Skylink Derby

Using one of the tickets I was given at the Trentbarton focus group last month, I rode Skylink Derby. As this Trentbarton line is joint-operated between them and Kinchbus, the MANGO cards are not used on this service and so it has not been, until today, a route I had explored.

Skylink Derby begins in Derby (obviously), goes to East Midlands Airport as Skylinks Nottingham and Express do, through Loughborough and all the way to Leicester. I travelled all the way to Leicester and walked around the centre there for a short time. This marked the first time I can recall of my stepping foot in Leicester during the daytime, rather than past midnight. Most of my experience with Leicester comes via travelling through it rather than walking around it.

As for Skylink Derby, it's a fun route; it's long and there's plenty of scenery to observe while riding it. Also, as a result of riding Skylink Derby and using it to travel to Leicester, I have visited all of the outer regions of the Trentbarton network, as viewed here (map is outdated as it shows the defunct Radcliffe Line and Ruddington Connection and doesn't show Skylink Express but nevertheless shows the distant points of the network).

London 2017 - National Express

My chosen method of travelling to and from London yesterday was via National Express - a coach company. While coaches take longer to reach London than trains do, they are significantly cheaper. Once I knew when I'd be travelling to London, I booked a month and a half in advance and paid a low fare for my tickets; the other trade-off besides the journey taking longer is that I was restricted to taking the buses at the specified booking times. For example, my bus from Nottingham was only the one at 6:05am and my return from London was at 9:30pm; if I'd missed them I'd have to have bought a new ticket for another bus and it would have been more expensive.

The route down was fun. While much of it took place on the M1 (the UK's main motorway from the south to the north), there was a brief stop in Milton Keynes and the route through London to the Victoria coach station took the bus through the Royal Borough of Kensington, which I'd never seen in person before. For the route back, it again stopped briefly in Milton Keynes but also went through downtown Leicester, which makes it the second time I've seen Leicester between 12:00am and 2:00am.

Will I travel via National Express again. Most certainly, yes!

Evening Leicester

I photographed a small part of the Leicester skyline when my train pulled into that city's station yesterday evening:

You might remember Leicester as the city I ended up in when I failed to disembark from the train after the O2 Arena concert I attended in March 2013.

Foxton Locks 2013

My family and I visited Foxton Locks today. I didn't take as many pictures as I did last year but I ensured I had a few for another post:

This is an area of the grounds up by the Foxton Inclined Plan; it was taken from the same observation deck that I mentioned in the previous post.

A shot of some yellow water-lillies; in addition to the lillies, this section of the river was filled with fish.

The plaque read as "Pats Bridge" (no apparent apostrophe); however, I think the bridge is named "Pat's Bridge" and not "Pats Bridge".

My brother and I walked north on the Leicester line of the Grand Union Canal; this was the furthest point we reached in our walk before we headed back to the locks. We had a pleasant afternoon at Foxton Locks.

Leicester train station

For my last C2C: Country to Country-related post: When I was at Leicester train station and had nothing to do but wait, I ensured I took one picture of the facility:

More images can be found here. It's not St Pancras or King's Cross, but it's a grand structure on its own merits. I'd like to see it during the daytime.

Leicester and snow again

In the nearly three years my family and I have been back in the United Kingdom, I had not been to Leicester until a few days ago. This morning, I ended up going there again, or at least, I went through it.

Dad, my brother and I were driving up to Nottingham when we reached near-impassable snowfall on our route. Rather than continue on a road rendered dangerous by the weather, we opted to turn around and take another way to Nottingham. This safer route took us through Leicester, where we were stuck in a traffic jam for a period, but we made it to Nottingham safely. Leicester twice in a week!

As for the weather, the snow has returned...yet again...and it's nationwide! There have been torrential downpours in parts of the country, which have led to floods, while the snow has disrupted traffic and caused numerous accidents; we observed two cars in the ditch before we turned around. We are in spring now, but to look outside, you wouldn't know it. I won't be surprised if we have to shovel the driveway tomorrow.

After the concert

After Becca and I had left The O2 Arena and proceeded to our respective trains, I caught my ride back home with several minutes to spare. At 23:00, it was the last train for the night; my only concern during the day had been the possibility of missing that train, but I hadn't let it become a distraction while in London. Once I was on board and was sat in a mostly empty coach, I patiently waited for the hour-and-a-half long ride to end, with the only pressing issue being to let Dad and my brother know when I was about to arrive at my stop.

What ultimately happened was not a problem I had envisioned.

When the announcement for my stop came, I made my way to the door. To my surprise, the door didn't open for me, and to my subsequent horror less than ten seconds later, the train started moving again. I noticed too late a small "open" button situated next to the door; I hadn't any need to press such a button in the past, because on the other trains I'd travelled in fellow passengers had already opened the doors before me. On this occasion, I was the only one who needed to exit the train at my stop.

I rapidly filled with dread, partially because I was wondering if there would be any penalties for going beyond the parameters of my train ticket (none, other than having to sort out my predicament), but also because of how I thought my brother and father were going to react, as they were waiting at the station to pick me up. Dad also had to travel in the morning and wanted to go back to bed.

My texts are usually typographically and grammatically correct, but the texts I sent to both of them and to Becca when I informed them all of my situation were littered with errors. Becca offered to research train times while Dad and my brother wanted me to get off at the next stop, which was already my plan; the City of Leicester was the next stop, and if I went beyond that I would have had to have contacted family in Nottingham to collect me.

I wandered around Leicester railway station for a couple of minutes before I went to the front of the building to wait for my brother and Dad. My wait lasted for around a quarter of an hour; when I got into the car, I was surprised to find them both in a good mood, as I expected a lecture! I later found out that they were initially angry but calmed down en route to Leicester. It took us around half an hour to return home.

That was my first visit to Leicester, which I didn't expect to take place at nearly 1:00am because I missed my stop on a train! I certainly won't make that mistake again the next time I use train travel.