Most convoluted journey?

[whole diary]

[grahame]

Wasn't sure if I should but this here or in the Ceredigion bus routes axed by Arriva topic, but that one said please consider starting a new topic given the time since the last post in that topic. Feel free to move this post if you can think of a better home for it.

I'm going to leave it here ... yet it becomes far from a "lighter side" topic and raises serious questions and discussion points of general interest.   So I'll probably follow it up on the "Other ways to travel / bus" section.   Probaly not for a couple of hours - at day job at the moment!

See new topic - http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=15202.0

[PhilWakely]

The OP^▸ (Original Poster / topic starter, or Off Peak, depending on context) asked about your 'most convoluted journey'. One of my 'madventures' as a young teenage trainspotter in the early 70s was a day return from Exeter to Derby on Easter Saturday 1973. This journey probably fits into 'the most indirect direct service'! I had intended to spend three hours at Derby, but ended up with just one and arrived home nearer sunrise on the Sunday than the scheduled 23:00!

I had chosen that weekend deliberately as the line from Exeter to Taunton was closed for some reason and as this was in the days before rail replacement buses were commonplace, trains to the north were being diverted through Honiton, Castle Cary and Bath. What I hadn't realised though was that the line between Cheltenham and Lickey was also closed and we ended up being diverted through Cheltenham Racecourse and Shirley to get to Birmingham NS. Birmingham to Derby was boringly normal! 

The return journey took me back through Oxford, Didcot and Reading for some reason before being diverted again at Castle Cary!  I don't think I have ever been on a more indirect service (apart from the occasional special) without having to change trains.

[Worcester_Passenger]

Not as convoluted in terms of distance, but a possible in terms of the number of diversions : back in September of 2008 I made a Sunday journey from Newcastle upon Tyne to Birmingham on CrossCountry.

Almost immediately we ran on what I think were the freight lines, and then we ran wrong line down to Chester-le-Street.

But the complications really set in at Sheffield. We reversed there, and went out on the Worksop line. Back on the main line at Chesterfield, then a diversion at Clay Cross going down through Toton and then back to Derby. Another reversal, and then to New Street by way of Sutton Coldfield.

[Andrew1939 from West Oxon]

My most convoluted rail journey was made just about 54 years ago from Winchester to Bridgwater. I was advised to travel via Southampton and Bristol but when arriving at Winchester station at around 15.00 was told that I had missed the connection at Southampton and advised to travel via Basingstoke and Reading. However the train was delayed by a landslip at Hook and I missed the Basingstoke connection and was told to go onto London and make my way by tube to Paddington for an early evening train westwards. The train was further delayed and I missed the train at Paddington by about 10 minutes. The next train was the 23.50 newspaper train that got to Bridgwater around 04.15 the following morning. I put my luggage in a locker and went back into central London and killed time at the Windmill - what a laugh - a continuous show with no seat booking and with people clambering over the seats from the back to get the most closeup few of the stage for you-know-what, an experience never to be forgotten!