And rail travel is - often - a lot less hassle and more enjoyable than sitting in a car, often in a traffic jam.
Rail travel on many cross country and inter urban type routes away from London and the South East, on weekends, is anything but enjoyable.
Unless you count the pleasures of trying to fight your way onto a grossly overcrowded 2 or 3 car DMU for the pleasure of standing, squashed like sardines in the doorway with hardly room to move, for hours on end enjoyable. Not forgetting to add in the mandatory non working toilet(s) (because it is a weekend not everything has been tanked), lack of luggage space, no doubt faulty air con / heating (depending on time of year), large groups of cackling pi**ed hen parties, large groups of pi**ed loud stag parties, and if you are really lucky missing your train altogether as you can't actually fit in the door (as per TPE most weekends, and some recent experiences on Northern and XC).
No, even as rail staff, If I am making such a journey I normally travel at times to avoid weekends / Friday evenings.