Travelogue observations - 1st September 2019

Home to off Ventnor – Sunday 1st September 2019

Taxi to Melksham Station; train to Westbury; train to Southampton Central; taxi to Mayflower terminal; ship to the English Channel. Double plus plenty of time at each transfer – to observe, to link up infrequent services along the way, and for defensive scheduling purposes. So plenty of opportunity to "people watch" along the way.

Just half a dozen of us joining the 09:47 at Melksham to Westbury, on time and with plenty of apparent capacity; we joined the front carriage and our luggage swam in the rack. A checked approach to Bradford Junction and a signal stop prior to Trowbridge indicated we were (as scheduled) behind the Portsmouth train, and passengers waiting on the platform but not joining our train gave clue to use being correctly ahead of the Weymouth. Then at Westbury the handful of passengers was joined by a flood from the rear – it rather looks like we have a developing flow once again from Swindon to the seaside on the south coast of Dorset. Excellent to see it so multicultural too.

The wait of nearly an hour at Westbury, with the buffet open, gave us a morning coffee and a chance to watch the ebb and flow of personalities and think about their journeys – Grandma and Grandpa with granddaughter – Grandma taking her back to home in West London and Grandpa instructing his wife as if she was totally new to such trips or inadequate; granddaughter perhaps of an age where she really should have been able to travel alone and was perhaps being disadvantaged by being helicoptered.

The lady who - now - was that fancy dress or her norm? Long white flowing skirt, yellow high vis blouse and matching florescent hair. A pair of crutches, also glow in the dark - and I know that because she was so talkative. She'd been 17 hours on a rave on the West Wilts Industrial Estate and was looking to get back to Southampton, confused by sleeplessness and perhaps other factors too. Talkative to the extent of being over-talkative.

Waiting in the buffet at Westbury is a noisy experience. The Weymouth train dropped off a couple of carriages which - a bit later - were shunted out to the sidings. The Swindon Flyer laid over before its next run. The Penzance and Paddington services called. And all had diesel engines under the carriages, mid-platform. There may be good soundproofing for passengers inside trains, but outside the movement from loco hauled to on-carriage powered has moved the noise from the open extremities to the busier centre sections of the station - and at Westbury, that movement from the push-pull trains that left us last year to powered passenger carriages is recent.

"This train divides here" said the information systems about our Portsmouth service, so we walked forward into the glorious sunshine a few minutes before it was due, just to quickly trot back when just a 3 car 158 pulled in. Our luggage fitted – just - into the racks amongst others, our seat reservations not labelled up (none were) so we selected a couple of other (airline) seats rather than disturbing the slumbering couple at the selected and booked table. "Next stop Warminster" said the display screens, correctly. They must have liked that message because they were still saying "Next Station Warminster" even after Salisbury.

Cardiff - Portsmouth is a busy service, and busy with people not going within striking distance of either Cardiff or Portsmouth - truly a local line, a regional line and a long distance line all rolled into one and trying to compromise between them. Significant numbers on at Warminster, off and on at Salisbury and off at Southampton. I'm perhaps not best to judge the numbers though as we were in the front carriage, and even in a short train (witness the 2 car Swindon to Westbury) loadings are incredibly uneven. I recall the 10 car scheme on South East in my youth - extending Charing Cross and Canon Street services to the likes of Sevenoaks from 8 to 10 cars to add capacity, then the issue of "how do we get people to move forward and join those extra carriages".

None stop through Dilton Marsh, though Dean and Mottisfont, through Redbridge and Millbrook to a dead halt outside Southampton Central. I did wonder if extra stops might be made to cover the strike-cancelled Romsey 6, but is seems not. An SWR^» train headed out towards Bournemouth and we pulled right across to the platform on the Docks side of the station. Something to do with engineering? Something to do with the SWR strike? Regular Practise? I don't know, but very convenient for taking out luggage out to the taxi rank for linking to the cruise terminal.

Our Melksham taxi had been pre-booked; no such need here in Southampton and a white cab (what is white in Southampton, black in London, yellow in New York and blue in Bristol?) took us quickly and courteously to the Mayflower terminal. Just the one cruise ship out from the whole port for the day - P&O's Aurora, bound TransAtlantic. Luggage from the taxi and across the pavement to the handlers; near-zero distance. Quick check it was labelled (and for the right cruise!) and we were free to walk into the terminal ... a vast hanger with a large seating / waiting area and coloured and lettered cards being handed out. With a "please arrive at 3 p.m." and an actual arrival 3 hours ahead of that, we knew we could be in for a long wait, though early arrival on previous occasions had not been a problem.

We did, indeed, have nearly 3 hours to "people watch" and these will be the people in who's company we are for the next "n" days. None of us is at our best after travelling. None of us is at our best when in an indefinite wait to be called forward for admin procedures. So no presumptions made about the lack of communications between the groups. From pure observations, almost entirely of a traditional British background, almost entirely in the latter third of their lives, almost entirely couples - though a significant number or paired up couples. Some reading, some just talking patiently. Few laughing and joking / little show of pleasure and only a very few of us doing anything electronic - Lisa and I online at times, and some on mobile phones, but so very different to the waiting room at (say) Chippenham station in the morning where 8 out of 10 are tapping away intently at screens.

The grey card alphabet goes all the way from A to Y. Blue from A to K. Green from A to P. Red from A to - goodness knows - we were F and I saw some red P (need to see a doctor if you have blood in your urine!). Called up in line after an eternity - but actually not far off the time we had been asked to be there. So can't (or rather shouldn't !) grumble.

They've done the check in procedure hundreds of time before – all pretty routine. Except – there are USA port calls on this cruise to everyone's had to get an ESTA - USA check / pre-clearance document. Yeah, right. Mine valid to May '21. Lisa - alas - no ESTA; doesn't need one indeed probably couldn't get one being a USA citizen as well as UK^▸ . And that's when we come to realise that the procedure is so routine - for the very narrow customer base that's P&O's. Concern as our check in lady goes of to consult with others, and our queue held while it happens. For sure, the final authority confirms "OK" and our check in lady jokes about "home for 3 days". Ah - the people who look at Lisa's paperwork when going to the USA for a very short period never know what to say!

And so... security screening without the hateful long queues of an airport, up the escalator and a walk along half the length of the ship to boarding. With the cruise card issued at checkin, a quick 'swipe' and a near-instant confirmation as we stepped on board, and so to find out cabin. There will be days at sea where I can tell you about that – about this way of travel - so I will hold fire just for the present. Beside, I'm off with Lisa in a few minutes to beginner's Bridge. I'm hoping it's something that will help in our "replacing the Severn Tunnel" thread, but apparently it's a card game.

Connectivity from the boat is slow, facilities limited when online. My laptop is itself a web server and I have Ruby, Python, Perl and PHP documentation in electronic or paper form, a MySQL and and SQLite 3 databases, and so forth. Much to be done while here and off-line-ish. Don't worry too much about Lisa - across from me also working on databases. Both beginning to relax already - an afternoon of Ruby after bridge, I suspect. What I don't have is a quick and easy upload, so you'll see writing rather than pictures. But then if I were to upload a view from the window now, it would be sea and sky and a thin piece of land hardly visible at the division - and that would be Scilly.