Andrew Kay: Does taking the train really take the strain?
Woo Woo
Autumn may well be the season of rich and mellow fruitfulness, but in the Kay family it’s the season of birthdays. Frankly, given that so many of my relatives’ birthdays fall in September, that rich and mellow fruitfulness must have at least a little to do with seasonal merriment the previous Christmas, one too many snowballs, you could say – and I am not qualifying what I mean by snowballs.
Mum’s birthday falls in late September and requires a visit. Readers may remember that at Christmas last year she suffered two strokes, and spent some time in hospital and then rehab. She may be no spring chicken, but she is a game old bird, and true to form, she has bounced back.
Okay, she’s walking with a frame now, but she’s back home and looking after herself rather well, with some assistance morning and night, of course.
Fiercely independent, she is also rather keen that I visit, especially for the birthday … 82, but don’t tell her that I told you so.
As I no longer run a car, the train is the way I have to travel, and yes I do miss the freedom of a car but not the crazy expense. My not owning a car is doubly green – ecological and financial, although that reference to money and green is somewhat outdated since we no longer have pound notes. Why is it that so many of my thoughts make me feel old these days?
Booking a train should be an easy process. I like to do it online and in advance, again because there are so many savings to be made. But how complex can it be?
The site I use is pretty good, but only now I have used it hundreds of times. You start by putting in dates, times, and of course starting points and destinations. It comes back with a selection and then asks if you would like the same information with prices.
Well, of course I want the prices, especially as they vary so much. I click for prices and discover that my journey can cost anything from £39 to £184 return. Now that is a massive difference, and although I can see that by travelling off-peak I put less strain on their service and in turn on my wallet, that does seem rather a radical jump in price.
I remember that I have a rail card. No, not an old person’s rail card, cheeky …
Having got this far, I remember that I have a rail card. No, not an old person’s rail card, cheeky. I go back and feed that information in, only to discover that it makes no difference to the lower fare that I have chosen.
I continue. Would I like a seat facing forward or backward, one near the toilet, a plug socket? I request the plug but nothing else. In my experience, even for the part of my journey where I can reserve a seat, I spend more time trying to oust some reluctant-to-move passenger from it than I will actually use sitting in there.
All this said, the train does give me a few hours of peace and quiet. The route taken to Mum seems to follow a mobile phone valley of unconnectivity; four hours and twenty minutes of enforced solitude. I listen to music and read, and it does me good, providing of course I am not sat next to a rambling mad person or end up waiting in the cold at Warminster as the schedule goes awry.
