Friday June 14, 2019

Another full breakfast to get us going. We had booked a taxi to the train station – the cost of the bus was 3.40 and the cost of the taxi was 5.60 not worth the hassle of waiting for the bus. The taxi driver was on time and very friendly.

I checked the boards at the train station and spotted the train to Edinburgh – off we went to Platform 9, about a half hour wait. As we were waiting I heard the announcement “The train now arriving on Platform 4 is the train to Edinburgh stopping at ……” The board on platform 9 hadn’t changed, there were two trains going to Edinburgh from York within 10 minutes of each other. One train originated in Birmingham, the other in London.

We got on the train at Platform 9 settled into our reserved seats and headed to Edinburgh. The train “service manager” we used to call them conductors, came down the train checking tickets, he checked our tickets and told us we should have caught the other train from Platform 4. “Don’t worry” he said, in his lovely Scottish brogue “we have plenty of room for you, but you must check the time on the ticket” and off he continued checking the tickets. On his way back I asked him what would the consequences have been if we hadn’t got a nice service manager such as himself. “Well, I could have charged you again for the correct train tickets and they would have been a lot more expensive from what you have paid”. I thanked him profusely for his kindness. “By the way” he said “if anyone asks, tell them I gave you a stern talking to”.

Obviously we were arriving at a different platform than the one Andrew thought we would arrive at. I found him trying to call me, but my new sim card wasn’t working and he couldn’t get through.

Andrew gave me a stern talking to! Lol He turned to Shelley and said “you trust this one with your travel plans do you”. Shelley smiled “Yes, I am having a wonderful time”.

Andrew very kindly took our cases home with him and we headed to a phone store to correct the problem with the Sim card. The young man switched the card from one sim port to another and it worked fine.

We decided to wander around Edinburgh New Town, which was actually built in 1800’s as the old town was getting overcrowded and smelly.

We had an average Italian dinner and then headed back to Andrew’s place on the outskirts of Edinburgh. We chatted until about 10:00 p.m. and then headed to our beds.

Andrew has a nice 3+1 bedroom house and is able to accommodate several warm-showers guests at a time. He is very knowledgeable about the various cycle routes to take from his house and was very helpful in checking train and bus times for us when we got to Oxenholme and to get us to Windermere