Post by davetscfc on Apr 13, 2008 18:17:18 GMT
There's some rather knackered Salisbury fans following our marathon journey home from Altrincham yesterday!
The Alty game was one of our 'fly there, train back' trips. Apart from the early start, the outward leg was perfect. All went according to plan and having woken up in Salisbury 5 of us find ourselves demolishing Wetherspoons Farmhouse breakfasts in rainy Manchester. Trammed it to Alty, drank ludicrously cheap Sam Smiths ales in the Malt Shovel, went 1 up at Moss Lane and at quarter to 4, another Whites' away day was going swimmingly well.
Well, from about quarter past 4 when our keeper and skipper collided in mid air and handed Alty an equaliser, and the team spent the rest of the game dreaming of their summer holidays the next 11 hours went downhill rapidly!
Journey home, though long (5 and a half hours) should have been simple - Alty to Stockport, Stockport to Bristol ignoring our reserved seats to hang around the buffet car flirting with the stewardess, then Bristol to Salisbury.
All went well til our train reached Stafford and we waited....and waited....til we were an hour or more late, and it was discovered we could go no further as the train in front's brakes had seized, resulting in the rail network north of Birmingham going into meltdown.....now Stafford is still quite trek to Salisbury. We next find ourselves on a replacement coach to Birmingham, already with no hope of getting our connector in Bristol.
Arrive in Birmingham to find total chaos at New Street with people trying to get to all end of the country with final connections missed. Go for pint, chaos can wait! Find out that if we can get to Banbury there's likely to be buses to Reading. Well Reading's closer to home then Brum so wander over to Brum Moor St station to catch the service to Banbury.
From Banbury, get replacement coach to Reading, 1 o'clock by now, station shutting up, and more chaos with people trying to get home. Go for kebab! Find that the railways have put 2 taxis on the get 10 of us back to Salisbury. Taxi driver's is only allowed to go from station to station, so poor old Malx had to get dumped on a road somewhere near his village! The other 3 of us who live in town jumped as and when we could. Finally got home at 3 o'clock, some 9 hours after leaving Alty! Would probably have got home at 3 anyway, but at least I'd have spent the previous 3 hours drinking in some dodgy club.......well I saved some money I guess!
Will I do it again next season if our team's generosity allows Alty to stay up. Yeah, probably!
The Alty game was one of our 'fly there, train back' trips. Apart from the early start, the outward leg was perfect. All went according to plan and having woken up in Salisbury 5 of us find ourselves demolishing Wetherspoons Farmhouse breakfasts in rainy Manchester. Trammed it to Alty, drank ludicrously cheap Sam Smiths ales in the Malt Shovel, went 1 up at Moss Lane and at quarter to 4, another Whites' away day was going swimmingly well.
Well, from about quarter past 4 when our keeper and skipper collided in mid air and handed Alty an equaliser, and the team spent the rest of the game dreaming of their summer holidays the next 11 hours went downhill rapidly!
Journey home, though long (5 and a half hours) should have been simple - Alty to Stockport, Stockport to Bristol ignoring our reserved seats to hang around the buffet car flirting with the stewardess, then Bristol to Salisbury.
All went well til our train reached Stafford and we waited....and waited....til we were an hour or more late, and it was discovered we could go no further as the train in front's brakes had seized, resulting in the rail network north of Birmingham going into meltdown.....now Stafford is still quite trek to Salisbury. We next find ourselves on a replacement coach to Birmingham, already with no hope of getting our connector in Bristol.
Arrive in Birmingham to find total chaos at New Street with people trying to get to all end of the country with final connections missed. Go for pint, chaos can wait! Find out that if we can get to Banbury there's likely to be buses to Reading. Well Reading's closer to home then Brum so wander over to Brum Moor St station to catch the service to Banbury.
From Banbury, get replacement coach to Reading, 1 o'clock by now, station shutting up, and more chaos with people trying to get home. Go for kebab! Find that the railways have put 2 taxis on the get 10 of us back to Salisbury. Taxi driver's is only allowed to go from station to station, so poor old Malx had to get dumped on a road somewhere near his village! The other 3 of us who live in town jumped as and when we could. Finally got home at 3 o'clock, some 9 hours after leaving Alty! Would probably have got home at 3 anyway, but at least I'd have spent the previous 3 hours drinking in some dodgy club.......well I saved some money I guess!
Will I do it again next season if our team's generosity allows Alty to stay up. Yeah, probably!
At least you got some beer on the way home. 
