The Long Non-Event.......

Ladies that lunch! This time six of us, three are my first cousins, two are my sisters who of course are also their cousins. We all live so far apart but try to get together once a year usually around springtime however last year life got in the way for a few of us and it never happened and this year it took till October, so I was really looking forward to it.

Ipswich to Liverpool Street by train takes just over an hour, meeting the others in the station 11:45am and the pub we are going to is a very short walk away. I decided the train would be more relaxing than driving to Newbury Park and taking the underground the rest of the way which would take about two hours.

Hubby drove me to Ipswich station at 9:45am and I bought my off-peak return ticket for £42.20. Online it said my train to Liverpool Street was 10:06 on the information board it said "10:09 - expected 10:12" so already running a little late, it actually left at 10:15 but still plenty of time.

First stop Manningtree, second stop Colchester, then it didn't move. We were all asked to leave the train as it was terminating here because someone had been hit by a train a little further up the line. So we all left platform 2 as told next train to London will leave from platform 4. It had turned bitterly cold so I stood inside the now packed coffee shop but with my poor hearing and tannoy announcements being what they are I found it difficult to hear and didn't want to miss something important so instead I walked up and down the platform to keep a bit warmer.

I had WiFi so messaged my sisters to tell them and was just about to message hubby when he phoned me. He'd heard there was a rail problem and was checking on me. Told him I'd wait till 11:30 and if I wasn't on my way by then I'd come home.

No reply from my sisters so did it all again by text. Told them to go on without me and if I can I'll meet them at the pub.

The tannoy was keeping us very well informed and by 11:30 they were saying the London line will remain closed for at least another hour. So I made my way to platform 3 for the next Norwich train stopping at Manningtree then ipswich. They announced this would now be the scheduled 11:47 service. Text my sisters and everyone sent sad regrets and I was sad too. Text hubby who said he'd meet me at Ipswich 12:15. Then the driver announced "change of plan we're leaving in four minutes" so another text to Hubby as this was nearly 10mins earlier and he said he'd be at Ipswich for 12.

Well first stop Manningtree where it sat for a while, then the driver said "Passengers I'm so sorry to say that I've a bit more bad news for you....." turns out a freight train had broken down on the line just ahead of us and we were going nowhere.

Another text to Hubby who by now was at Ipswich station. So checking with station staff that yes indeed this was going to be a long delay I left the train and the station to wait outside for Hubby to come in the car for me.

The latest we were told was no London service for at least another two hours, so I was right to head home and now nothing moving toward Norwich either, glad I was sitting outside waiting for my lift, so when a few cars pulled up outside and a passenger was getting out I rushed forward to warn them before their lift drove away and they were very grateful, one even offered me a lift to anywhere I needed to be, so kind of them, but Hubby was nearly there.

Much later in the day when I  checked the rail situation it was still in chaos,  had I gone I would probably have been struggling to get home again. Then I wrote the sorry story on facebook, later still I thought it odd there had been no comments made, well that was because it wasn't there! ! !

So I wrote....
"Hahaha Well that's typical for today, I wrote a long post which has now disappeared!"
By then I just wrote the shorter to-the-point version 😉

I've claimed my ticket price back on the Delay Repay Claim form online but there's nowhere on the form to ask about compensation for not actually getting to where I wanted to be or if I'd incurred further costs because of it. Automatic emails now saying it's being processed.

OK not the outcome I wanted, two hours away from home getting nowhere, but actually I talked to quite a few lovely people during mutual commiserations. Yes Colchester station was freezing but sitting outside Manningtree waiting for Clive I was on a bench in a suntrap 😎 And walking through Manningtree station to the exit I discovered the tunnels are displaying artwork done by the residents of Acorn Village that I would never have seen otherwise.
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