The Daily Cartoon

How not to spend a day!(or British trains, I love ‘em)

00.00 Fast asleep (This part is fine)

06.30 Get up

06.50 Drive to station

07.20     Get on train. Told to change at Swansea by guard. Get off train at Swansea. No sign of a train to Paddington. Told by railway official to get on that train (here he points at train I have just got off) Jump back on just before it departs.

A few stations further- announcement that the track is blocked and we must all get off the train and go to the other platform to get another train. Everyone walks over the bridge to the second platform and the train we were on goes a hundred metres backwards.

Another train arrives at a third platform.  People pile on, then some get off, then the first train reappears at the first platform,and an announcement tells everyone to get back on it.

And so we arrive in Cardiff late and on the same train we started.

As our train pulls away I hear this conversation between a man and an official, which sums up travel on UK trains:

- Was that the train to Manchester?

- Yes.

- So it arrived at the wrong time and the wrong platform?

- Yes.

14.10 After crossing London on the tube arrive at the Crematorium just in time.

The funeral and wake are obviously a difficult time, but they go well, given the cirumstances.

17.30 Get dropped off on at a tube station and travel back to Paddington.

19.15 Pull out of Paddington and at every stop get further behind schedule - I know this because they keep announcing it. No conductor goes through the train so there is no one to ask. I ring national rail enquiries but they have no idea if the train will be held at Swansea.

22.30 Arrive in Swansea. Hear official telling men next train on is at 23.30. Ask him myself, says they had been drinking, wait here and he’ll sort it out. There is no train onwards, so we have to go by taxi for the rest of the journey

23.40 Arrive at car

00.25 Get home

As travelling is mainly sitting down on comfy seats, why is it so tiring?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 24th, 2007 at 12:02 pm and is filed under Art, Life & T shirts . You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site. Your comments will appear immediately, but I reserve the right to delete innapropriate comments.