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Adventures in Public transport: looking at my itinerary for the Hel - Stock - Man - York leg, I appeared to have stuffed up the timing of my plane landing in Man and me catching the train to York I'd booked. There was only 40 minutes between the two events and I had to get off the plane, get through Passport control and baggage reclaim.
I had anticipated having to buy another ticket.
On the train between Joensuu and Helsinki when I realized what I had done, I went looking for ways to speed things up at Manchester airport on my arrival and found Fast Track, which puts you to the front of the queue for £5. Bargain.
Plane from Stockholm left about 10 minutes late but landed right on time.
Got to passport control, found the Fast Track line, I was the only one in it and was through Passport Control in less than a minute. A definite improvement on the two hours at Heathrow.
Went to baggage claim and my suitcase was among the first off.
Nothing to declare, headed for the train station and arrived with about 30 minutes to spare. Only to see from the board that they had cancelled the fucking train.
The poor railway person was besieged by a horde of travellers, most of whom didn't speak English, demanding answers as to how to head north. He was telling everybody to get on the next train and go to Manchester Picadilly, so we did. Got to Picadilly, where we were told to go to Manchester Victoria, this time by tram.
We were helped immensely by a nice young man who worked for Northern Railway who carried our bags and made sure we got on the tram ok.
Got off the tram and were directed to the trains. Up stairs, down stairs and onto platform 4.
Where we got on the very train we were supposed to catch. I have no idea where it had been hiding between the airport and Victoria.
To cut a long story short (too late!), I caught the train I had booked, arrived only 9 minutes late, and got to see bits of Manchester I wasn't expecting to see.
I had anticipated having to buy another ticket.
On the train between Joensuu and Helsinki when I realized what I had done, I went looking for ways to speed things up at Manchester airport on my arrival and found Fast Track, which puts you to the front of the queue for £5. Bargain.
Plane from Stockholm left about 10 minutes late but landed right on time.
Got to passport control, found the Fast Track line, I was the only one in it and was through Passport Control in less than a minute. A definite improvement on the two hours at Heathrow.
Went to baggage claim and my suitcase was among the first off.
Nothing to declare, headed for the train station and arrived with about 30 minutes to spare. Only to see from the board that they had cancelled the fucking train.
The poor railway person was besieged by a horde of travellers, most of whom didn't speak English, demanding answers as to how to head north. He was telling everybody to get on the next train and go to Manchester Picadilly, so we did. Got to Picadilly, where we were told to go to Manchester Victoria, this time by tram.
We were helped immensely by a nice young man who worked for Northern Railway who carried our bags and made sure we got on the tram ok.
Got off the tram and were directed to the trains. Up stairs, down stairs and onto platform 4.
Where we got on the very train we were supposed to catch. I have no idea where it had been hiding between the airport and Victoria.
To cut a long story short (too late!), I caught the train I had booked, arrived only 9 minutes late, and got to see bits of Manchester I wasn't expecting to see.