Getting locked on a train.

This weekend I thought it would be good to travel a little off piste. Marylebone station is now just around the corner from work and I was keen to explore and see what it was all about. Marylebone is indeed a very interesting and unique station, the youngest of any London termini and the only station with no track electrification. The station has a certain charm that no longer exists in London, it's a quaint, friendly station with a pleasing decor. Remnants of Network SouthEast branding were a pleasant sight, something that is seldom seen any more. I arrived early to have a wander round and take the very short tube journey from Baker Street, I perhaps got there a little too early...

Thinking I was clever I checked out what platform my train was scheduled to depart from (using www.opentraintimes.org) and boarded it immediately after the incoming passengers had left. Drank my coffee, had some lunch and welcomed the peace aboard my personal coach. After a short while people were running down the platform, ha! silly people I thought to myself.  Then it struck me. People were running because this coach wasn't part of my train. In fact, this train of which I was now the sole occupier of was not my train. Lunch abandoned I headed for the door and hit the exit button, realisation soon struck me; the doors had been locked to stop people boarding. Whoops. I quietly contemplated my stupid mistake while people attempted to open the doors from the other side in an attempt to board (which is exactly why they lock the doors) of course none of these people considered notifying a member of staff about the imprisoned man on the train (I'm pretty sure I would, if in their shoes). The green emergency door release lever had never been so appealing, if it weren't for the possibility of it sounding an alarm I probably would have operated it under a partially legitimate circumstance! About five minutes after the train I should had boarded had left a dispatcher finally noticed my frantic banging and rounded up some staff to secure my release. The only upside to this embarrassing incident is that I left through the train's cab. I discovered train cabs are quite small, smaller than I had imagined, but equally as awesome as I had anticipated one being. I can now quite proudly brag that I've been inside the cab of a a Class 168! (I may have to improvise an alternate story when saying so...) The next problem arose in that my advance tickets to Leamington Spa were quite useless a kind ticket inspector scribbled some presumably important numbers on them and said they should be fine now. Result!

Back to the planned feature: The journey up to Leamington Spa was quite relaxing, the train was busy but against all previous 'quiet zone' experience people actually respected it's cause, which was nice. At one point I think the loudest thing on the entire carriage was the tapping of my fingers against my think pad's keyboard. Leamington Spa was an interesting place, I was only there for an hour or so but successfully managed to locate the local Wetherspoons unaided by technology. I enjoyed a pint of Meerkat Mild which was darker than I like my ale, but it had a good head and a well rounded taste, wasn't particularly hoppy which was a shame.

The station at Leamington was well maintained, to the extent I'm convinced it must be under the maintenance of a preservation society of some kind, the paintwork on the signage and benches was flawless, with some fantastic detail. This amongst the pristine flower beds made it a very impressive stop.

The journey back was even better, the WiFi on the Chiltern service was fantastic as were the power outlets, I managed to log on to some problematic equipment in Poland and talk to the guy there while steaming though countryside. I was very impressed!

Interested in which service and trains I used? Take a look here: http://railmiles.14zz4.net/ Make sure you filter for the 8th May 2013.

Rail Miles

It's been a while since I posted about a train journey of some kind, there are a few drafts sitting here but they're not really polished enough, so I'd rather finish them up properly. In the mean time I need to share some fantastic news! I have become a member of an elite service, known as 'RailMiles'. It's a rail journey database system that allows aggregation of  all journeys producing statistics and even a group league table. I will probably add a section to my 'About Me' page but why don't you take a quick peek now: http://railmiles.14zz4.net or at the league tables: http://stats.railmiles.org/. Of course, I'm in last place, but hopefully not for long! Currently being beaten by nobody less that Owen Rudge who has an amazing TTD website, check it out at: http://www.transporttycoon.net/

Tower Lifeboat Station

Without a doubt one of the more unique RNLI stations, this branch was set-up in 2002 following a request from the government. It has grown to become the busiest station in the UK, manned 24/7. Because of the unique city location the boats moor on a dedicated floating pier, known as Lifeboat Pier. The station officially has three Class E inshore vessels, but in practice craft is shared between the up-river Chiswick station (which also has it's own dedicated craft).

With the Chiswick, Tower, Gravesend, Sheerness and Southend stations the RNLI can provide very quick response timesto all of the Thames and it's Estuary. The Sheerness vessels often attends incidents on The River Medway, although no dedicated ILB services are stationed on the Medway.

Fowey Lifeboat

Fowey is literally one of the most beautiful places I've ever been, it's fantastic! It is a small town situated on the banks of the River Fowey in Cornwall, the town has a very strong sailing community, similar to that of Cowes IoW. The river is packed with yachts, cruisers and all manner of craft, all surrounding a main town quay. The Quay is the central part of the town and has plenty of places from which people can rent a motor launch, buy a Cornish pasty or even a pint of Cornish ale! What more could anybody ever need?! What's more, Fowey has it's own lifeboat station, with a fantastic history. I won't rewrite what already exists on Wikipedia but it's definitely worth a read.

The station has two main vessels; an AWB Trent class (14-18 Maurice and Joyce Hardy (ON 1222)) and a D-Class ILB (D681 Olive Two). The Trent has been stationed at Fowey since 1996, replacing the dated Waverly class that has been in operation since 1987. The ILB is stationed within the boathouse (which is to the right of the blue building), it is launched using a small crane situated in the opposite car park. The ALB is permanently moored on a purpose built jetty.

Fowey have a great website, here: http://www.foweylifeboat.co.uk/

Donate to the RNLI here: https://rnli.org/donateorbecomeamember/Pages/One-off-Donation.aspx

Tignes Snowboarding 2010

 Wow, 2010 was a busy year indeed! In the spirit of continuing my blog catch up here is my second official bucket list completion: #6 - Snowboard down a mountain.

Snowboarding isn't the easiest thing in the world, that's probably a given, so along with a friend of mine we decided to get some dry slope practice in before heading off to Tignes, France. the John Nike Centre in Chatham has a fairly big dry slope and with a few private lessons, some falls and some scuffs the n00bs were ready to rock.


We stayed in the Les Almes area of the Tignes resort in a group chalet called Chalet Milou. the chalet itself was good fun, as there were a few people in our group it allowed everyone to be in the same chalet but still have separate sleeping areas. The chalet was run by two young guys who made breakfast and cooked dinner each night. the location was fantastic, right next to two ski lifts, 'Chaudannes' and 'Lavachet' which made getting going in the morning a breeze. It also wasn't too far from a 'green' slope, which was great to get adjusted to snowboarding on snow - I even managed to begin mastering turns!

The height of the trip was going up to 'Le Grande Motte' (see what I did there? :P) Which translates to 'The Big Mound' I can assure you the one thing I would not describe it as would be 'mound', this thing was an all out mountain which offers round the year skiing. The Grande Motte was impressive, although I discovered I have a mild fear of cable cars, not chair lifts, just cable cars. Why? Not sure, I'm normally all down with physics and will quite happily hang from a large height with all but a rope and harness to support my squidgy self - I think there was something quite disconcerting with piling into a caravan type vessel to then slowly be moved out over a MASSIVE crevasse. Needless to say I just kept quiet and dealt with it like a man. The view was of course worth it, literally one of the most amazing, fantastic and breathtaking places I've ever been or am likely to ever go, I'd suffer the caravan death machine without a second thought. 

Bucket List, #6 - Snowboard down a mountain - done.

Oktoberfest 2010

This was a long time ago, it's actually pretty scary. Anyway, here I am three years later finally tapping out a blog post about it!

Oktoberfest 2010, for those that don't know is the largest 'fair' in the world celebrating that glorious golden liquid in which the Germans are unquestionably awesome at creating. Around 6 million people visit the 16 day festival every year, Kelly and I visited for a few short, but eventful nonetheless days with an extra bonus day courtesy of Easy Jet.

The fest is and has been since it started in 1810 a part of Munich's culture, it consists of various attractions, from roller coasters, food stalls, rides and of course many beer tents. The beer tents aren't just beer tents, they are enormous semi-permanent structures typically of wooden construction, some have multiple levels and all have ornate wooden carvings, fabric banners and a stage of some kind. Inside this structure there are rows upon rows of wooden tables and benches most tents have an inside capacity of 6,000 patrons. You can see all this in the picture above, the to the top left is a open gazebo form which traditional bands would play.

The beer of Oktoberfest is typically lager, served in a 1 litre stein or 'Maß' which costs around 9 euros. Each tent is operated by an associated beer house and only the houses' beer is served within, the beer in the picture above is 'Paulaner-Bräu', a favourite of mine. The steins can't be taken outside of the drinking areas and this rule is strictly enforced, they are incredibly heavy and when thrown would cause a lot of damage! Food at Oktoberfest is plentiful, and all to traditional German tastes, is is served within the beer tents on large platters and fellow bench sharers often invite others to tuck in too, there is a fantastic sense of hospitality and kindness from everyone, especially the Germans.

Once one has finished drinking there are countless ways to ensure the drink doesn't stay down for too long, one place Kelly and I spent a log of time spectating was the 'Teufelsrad'. This amusement is is a large wooden spinning disk in the middle of a padded arena, participants clamber on to the disk which then starts spinning slowly, people fly off until the disk is spinning pretty fast. A heavy padded ball is then lowered from the roof in an attempt to dislodge people from the disk, occasionally this didn't work and an attendant would use a large rope to literally snag people! Countless hours were spent laughing at people fall and slide, most of whom were pretty drunk.

I simply can't describe how fantastic this festival is, many people have misconceptions that it's just a drunken free for all, that couldn't be further from the truth... Even if you're not a beer drinker I insist that at some point in your life you visit, you will not regret it.

Bucket List #16, done.

A Change of Scenery...

It's been a good (almost) 2 years, I've met some fantastic people, some not-so-fantastic people and learnt lots along the way; but unlike a bad smell I'm not one to hang around. As of the 20th May I'll be moving on to newer things and I'm the most excited about a new job I have ever been.

That said, Atos has been a very important learning curve and given me some fantastic opportunities. I've worked for some of the biggest organisations in the UK, set-up networks for Government ministers, flown up to Scotland to resolve problems and played with some very cool gear. Oh, and we can't forget feeding my strange desire to take the train at any opportunity! 

To all those I've met along the way: I can't thank you all enough, but as ever, you guys rock.