SailRail questions

[181]

Thankyou to Eire Sprinter for the information in the other thread about the restored connection at Rosslare -- I've booked a journey via that route for a change.

Does anyone know if it's possible to book a SailRail Advance ticket on an earlier train than the latest possible one? Getting to Fishguard with an Advance ticket seems to depend on an 11-minute connection at Cardiff, and if you miss the boat train the next boat is the night sailing 12 hours later. Similar issues can arise on the way to Holyhead, depending where you're travelling from. It would seem reasonable to sell Advance tickets for earlier trains when the consequences of a missed connection are so great, but I couldn't get any of the websites I tried to do this (in any case they seem rather hit and miss in what SailRail tickets they sell), and the ticket office at Paddington couldn't do it either; I didn't try the phone booking service. I've now bought a SailRail Standby ticket for an extra £7, but for future reference it would be useful to know if there's an alternative.

I plan to buy my ticket home when I'm in Ireland. Seat 61, and the Irish Rail page linked to in the other thread (http://www.irishrail.ie/index.jsp?p=118&n=249#SailRail), imply that all SailRail tickets can be bought at the stations listed, but they don't explicitly say so, and when I tried last year to buy a ticket via Dun Laoghaire at Dublin Conolly (the 13.30 HSS sailing is the most conveniently timed crossing for my particular journey), I was told that they only sold tickets via Irish Ferries, so I had to buy my ticket at the port on the day of travel, at a higher cost. Does anyone know whether what I was told is correct, or whether I just encountered a poorly informed booking clerk? If they are supposed to sell Stena tickets, does anyone have any suggestions for how to persuade them do do so?

 

[CallySleeper]

Did you ever try booking on stena line's website?

 

[dubscottie]

SailRail can be bought in advance from the ferry companies. (never buy tickets for travel to another country from CIE.. Had fun in the UK with a BritRail pass issued by them.. Never again)

If you are returning from Ireland then you need to buy the SailRail ticket from the ferry company..

For example I use them to travel to the UK from Ireland but need to make my way to Dublin port myself then get the SailRail..

Its the same going in the other direction. You need to make your own way to Holyhead, for example, get your SailRail to any place in Ireland and away you go.

Have you tried putting Dublin into a self service ticket machine in the UK? It worked for me (about 2 years ago - Killing time when I was waiting for a train). It was £190ish for a ticket from Haymarket (Edinburgh) via Glasgow, Larne and Belfast to Dublin, ferry fare included in price.

Remember it had some of the more obscure places in Ireland listed as well! (Howth Junction came up..)

 

[181]

Thankyou for the suggestions.

I think the Stena website only sells tickets to/from a few UK stations, none of which are very near where I live (I only went to the ticket office at Paddington as I happened to be in London the other day).

Irish Rail have now replied to my e-mailed enquiry and said that I should be able to buy SailRail tickets at the stations listed (although they didn't explicitly say 'via Stena'), so I'll see what happens at the weekend. If I can get them to sell me a ticket to the right destination via the right ferry, I presume I shouldn't have any further problems (on a previous occasion Stena sold me a handwritten ticket from Dun Laoghaire to an illegible squiggle that was scarcely recognisable as the name of my local station, and all the ticket inspectors I met seemed happy with it).

I'd always want to get a ticket that included the UK train travel and the ferry -- a ticket from much of the UK to Holyhead can cost more than one through to Dublin, even without taking into account peak time restrictions. On the Irish side it's less crucial.

It's interesting that ticket machines have these fares, but presumably they won't give you ferry reservations. That was the problem I had when buying SailRail tickets from my local station a few years ago (on that occasion I e-mailed Irish Ferries who said something to the effect that unless it was Christmas, Easter or a weekend with a big sport event I didn't really need a ferry reservation, but I don't know whether that's still the case).

 

[dubscottie]

What are your plans? Remember Irish Ferries sell SailRail as well..

Think you are being told Stena is the only ferry. Don't trust CIE (aka IrishRail)

Get yourself to Holyhead..

Choice of the fast ferries (Jonny Swift) or Stena to Dun L, Ulysses is the slow boat.

Word of warning again, Every ticket issued in Ireland,That I have been issued with, has been refused, or questioned in the UK..

Drunk response to this but Ill help as much as I can..

 

[Eire Sprinter]

Thanks 181.

I'd definitely recommend intending users to book SailRail for the entire journey rather than just from the port onwards. There's usually a saving by doing so - often very considerable on the Wales/England/Scotland side.

This side it's possible to have a SailRail start at any station bar Dublin Suburban stations.

Don't know about getting an earlier train on advance but unless adverse weather prevails (like the flooding of the Great Western line a few months ago which would entail needing to set out earlier than usual) the connection at Cardiff between the 08.45 HST ex Paddington (arr. 10.46) and 10.57 Fishguard express ex Cardiff isn't a problem. Several passengers make the change.

Given the increased usage in SailRail a reservation coupon is desirable particularly summer daytime. Around a year or two ago there were problems of passengers with SailRail tickets not being able to board ferries at Holyhead due to the ferries being at capacity and the ferry companies not knowing how many SailRail tickets had been sold by rail companies for sailings. I believe these issues have now been rectified.

 

[4SRKT]

If you buy the sailrail standby ticket for an extra fiver there are no restructions on use. You get reservation coupons for the trains but you don't have to use them. A month ago I got a Newmarket > Dublin standby ticket with route/reservations via Cambridge, Nuneaton and Holyhead. I actually went via Bury St Edmunds, Peterborough, Birmingham and Shrewsbury without any issue.

 

[181]

Thankyou for the further replies.

In case anyone is interested:

The 10.46 arrival at Cardiff was on time, although I'd arrived on the previous train (which didn't require me to leave home any earlier).

The check-in clerk at Fishguard showed no interest in my ferry reservation coupon -- I showed it to her but I think she thought it was a train seat reservation.

I didn't have to test Irish Rail's ability to sell a Stena ticket, as when I passed through Rosslare on the outward journey the Stena desk there were able to sell me one from Dun Laoghaire to my local station (or to be more precise they sold me a receipt to exchange for the ticket when I got to Dun Laoghaire). I didn't ask whether they could sell tickets including train travel on the Irish side; on this occasion it would only have been from Dublin Connolly anyway (as I was stopping off in Dublin on the way out, and getting there via Fishguard anyway, I needed a separate ticket for my journey further west, and it seemed cheaper and simpler to buy a return than to buy a single for the outward journey and do the return with the SailRail ticket).

The guard on the train at Rosslare sold me a ticket to Connolly, but not to the DART station to which I wanted to continue, so I had to buy a separate DART ticket on arrival at Connolly.

After getting to the front of a slow-moving queue at the ticket desk at Dun Laoghaire, I found that I needed to pick up my ticket not there but at the check-in desk on the inside of the (non-operational) security gate. As on previous occasions, I was issued with a hand-written ticket in one of those blue-and-white booklets that I associate with international train travel of years gone by, and had no trouble using this (two guards gave it a second glance, but I think that was because they didn't know where my local station was).

My reason for using Stena was that the 13.30 HSS sailing provided the best connections for my journey. Same-day travel to the UK from anywhere not near Dublin requires you to use either that or the 14.30 Swift. Although not as convenient as last year when it connected with the 15.44 from Holyhead, the HSS meant that I could be sure of getting the 16.50 and so of getting home not too late, whereas the Swift only gives 20 minutes to get the 16.50 (as it happened passengers from it did appear in the station in time on this occasion), and if I don't get the 16.50, there's a risk (if any of three fairly tight connections is missed) of my not getting home until after 1 a.m.

 

[Eire Sprinter]

Thanks for sharing this. I put my observations in italics (sorry I've had problems trying to multi-quote).

I didn't ask whether they could sell tickets including train travel on the Irish side:
it has been my experience that Stena Line at Rosslare only sell from Rosslare into Britain i.e. not tickets with a rail element this side.

The guard on the train at Rosslare sold me a ticket to Connolly, but not to the DART station to which I wanted to continue, so I had to buy a separate DART ticket on arrival at Connolly.
It should have been possible for the portable machine to issue a through ticket from Rosslare Europort to the required DART station and staff have a supporting info/fares book too. This is disappointing as in all likelihood it has resulted in the journey costing a few extra euro that it should have.

After getting to the front of a slow-moving queue at the ticket desk at Dun Laoghaire, I found that I needed to pick up my ticket not there but at the check-in desk on the inside of the (non-operational) security gate. As on previous occasions, I was issued with a hand-written ticket in one of those blue-and-white booklets that I associate with international train travel of years gone by, and had no trouble using this (two guards gave it a second glance, but I think that was because they didn't know where my local station was).
Ditto at Dublin Ferryport with Irish Ferries in terms of collection arrangement.
An aside is that the booklets still mention the now obsolete Swansea Cork ferry link.


My reason for using Stena was that the 13.30 HSS sailing provided the best connections for my journey. Same-day travel to the UK from anywhere not near Dublin requires you to use either that or the 14.30 Swift.
I wish Dun Laoghaire had more ferries given the adjacent rail stations both sides but given the spiralling cost of fuel it’s perhaps very fortunate the HSS remains.
The 15.10 Stena Nordica ex Dublin is now a further option and more weather-resilient.

 

[181]

It should have been possible for the portable machine to issue a through ticket from Rosslare Europort to the required DART station and staff have a supporting info/fares book too. This is disappointing as in all likelihood it has resulted in the journey costing a few extra euro that it should have.

There didn't seem to be a machine -- my ticket was a paper one headed 'Excess Fare Ticket' and filled in by hand. Now I think about it, I seem to remember that the man selling it remained on the platform when the train left, despite the basic nature of the station, so presumably he wasn't a guard. The DART ticket only cost a couple of euros, so if I was left out of pocket it can't have been by more than that.

I wish Dun Laoghaire had more ferries given the adjacent rail stations both sides but given the spiralling cost of fuel it’s perhaps very fortunate the HSS remains.
The 15.10 Stena Nordica ex Dublin is now a further option and more weather-resilient.

I suppose if surface travel is meant to be environmentally friendly then a gas-guzzling boat isn't ideal. A conventional ferry leaving Dun Laoghaire or Dublin port about 12.45 would seem to enable travel from most places in Ireland with a train service to quite a lot of the UK, but of course such passengers aren't a priority these days.

Are the Stena Nordica sailings now available to foot passengers? (and to SailRail bookings? -- I wouldn't be surprised if that depended on which means of booking you use). If so, it might be worth telling the Man in Seat 61 about it, as it's not currently mentioned on his site. The 15.10 from Dublin wouldn't help people going to London (or to where I live), but it might be useful for journeys to Manchester or Birmingham, for example.

 

[island]

There didn't seem to be a machine -- my ticket was a paper one headed 'Excess Fare Ticket' and filled in by hand. Now I think about it, I seem to remember that the man selling it remained on the platform when the train left, despite the basic nature of the station, so presumably he wasn't a guard.

Probably had the fares for main stations memorized and didn't have the "What's the Fare" book to look up suburban stations.

 

[Eire Sprinter]

Yes, all Stena Nordica sailings are carrying foot passengers since April.

ATW online booking facility is showing SailRail ticketing available for the Stena Nordica.

 

[bkhtele]

Glad you had a good trip 181, my experience with all variations of Sail rail tickets has been fine, only difficulty is buying the tickets. Last time I bought Swindon to Rosslare from great western and a cheap Irish rail advance ticket online to Dublin. Collected it from the guard. (Printout said collect from ticket office in Rosslare but there is none. Dublin Connelly have told me several times that they can sell me a Stena ticket via all Southern Ireland routes.

 

[Eire Sprinter]

Some further info:

Through SailRail tickets are now available from England/ Wales to Irish stations via Fishguard-Rosslare.

There used to be a ticket office in the ferry terminal at Rosslare Europort even after the closure of the integrated station. The ticket office/port authority desk was there until late-2009/early-2010. It was in the unit closest to the entrance doors and is now occupied by a car rental firm.

There are notices at Europort station to the effect of advising passengers who have purchased online to bring the confirmation and obtain the ticket at the first opportunity.