I’ve 65 mins to get the connecting train in Fishguard. But the ferry was meant to depart at 08:15 and I’m not even on board yet… let’s see how this works the other side!
@mikerspencer Right. I know it well - from long ago. My parents live in Newport (Gwent, not Pembrokeshire) but we often went to west Wales. But that was all 20+ years ago!
Stena Line (Boat: Stena Nordica) has useable free wifi. And the boarding experience was the best so far - they take your heavy bags on for you in a van. And there’s no bag scanning either (something to learn, Roscoff!)
This is the ship I’m on - Stena Nordica. Rosslare Europort - Fishguard.
Pic taken yesterday at Rosslare Europort.
It’s not quite as nice as Pont Aven (Brittany Ferries) that I took last week for the longer Roscoff-Cork crossing, but it’s perfectly fine. And unlike Brittany Ferries it has free (limited) wifi throughout the crossing.
Ship departed 40 mins late from Rosslare. But docked more or less on time at Fishguard. But as there are no gangways we have to let cars and trucks off before being allowed off as foot passengers…
@jon I think the only time I’ve arrived late off a ferry was on a Harwich Hook run. And we were massively late - 3hrs or so. Luckily I didn’t have to rush off the ferry as I was going to the Ruhrgebiet. Meant extra time in bed!
Might ask TfW whether they have a connectional policy if it is late… Got my Performance Manager hat on! 👍🏻
@jon our ferry from Barcelona to Ibiza was literally across the street from the terminal, but they made us take a bus to get there and then we also had to walk through the car loading ramps.
@jon it’s great that the train station is still on the quayside but a shame that no foot passenger gangway is in use.
The train looks suited to shorter journeys and certainly wouldn’t entice Irish passengers away from air travel if their destination is further afield than Cardiff.
At least there are still some direct services running from Holyhead to London.
When I was in Holyhead last month, I saw a Birmingham train depart without any foot passengers from the ferry - our shuttle bus arrived in the terminal at exactly the time of the train’s scheduled departure (it left three mins late).
AFAIK Eurostar have no obligation to take you on an alternative service if you’re delayed.
We need a Brusssels/Paris SailRail through ticket!
I’m on a 40 year old diesel train with no air conditioning on bolted (instead of welded) track. The bushes are close to the sides of the train. The train is almost 40 years old.
No it’s not Romania, but UK… Fishguard-Cardiff on a Class 153 Sprinter
In all the #CrossBorderRail trains I’ve taken I’d not think I’d need to measure sound levels. But here we are. UK, on a Class 153 Sprinter, windows open, hot day
@jon You'll want to avoid London Jubilee Line. Sunday we had a very rare trip Green Park to London Bridge and sound level was (subjectively) approaching pneumatic drill level.
@jon Having bought some noise cancelling headphones a while back I was surprised at how effective they were at blocking out most background noise on train or bus even with nothing playing. Probably at least as good as custom earplugs used for motorbike riding.
@jon I guess the advice for anyone travelling from the Severn basin to Dublin is to stick with the Holyhead crossing then, no matter how much they'd like to occasionally see non-Dublin Ireland.
Also, I did 2 hours in a 3+2 156 Bath to Weymouth recently, and it's amazing that's considered acceptable.
@jon i have no idea how loud that is and no calibrated setup to measure for myself, but i find it difficult to believe that the various non-ac regionals of central-eastern europe aren't much worse
Now a dude has taken his shirt off because it’s hot. There are announcements telling you all sorts of things here, but there’s none against that…? 🤔 And no, I’m not going to try to photograph it
I abandoned the stinky sprinter at Port Talbot instead of Cardiff. And caught a delayed Swansea-London service there instead. Listen to the noise of this thing departing!
@jon Transport for Wales still has a lot of those old diesel units on its slower commuter lines. They come through Warrington quite frequently on their way to Manchester Airport from north Wales and Chester.
@jon Welsh, the language that fascinates me because how different it is to the English language next door. How do I pronounce that again? I need to get back there.
First time in my life I’m taking an ⚡️ train Cardiff-Newport. Given I’ve done this trip hundreds of times as a kid… and well it’s been a while since I went this way!
@jon the class 800 are questionable as to if they can take bikes. The silly cupboard has two dangle hooks and getting any bike other than a small race bike in there is almost impossible.
@jon I love the GLC, and that you went to school with (at least) one of them! Although I'm not from there, I have unusually been to Liswherry, Ringland and Risca.
@jon for a moment I thought that you were referring to this: https://www.thewave.com/ - but that would've required you to already have crossed the Severn (and I don't think it can be seen from any railway)
@jon A few years back when Berlin had S-Bahn maintenance troubles they got some trains from Stuttgart in red. One early morning seeing a red S-Bahn in the station gave me total vertigo because I crew up with them looking like that in the south.
@jon, I remember two years ago our cycling route passed through Newport, and we arrived in front of the bridge, and thought: "How the hell are we supposed to climb up there? Oh, there's a lift! By why is it so tall?" before realising the "lift" doesn't actually go up, but instead goes sideways 😄
@jon, come to think of it, we haven’t actually seen central Newport, we’ve just cycled across the river and quickly disappeared in the countryside, having seen enough of the industrial areas 😃
Maybe I should go to Newport proper one day. I can’t believe it can be as depressing as some people described it to me 🙂
I was just going to write that is understandable as I also did not take a foto when a woman traveled U1 from Karlsplatz to Vienna Central station topless (17th june 2023 some time between 16:00 and 17:00).
@jon I was on a 153 to Pembroke Dock a couple of weeks ago... you get quite the range of behaviours on those trains. I had a guy live rapping to beats on his phone
@jon@Sagetisseur This is a very realistic experience of today's UK train travel. Take it from a local. Reminds me a bit of train travel in 1980s West Germany. Nostalgia anyone?
@jon At least you still have trains (although, yeah, that does sound like it sucks). We ripped up so much of our public transit so long ago, and what we have left is so underfunded and mismanaged that it’s considerably cheaper to fly between most cities than take Amtrak (if you even have that option).
@jon@yrrsinn I am on an air conditioned ICE train in Germany that was probably made in the 90s and refurbed in the last decade, and … actually, I feel your pain? Every express train we've caught in Germany yesterday and today has been delayed, and a third of our booked trains were cancelled! It makes a Sprinter look efficient.
@jon@yrrsinn Also, the air conditioning is struggling, there are no windows that open, the noise level on the platform peaked at 98dB, half the toilets are out of service, the wifi fails at random, and the ride is as bouncy as a 40 year old InterCity 125 at speed. It's British Rail! Only German.
@cstross@jon we blame DB for creating superspreader events by running trains during the heat wave with no AC, no airflow and no way to open the windows.
@th@cstross@jon Of those, at least the windows that can't be opened on a 300 km/h ICE train I can understand. The lack of a passive ventilation system separate from he train's AC, less so.
@jon@yrrsinn … Welp, just went to the galley car to buy a coffee, and the power to their appliances went out! So, Coke Zero is the New Coffee. Just hope the Erdinger bottles stay cool until @feorag gets hers.
@grrrr_shark@cstross@yrrsinn@feoragUnderinvestment hasn’t done DB any favours. It’s still 100% owned by the German state. (Preparing it for privatisation - that never happened - was the start of the rot)
@grrrr_shark@cstross@yrrsinn@feorag there has been competitive tendering of regional rail. Which has been mixed. Some places better, some worse. But the track, and any trains labelled DB are still state run.
@grrrr_shark@cstross@jon@feorag indeed. making the DB ready for the stock market broke it's back.
Meanwhile trains and tracks in the former east block seem to be in a better shape than in some western countries
@yrrsinn@grrrr_shark@cstross@feorag you get what you invest in. Germany is mid table in Europe in investment per capita in rail. France is very low - that’s why other than TGVs it’s horrid. Main lines in PL, CZ, SK have improved quite a bit in the last decade.
@cstross@jon@yrrsinn I'm afraid that's routine. And frustrating, as when travelling on business I try whenever possible to use trains rather than planes.
The upside, I suppose, is that all those people worried that a reunited Germany would yet again become a bullying tyrant can relax -- these days, the Germans can't even make the trains run on time.
@marcas@jon@yrrsinn My father used to observe that Americans are Failed Germans at heart. If he could see them now he'd peg today's Germans as Failed Americans, and today's English as Failed Period.
@jon TfW have had problems with their newer trains this year, I think it's both new trains not working and less old (20 years old 170s) breaking down en mass. So they've fallen back onto more of the old trains, and it's caused cancellations and overcrowding due to shorter trains.
Still, at least they actually try to run something, which is more than can be said for any of the English TOCs who aren't allowed to reach a deal with the unions
@jon Just like the west highland line. I invested in a decent set of noise cancelling headphones to make the three hour journey to Glasgow less headache inducing.
@jon it was never expected to have such volume, and no push to upgrade. Until Brexit. Apparently not straightforward to expand the port due to tides, seas etc (but I'm open to correction here) so intent is there, but it'll be slow.
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