so, per last post, i was mentioning the flooding. because of the epic amount of rain that has been falling, alot of the trains have been shut down, which put a damper on some of my travel plans this weekend. but i, being the fearless, intrepid, and ultimately foolish man that i am, said, “rain? floods? cancelled trains? bah! i am a kent, a seasoned traveller, conqueror of the costa rican bus system and master of jet-lag. this will not stop me.” and for my pride, i have paid the price.
philip, tregg, and i left yesterday for leeds to find hadrian’s wall, catching one of the few trains that was still leaving the partially flooded oxford station. upon arriving in leeds, we discovered that in order to get to the wall, we actually needed to ride the train another two hours north to the town of newcastle. we decided that as long as we were in leeds, we might as well get some lunch and visit the royal armouries, this stellar museum that houses much of the historical armour of england.
to get there we had to walk into the bad side of town, literally on the wrong side of the train tracks. we innocently stopped at the first pub we saw to grab some lunch, which was shall we say, less than reputable. from about the first three steps in the door i could tell that we were not welcome. it was like walking into a scene from “snatch” or “lock, stock, and two smoking barrels.” needless to say, we made a quick about face and found our way to a friendlier place across the street.
after lunch we headed up to the amouries, which was awesome. they have a huge collection of suits of armour, swords, lances, and shields, with live demonstrations of everything from jousting to swordfights. the six-year-old-castles-and-kings-obsessed side of me was in heaven.
after a few hours we made out way back to the train station, just in time to catch our connection to newcastle. we got to newcastle only to find that we had missed the buses to the wall by about three hours. it was disheartening. so, we grabbed some dinner and caught the next train back to oxford. this was a mistake.
see, the last direct train to oxford had left a while back, so we had to catch one with a change in london. but, little did we know, because of the flooding there were no trains leaving london to oxford. so, upon arriving in london late that night, and a wild ride on the bus from king’s cross station to paddington station, we discovered that we were basically stranded in london.
fortunately we were able to get in touch with some kids on the baylor in london program, and we were able to bunk with them for the night. my eternal thanks to elliot and sarah who so graciously shared their rooms with us.
this morning i woke up, willing to forgive england and her flawed public transit system. but, alas, she was not ready to kiss and make up. tregg and philip wanted to spend the day in london, so we parted ways. i knew that to get back to oxford i would need to take a train north and then loop back down again. i decided that while i was heading that way i might as well go the extra distance back up to newcastle and see the wall. after four hours on the train i walked into the newcastle station to see that i had missed the bus, again, by five minutes. five.
i admitted defeat and boarded the first direct train back to oxford, utterly disillusioned with travel. moral of the story: when they say to you, “don’t use the trains this weekend unless you absolutely have to,” you ought to listen.
