"Doh" railway moments

[185143]

@Recessio @aar0 @Skiddaw those are priceless and they trump my latter 1990s overshoots.

Friday nights, I'd invariably be worse for wear on boarding the 00:12 out of Liverpool Street. I lived in Cheshunt but my best attempts at staying awake would fail me; I'd invariably wake at Sawbridgeworth, or train's termination Bishops Stortford. My crumpled-suited self would huddle in the waiting room, the electic heater and noisy platform clock for company, until first train south on the Saturday.

Once at Bishops Stortford, two police officers saw me and took pity on me. I was ushered to their marked Volvo squad car; a similarly-crumpled chap sat in back - turns out he had also overslept Cheshunt, he'd been huddled out front - but he'd seen me remain on the platform, so he'd mentioned of me.

The two police officers told us we were two lucky chaps; and what followed was a fast blast down the A10 and a drop-off outside home. Neither officer would accept my cash tip - they parted with "don't do it again". Legends.

Things like that are an excellent example of great community policing.

OBVIOUSLY I'm not suggesting Police officers become taxi drivers, they have far better things to be doing. But they're preventing potential issues later on, ensuring safety of the public and gaining the respect to be regarded as "legends".

Back on topic. I did a great one last week. Got off the ferry in Santander. Went for a few beers before my 16:27 Renfe train from "Santander Estacion" to Salamanca with a change somewhere. I followed signage to the station. Saw a building that said Santanfer Station and Renfe on it. Entered. Scanned my ticket on the barriers, which opened. I didn't know the final destination of my train, but the app said P2. There was a train on P2 with passengers on so I boarded it

We departed at 16:25. I very quickly found out there was two stations in Santander almost next to each other, I needed the one that has the Adif logo on the front, and that I now couldn't physically get to Salamanca and my hotel for the night. Was only going there to avoid paying £££ for a stay in Madrid. Quite honestly, €17.75 for a new ticket and £57 for an Airbnb near Madrid Chamartin could have been a LOT worse!

 

[Recessio]

@Recessio @aar0 @Skiddaw those are priceless and they trump my latter 1990s overshoots.

There's one at the end of the 1993 documentary "Old, Dirty and Late" - linked with the correct timestamp 45:57 below. A passenger oversleeps, misses Rainham, wakes up at the end of the line in Ramsgate at 1am, to be told the the first train isn't for over four hours! Yes it was fairly embarassing sleeping and missing my stop... but at least I didn't wake up with a film crew capturing it for the nation

 

[wimbledonpete]

As a child in Wimbledon I asked my dad what the people at the end of the platforms were writing in their books. He told me they were collecting the numbers on the front of the train, which to my mind was a completely useless occupation - if you stood at Wimbledon for only an hour you'd get them all - 17, 18, 24, 30, 42, 62, 81, 91 etc. Hadn't clocked that unit numbers existed, had only ever noticed headcodes. Took me longer than it should have done to work it out.

 

[Trackman]

When I was a small child in the late 70s I stayed in a hotel overlooking Folkestone Harbour station and the level crossing.
I would sit at the window in the hotel waiting for a train.
This became fruitless as nothing arrived after hours, but I stuck at it.

One day on the same trip, we had a weekend in France, I *think* you had walk through the station for the ferry - Then I saw a train timetable, to put it mildly an extremely limited service then it dawned on me about the Ferries.

 

[Train Maniac]

A few years ago me and a mate were booked to go on a railtour to the West Somerset Railway. It was due to depart Paddington at an ungodly hour so decided to leap frog it to Reading and catch it there, with the bonus of a much cheaper breakfast.

We arrived on Paddington concourse and used RTT to find the next train to Reading. Unbeknownst to us there was a last minute platform change. Having just got comfortable we watched in horror as the IET in the platform left before us!

To add insult to injury, there had been some complications at Southall, so we joined the rest of the prospective passengers on a service train to Reading, breakfast eventually being served on the approach to Westbury!