After our trip to Sheffield on Thursday, Good Friday found myself and The Lines In My Network heading for CORNWALL. This may seem like an excellent use of the long bank holiday weekend (spoilers: IT WAS) but it did involve a certain amount of PANIC, as Good Friday is THE VERY BUSIEST day in ALL of the travelling calendar.
We knew what to expect well in advance - all of the cheap tickets had LONG gone, and when we'd tried to at least reserve seats in Standard Class we'd found that it was FULL, so came up with a PLAN. When we arrived we cunningly HACKED into the system to work out which platform our train would come in on (i.e. looked at which platforms had trains on but no destination yet, then cross-checked this with where they'd arrived from) and then casually went and stood near the gates. It seems that we were not the only H4X0Rs in the station as quite a crowd developed, all panting for SEATS. Things got tense/exciting as people got OFF the train, and as soon as the gates were opened (painfully slowly, one by one) for people getting ON we all RAN - RAN! - for the train! Our team went STRAIGHT for First Class where we knew a) there were SOME unreserved seats and b) Weekend Upgrades were in operation (i.e. you pay a bit extra for a First Class SEAT). We managed to NAB a two-er and watched as the carriage filled up, and then got FULLER, all around us, with people STANDING and LEANING on tables all the way to Exeter. MAN we were glad to get sat down, and even more glad that the RAMMED train meant that nobody could get down the corridors to ask us to pay an upgrade fee. WINZ!
The weekend itself was DELIGHTFUL, as we met with PARENTS and did what we always do when we go down to see them i.e. went straight to the pub on the first day, and on the second went for a WALK and then a CURRY. It's a system that works VERY WELL. We also had Family Christmas, which involved quite a lot of WHISKY and then everyone feeling Mysteriously Unwell the next day.
We had our big walk this time on Crantock beach which is HUGE and GORGEOUS. The Toes On My Foot suggested de-shoeing so we had a PADDLE and a SQUIDGE through the amazing SAND. It was an idyllic day made even more so by a stop-off in The Hevlas Licensed Tea Gardens, where we had CAKE and BEER in the sudden glorious sunshine while one of the owners played his guitar and birds sang along. It was bloody lovely!
Having gone out on the busiest travel day of the year we came back on Easter Sunday, which is apparently the quietest, and the train was NOTICEABLY calmer, which meant that we DID get charged for the upgrade but didn't mind - we were in such a good mood, in fact, that we didn't even getting DETRAINED at Reading and being put onto a MUCH slower service instead did not harsh our VIBE. I suggest The Mayor Of LONDON take a leaf out of Cornwall's book and bring in sunshine, beer, whisky and CAKE for everyone, it would make the tube MUCH more relaxed!
