Date: Friday 11 November 2011
It will be our last visit to the capital this year, so Mr UKBuses and myself decide to spend the weekend in London which means that we will be able to see The Lords Mayor Parade, as we have seen in previous years and we can also see Remembrance Sunday at the Cenotaph.
Work have allowed me to leave half an hour early, but I also sneak off a few minutes earlier so that I can make my way down to National Express West Midlands Pensnett Garage where I will meet Mr UKBuses who will give me a lift home so that I can have a quick bite to eat before we leave for London and also so I can pick up my bag. Before we get back home though, Mr UKBuses pulls up outside a newsagents in Kingswinford so that he can get an Express and Star for his mom, I do the honours and also get Mr UKBuses a poppy as he as lost his. After making our way through Wordsley and Amblecote, beating the rush hour traffic, we arrive in Wollaston where Mr UKBuses drops me off at home. As soon as I get in, my tea is ready so I eat it fast so that I can pack my final few things for the weekend, I also have a quick freshen up before getting changed and have a final check to see if I have everything.
I now make my way back to Wollaston village where I board the 1726pm National Express West Midlands service 276, which will take Mr UKBuses and myself to Stourbridge Junction. As I take my seat, I send a text to Mr UKBuses to ensure he is at his stop, and as the bus makes its way through Norton, Mr UKBuses is at his stop and boards the bus. We make our way through Stourbridge, and as we pass the construction site which will be the Stourbridge Interchange, we can not see any progress as it is too dark. After a couple of minutes wait in Stourbridge, we make our way around the ring road again and shortly after we arrive at Stourbridge Junction, being dropped off virtually outside the station as Mr UKBuses uses his powers by ordering the driver to drop us off after the proper bus stop. We have a shorter walk to the railway station, and before we catch our train, we buy our One Day Travelcards for use in London on Saturday and Sunday. We time it right as the person in the ticket office informs us that a Birmingham bound train is waiting to depart on Platform 3.
We board our train and we arrive just under half an hour later at Birmingham Snow Hill. We have a little time to kill in Birmingham before our London train is due, so as we make our way to the next station, we divert to Bennett's Hill, where we have a quick drink in J D Wetherspoons' "The Briar Rose", the pub is busy, so Mr UKBuses finds a seat as I buy the drinks. Between Birmingham Snow Hill and The Briar Rose, Mr UKBuses has lost his poppy, so he makes a mental note to purchase another one in London tomorrow ready for the Remembrance service on Sunday. Drinks finished and toilets visited, we make our way to New Street Station via The Pallasades and as we arrive we check the destination board to ensure that there are no problems with the train that we are catching. We find out that our train will be leaving from Platform 5 on time, so after getting refreshments from WH Smiths for the train journey, we make our way to the platform where our train is waiting.
We board our Virgin train and take our seats and to keep us busy on our journey ahead, we decide to make notes for crossing points on the upcoming charity walk for the 246 route at the end of November that we will be taking up the honours of marshalling the traffic en route. We go through the maps twice and make notes of how the marshalling will work. We think that this will keep us busy for the most of the journey, when we finish we have a look at what station the train has stopped at and we discover that it is only Coventry, we still have just over an hour to go before we arrive in London, we can not even look at the scenery outside as it is pitch black. The drinks we had at the pub earlier are catching up on me, and after visiting the toilet, I make my way back into coach A, where with a posh voice I try and do my impression of the ticket inspector and say "Tickets and passes please" just after I have walked through the carriage entrance. I seem to have fooled Mr UKBuses as I'm sure he nearly pulled his tickets out for inspection.
We arrive at London Euston and we now need to get our ticket for the journey on the tube to the hotel in the East India district of the Docklands. We don't know where we need to purchase these from as the normal London Transport ticket office is shut, we make our way to the Virgin ticket offices to see if they can gives us the appropriate ticket, but when I ask for "two single tickets to East India", the man behind the counter looks at me gone out before he informs me that we need to purchase our tickets from downstairs in the tube station. Before we do that, we head outside so that I can have a much needed "fresh air" break, and after I have finished we make our way down to the London Euston tube station. We both don't have any change, so we have to wait in a long queue for our tickets. After waiting about twenty minutes, we get our tube tickets, and after passing through the ticket barriers, we make our first tube journey of the weekend, and as we arrive in Bank, we change from the tube and we get on the Docklands Light Railway to our destination at East India. This would be our only trip on the DLR this weekend as there are engineering works for the rest of our stay.
We alight at East India DLR station, and we need to find the hotel. After a walk of about ten minutes following the main road and quite a few office complexes, we arrive at our hotel, Travelodge Docklands (the photo can be seen at the top of this blog post), as we book in at reception we decide to book breakfast for tomorrow morning, especially as it an "all you can eat" breakfast buffet. After booking in, we decide to drop our bags off in our rooms, and after a quick freshening up, we both meet back up in reception where we decide to have a couple of pints before we go to bed in the hotel bar, as can be seen in the photograph, right. As we settle down in the bar, I notice a man in a CM Punk T-shirt, and after a few more minutes, a load more people descend upon the hotel wearing different wrestling t-shirts. It seems that the WWE are in town and the WWE Raw brand have been showing off there wrestling skills in the nearby 02 arena. If only I had known, I would have booked the day off and come down to London earlier in the day and watched the event whilst Mr UKBuses made his way from work. As we finish our second pint we decide it is time for bed, I wish Mr UKBuses a goodnight, and pop outside for a "fresh air" break before I hear my bed calling.
It has been a different experience as we travelled down toward London during the evening and also in the dark. The weekend has got off to an enjoyable start ahead of the next couple of days.....
We board our Virgin train and take our seats and to keep us busy on our journey ahead, we decide to make notes for crossing points on the upcoming charity walk for the 246 route at the end of November that we will be taking up the honours of marshalling the traffic en route. We go through the maps twice and make notes of how the marshalling will work. We think that this will keep us busy for the most of the journey, when we finish we have a look at what station the train has stopped at and we discover that it is only Coventry, we still have just over an hour to go before we arrive in London, we can not even look at the scenery outside as it is pitch black. The drinks we had at the pub earlier are catching up on me, and after visiting the toilet, I make my way back into coach A, where with a posh voice I try and do my impression of the ticket inspector and say "Tickets and passes please" just after I have walked through the carriage entrance. I seem to have fooled Mr UKBuses as I'm sure he nearly pulled his tickets out for inspection.
We arrive at London Euston and we now need to get our ticket for the journey on the tube to the hotel in the East India district of the Docklands. We don't know where we need to purchase these from as the normal London Transport ticket office is shut, we make our way to the Virgin ticket offices to see if they can gives us the appropriate ticket, but when I ask for "two single tickets to East India", the man behind the counter looks at me gone out before he informs me that we need to purchase our tickets from downstairs in the tube station. Before we do that, we head outside so that I can have a much needed "fresh air" break, and after I have finished we make our way down to the London Euston tube station. We both don't have any change, so we have to wait in a long queue for our tickets. After waiting about twenty minutes, we get our tube tickets, and after passing through the ticket barriers, we make our first tube journey of the weekend, and as we arrive in Bank, we change from the tube and we get on the Docklands Light Railway to our destination at East India. This would be our only trip on the DLR this weekend as there are engineering works for the rest of our stay.
It has been a different experience as we travelled down toward London during the evening and also in the dark. The weekend has got off to an enjoyable start ahead of the next couple of days.....
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