Lyv! Kllekshunn Thred 400mi round trip

[grogee]

PC: 1

Breakfast: as pictured

Mode of transport 1: @Cluffy's BMW coop

[Soundwave]

Chodspeed!

[grogee]

Parting wishes from Mrs Grogee: "Have fun on your stupid journey to get your stupid old car"

Love you too honeybunch 

[Saabnut]

400 mile round trip? Just a local collection then!  

Good luck and enjoy!

[grogee]

Mode 1 successfully completed. Mode 2: on foot to Leamington Spa station. 

This part of Leam (first pic) is a cluster fuck of traffic lights and yellow box junctions, I let @Cluffy off doing that shiz and walked instead. 

50 minutes to kill before train to Motor City, where I'll "de-train" and find a wheeled contrivance to Newcastle. 

PC: unchanged

Drinks: one espresso before I left, might grab another

Conditions: warm, cloudy, muggy

[grogee]

I keep reading in the news about people being pissed off about diesel at £2/litre. Yet they can't get enough of caffeinated warm milk at £15.50/litre. (Estimated 200ml @ £3.10)

[Soundwave]

Ah, good old Leamington Spa. Very London-like architecture in places despite being 100 miles away from it. Seems to switch from ridiculously upscale to absolute shithole from one street to the next - it's like Tower Hamlets and Kensington had a baby.

[grogee]

Mode 3: Sports train to Birmingham New Street. It's a big train but for some reason we were all shepherded to sit in the front coaches. Maybe it's one of those trains that splits into two; that would be exciting. 

[grogee]

31 minutes ago, Soundwave said:

Ah, good old Leamington Spa. Very London-like architecture in places despite being 100 miles away from it. Seems to switch from ridiculously upscale to absolute shithole from one street to the next - it's like Tower Hamlets and Kensington had a baby.

The nice bits have the Bath-like limestone architecture and as towns go it can be quite picturesque. 

The rotten bits (Lillington, Sydenham) are rough but residents of Toxteth and Cheetham Hill would laugh in the face of its roughness. 

The most confusing bit for me is where Leamington ends and Warwick begins - they've both spilled over into each other so it's difficult to be aware of any boundary. 

[grogee]

I used Split Ticket for this train journey, which ended up being £50 or so. It's confusing as fuck and relies on all the trains behaving themselves and 'dovetailing' reliably; the chances of this diminish exponentially with every connection. 

It's also bananas that to get the best value out of our privatised rail system, an AI algorithm 'games' the system to find the cheapest journey. Utterly bonkers, but to be fair the petrol to get back from Sunderland is going to cost significantly more than £50.

[grogee]

Mode 4, Train #2 - indistinguishable from the previous train. I'm probably sitting in someone's reserved seat, but then someone's probably sitting in mine. 

I've got an hour and a half on this one so might have a nap. 

Despite the heatwave I brought an emergency jumper in case of over-zealous air con. Glad I did as this one feels chilly and it's not even departed New Street yet. 

[hairnet]

2 hours ago, grogee said:

PC: 1

Breakfast: as pictured

Mode of transport 1: @Cluffy's BMW coop

dunno about pc

are you not well ?

eek

 

[grogee]

2 minutes ago, hairnet said:

are you not well?

Clearly not; I'm travelling halfway across the kingdom to collect a 34-year old rustbucket. 

[grogee]

My train is vibrating its way North and I have FOUR separate tickets to cover my stay. I am looking forward to the guard telling me this "isn't allowed" or some such BS.

[hairnet]

thats not ill thats insane

spesh if its british or french

400 miles tho will you be falling off the end?

rustbucket - @beko1987 is walking distance for those - why travel

 

[gadgetgricey]

23 minutes ago, grogee said:

 I am looking forward to the guard telling me this "isn't allowed" or some such BS.

It'll be fine. Did exactly the same when travelling from Birmingham to Plymouth.
Same train, same seat, just four tickets for the same journey.
Was also worried re conductor but just checked and clipped them all.

[grogee]

23 minutes ago, hairnet said:

thats not ill thats insane

spesh if its british or french

400 miles tho will you be falling off the end?

rustbucket - @beko1987 is walking distance for those - why travel

 

I've reached Derby where people have started to talk proper Northern. 

On the platform here is a skinny teen wearing black jeans, Converse and long hair. I think he is me from 1993.

The collection 'victim' is neither British nor French, but other guesses are welcomed. I can tell you it has five forward speeds in Spanish waiter configuration. 

[gm]

which app / site did you use for ticket splitting ? i’m potentially looking for a similar bunch of tickets for this weekend  

safe travels 

[gadgetgricey]

4 minutes ago, gm said:

which app / site did you use for ticket splitting ? i’m potentially looking for a similar bunch of tickets for this weekend  

safe travels 

I always used https://www.splitticketing.com/ but just to get the actual costs and train times.

Then https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/ to buy the suggested tickets as above. Its a little bit cheaper per ticket and you can get a few more options re seat. (Has been a while though, so this may have changed)

[Fabergé Greggs]

15 minutes ago, gm said:

which app / site did you use for ticket splitting ? i’m potentially looking for a similar bunch of tickets for this weekend  

safe travels 

If you book through trainline it automatically splits your tickets these days 

[grogee]

19 minutes ago, gm said:

which app / site did you use for ticket splitting ? i’m potentially looking for a similar bunch of tickets for this weekend  

safe travels 

As GG says, the split ticket one. 

It worked out considerably cheaper than Trainline, so I'm not sure that's true Fabergé 

[grogee]

Train rant: it's quiet, comfortable (too cold in fact, but I'd prefer that to no A/C) and so far on time. 

But the WiFi is total garbage. I know this isn't the train's fault. There are lots of people on board. But we are supposed to be a developed nation and our cross-country data service is shocking. 

Trains are supposed to be places that people can work while they travel. Not at 300kbps they can't. 

The problem is our privatised networks. Rail will point at phone companies and say it's their fault. Phone companies point at government and say they don't have enough incentive to provide coverage. Government points at business and says 'be competitive'. Business sacks workers to stay profitable in a recession, and takes short-term decisions to protect shareholders. 

I could, of course, use my own data service. But between Birmingham and now Sheffield I've had zero signal (Vodafone).

[Soundwave]

50 minutes ago, grogee said:

 

The collection 'victim' is neither British nor French, but other guesses are welcomed. 

 

 

Ooh, I know! I know! But I won't spoil it for everyone else.

[grogee]

The air is thin; the accents impenetrable. It must surely be the case that there are dragons this far North. 

I've had a cup of tea and a KitKat to settle my nerves. 

PC: Still one, but I had a wee on the train. 

[grogee]

Piece of shit train got cancelled. Luckily this is the last hop so I'm nearly there. 

Am going to brave the Metro instead. I hope it's as good* as its Austin Rover namesake. 

I am using the time for a tactical refuel

[Jazoli]

Is it a floppytop Saab? 

Nope just realised you are too far north for that one

[D.E]

1 hour ago, grogee said:

Whoever made that sign couldn't be arsed to center a four letter word?

[Rocket88]

Or centre it….

[Pieman]

It will have had a now-defunct rail company logo on the end which has been painted over.

[Soundwave]

It's actually an extremely low-budget advert for Yorkie bars. So low budget, the last two letters were only held on with spit instead of glue.