed this one so much we’re adamant we’re going back and this time we’ll make it more about seeing the Northern Lights!

We get to the outskirts of Gloucester and we reckoned we’d take a wrong route here. Sure enough, we got in the wrong lane and it was too late to change it so we had a very minor detour of just a few minutes and less than 2 miles. He’s done the same mistake many times in the past and tonight was no exception! It’s onwards towards Highnam and Newent, cruising along the Newent by-pass and onwards to Dinmore Hill, where I’m definitely on familiar territory now! A short stop in a layby for James to have a quick stretch of legs and we’re soon off again. We get about 7 miles from my house then we remember we haven’t done one thing we said we were going to do on this trip! What’s that, I hear you ask? Simple, playing Lily the Pink at full volume and having a sing-a-long on the drive! It’s much more fun if you’ve had a few drinks, admittedly, but it’s still a good classic song. I heard it almost exactly a year ago when James gave me a lift and it’s been a much-loved song since! Once wasn’t enough, we ended up playing it twice. We get me back home at 2235 or so, so not bad to cover that distance in 4 hours and 40 minutes!

An absolutely fantastic trip, much more enjoyable than I expected it to be, and neither of us wanted to kill each other before the end of it which was a pleasant surprise! Still planning to do a similar big trip next year, and I’ve already got plenty of planning done, with just short of 9 months to go until the booking can be done. Best get saving eh? I’ve still a lot of bookwork to do as I finish typing this up at 0233, 24/11/2014, but I’m getting there. Now I’ve finished typing this, that’s a big chunk of it done! I’d say it was easily 6 hours of solid typing, and I’d have not made it if it hadn’t been for a lot of music filling my ears to keep me motivated! Just the photos to add to this now, the moves book to do, final bits in my notebook, the numbers to add to my books and my journeys to be processed on RailMiles, with mileages coming from Wikipedia. So I’ll still be busy next weekend! Oh, and this takes up almost 11.5 pages of A4!

I haven't processed my numbers or my mileages yet I'm afraid, so no statistics are available. However it has been a lot on both counts! Finally, below is the link to the entire photo collection, if you're interested at what I didn't include in this post!

 

[Clip]

Good read that again Techniquest and some cracking pictures too... But sod driving to/from the airport from where you live - mammoth first days trekking that - especially with the bus for that long from the sirport whilst there - sod that.

Unsure If I wasnt to go to Sweden but I know the missus wants too so maybe a train excursion or two thrown in may change me mind

 

[Techniquest]

Good read that again Techniquest and some cracking pictures too... But sod driving to/from the airport from where you live - mammoth first days trekking that - especially with the bus for that long from the sirport whilst there - sod that.

Glad you enjoyed the read and the photos. I probably could have taken better and/or more interesting ones if I'd had the patience, but I'm not a photographer!

The alternatives to driving were few and far between to be fair. Very few UK airports have flights to/from Stockholm it seems, unless you include the likes of KLM who fly to Stockholm Arlanda but charge the Earth (seriously, I looked up a return trip from BHX last night and they wanted nearly £300 for it! Absolutely no way on Earth am I paying THAT sort of ching!) to fly with them. All hail Ryanair, the saviours of the skies for budget travellers!

Trains were also an option, but meant leaving Hereford at 0450, arrive Stansted Airport at either 0831 or 0851 and had very little room for delays. The ching would no doubt have been massive too!

Hopefully 2015's big trip will involve flying from much closer and much less driving!

Unsure If I wasnt to go to Sweden but I know the missus wants too so maybe a train excursion or two thrown in may change me mind

Definitely worth a go, if it's affordable from your way, as you can get some train action in (I can't comment on the high speed trains but they look interesting) and earn some brownie points with the missus too!

 

[heart-of-wessex]

Great report! Sweden rail travel is on my bucket list, especially to see the advertising schemed locos

Your mate sounds as bad as me on take off I'd love to go up in a 737. I'd also like to try an Embraer too, I remember you saying why didn't I fly from Bristol, mainly because Gatwick was cheaper overall, even doing the BMI Bristol - Hamburg on a ERJ-135 was around £200 each! If you were plane scratching with EasyJet, you can't really do the same service again the day after unless you go at a different time, as they usually are the same numbers on the same services for a week or two. G-EZAJ for example was out again on the same flight from Gatwick. I think Ryanair does the same thing.

Your right about ching by train! I suspect advances might not have been as cheap as the car either, I don't know. I was quite lucky to get £17 advances to Gatwick and was valid for the GatEx too, bearing in mind that's around £19 as it is (StanEx is over £20 IIRC)

Same as me for food, I wouldn't know what to order over there in a restaurant, especially if I didn't know what it was on about lol!

I had to chuckle at the remark about the History Musuem, and also what you'd normally do otherwise, scratching off stations, I would probably too!


Sounds like it's well worth a visit, I think for 2015 or maybe 2016 I might arrange a group trip to Amsterdam or Hamburg though for those interested in planes, even if you don't take numbers, photography is fun, as is seeing stuff you don't normally see here.

 

[Kristofferson]

Another cracking read, well written and certainly kept me entertained this afternoon. I must say, the Twitter photos throughout the trip broke up the monotony of my Twitter feed as well (I follow your account under a different name).

Sounds like a great road trip as well - as much as long distance trips are more comfortable by train, they're much more entertaining by car

Looking forward to the 30th birthday bash!

 

[Techniquest]

Great report! Sweden rail travel is on my bucket list, especially to see the advertising schemed locos

Your mate sounds as bad as me on take off I'd love to go up in a 737. I'd also like to try an Embraer too, I remember you saying why didn't I fly from Bristol, mainly because Gatwick was cheaper overall, even doing the BMI Bristol - Hamburg on a ERJ-135 was around £200 each! If you were plane scratching with EasyJet, you can't really do the same service again the day after unless you go at a different time, as they usually are the same numbers on the same services for a week or two. G-EZAJ for example was out again on the same flight from Gatwick. I think Ryanair does the same thing.

I didn't see any advertising locos, but then to be fair I didn't venture far. I was quite content with the T-bana!

I love the B738s, although I still want to sample one of the bigger planes one day (777s and A380s come to mind). Can't see that happening any time soon though!

Fair point on it being cheaper to go to airports some way away (yet logic would dictate that we'd all use the most local airport!), which is beyond silly. I reckon you're right about the repeated use of planes with the likes of easyjet and Ryanair, although I had two different craft on my trip (EI-DCZ on the Friday which then immediately returned to STN, EI-DCY which did the inward flight from STN and took us home on the Monday). Would have been interesting to know what did the Saturday and Sunday flights!

Your right about ching by train! I suspect advances might not have been as cheap as the car either, I don't know. I was quite lucky to get £17 advances to Gatwick and was valid for the GatEx too, bearing in mind that's around £19 as it is (StanEx is over £20 IIRC)

Aye I just looked up the ching by train, jeez it was insane! A walk up return for one person is insanely high! Your Advances were very reasonably priced, fair dos!

Same as me for food, I wouldn't know what to order over there in a restaurant, especially if I didn't know what it was on about lol!

I had to chuckle at the remark about the History Musuem, and also what you'd normally do otherwise, scratching off stations, I would probably too!

Was rather fortunate there were English menus available, it must be said! Aye we're both similar in terms of what we'd do on a normal cranking trip, although I believe you spend more time taking photos these days?

Sounds like it's well worth a visit, I think for 2015 or maybe 2016 I might arrange a group trip to Amsterdam or Hamburg though for those interested in planes, even if you don't take numbers, photography is fun, as is seeing stuff you don't normally see here.

Definitely worth a go, nice and cheap to get to VST and the onward travel isn't too bad either. Amsterdam is easy enough for me to get to with Flybe from BHX, although if money was less of a barrier I'd go by Eurostar as far as Brussels and Thalys onwards. Hamburg I like the idea of as I've never ventured even close to that far into Germany yet, and if the 218s are still going I am more than interested!
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Another cracking read, well written and certainly kept me entertained this afternoon. I must say, the Twitter photos throughout the trip broke up the monotony of my Twitter feed as well (I follow your account under a different name).

Sounds like a great road trip as well - as much as long distance trips are more comfortable by train, they're much more entertaining by car

Looking forward to the 30th birthday bash!

Glad you enjoyed the read, and I'm also glad to hear your Twitter feed was made more interesting

Aye it was a decent ride in the car much to my surprise. Some of the trip was a little stressful with the traffic and heavy rain mind, but generally speaking for me as navigator it was good.

The 30th birthday bash report will be up a few days before Christmas, although when exactly is unknown as I know full well it's going to be hectic at work for the next month and a bit. The trip isn't until I finish work at 1700 on 13th December 2014, so a little while off yet! How it's going to go I have no idea, as there's a lot of long distance coach travel involved, but it was needed to get to where I wanted to be. Details of the trip will be revealed nearer the time!

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Quality - as ever ! - there is a book here - you are the new Simon Calder on a budget !

 

[Techniquest]

Who is Simon Calder? Never heard of him I'm afraid!

 

[Kite159]

Travel writer for the "i" paper I believe he is (probably has other books out).

Good report

 

[Bald Rick]

Stockholm is lovely. And not as expensive as it once was.

For anyone who refuses to fly Ryanair (like me - one too many p*ss poor customer service experiences), BA will do you a return to Arlanda from LHR starting at £100.

For anyone who also refuses to fly BA (like me - one too many p*ss poor customer service experiences, oddly enough last time I flew to Stockholm) SAS will see you right for between £100-140 from LHR and Manchester.

Alternatively Norwegian will get you to Arlanda from LGW from as little as £75, and you might even get a Dreamliner. Of course you need to book in advance and pick your dates for all these airlines.

Arlanda is far preferable to Vasteras in ease of getting to Central Stockholm, aside from being (much) closer you also get the Arlanda express. We did Hertfordshire to hotel in well under 6 hours, which for me was definitely worth the (marginally) more expensive travel cost.

Simon Calder is travel editor of the Independent, also has a weekly column in the evening standard - tonight he recommended Helsinki. He regularly appears on BBC Breakfast for any travel related stories, usually those involving flying. He does know his trains though, he introduced me at a conference once, nice guy.