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National Express Coach and Greater Anglia Train from Luton Airport to Norwich

The late night arrival of my flight meant that I knew I’d have to stay at Luton Airport for a couple of hours and then cross over to Stansted Airport by coach before getting a direct train to Norwich. That was the cheapest option and Pret was clean, warm and had power points. Thanks to the staff member for giving me a decadent coffee for a price of a filter coffee, much appreciated.

I was very tempted to book this, all I would have to do is go through security and then a few hours later I’d be in the great city of Tallinn. I showed enormous restraint not to book this £8.99 flight as it would have been easy to get muddled up.

I went outside to look at the coach station and it was still there.

The Stansted Airport coach pulls in.

It was a slightly odd arrangement, the driver said hello and disappeared into the coach. He seems surprised I was still obediently waiting at the door a few minutes later and he didn’t bother checking tickets. This rather made the whole operation feel less like formal transport and more like a man with a coach had agreed to take us somewhere broadly useful, but I’m easy going (well, generally) and so I didn’t query him.

I have a theory that National Express is going into a permanent decline, this service was a third full and was one of the busiest I’ve been on in a while. I looked at some of their prices, and they’re charging ridiculous amounts in some cases where they have a monopoly. That’s great for a while, but Flixbus is going to steal that trade and I can’t see how they’ll get it back. National Express also have fiercely uncomfortable seats with very limited leg room, it’s fortunate that they do shuttle about nearly empty a lot of the time. Incidentally, I didn’t get my usual emergency exit row seat here, which is likely why I forgot about how poor the leg room was in the other seats. Nothing says ‘premium national transport network’ like quietly folding a passenger into a seating position not found in nature, but we shall see what the future holds…..

Safely at Stansted Airport.

I had a few hours to kill so I went looking for bargains and found some in Boots. Note the number of reduced prawn sandwiches which is either a sign of my impeccable timing or a troubling commentary on airport seafood confidence.

Another breakfast of champions. The quality of Boots Meal Deal has declined a lot over the years, that’s another example of greed and then noticing that rivals have stolen a march on them. Still, it was edible, portable and reduced, which is sometimes the holy trinity of travel catering.

I then went down to Stansted Airport’s railway station to get the direct rail service to Norwich. There were no delays which meant no delay repay, but at least I’d be getting home in a timely manner. Punctuality is good, but it’s also rather lovely to have a little financial gesture when things go slightly wrong.

It was relatively quiet all the way to Norwich.

Cambridge South had opened the previous day and it was rather lovely to see it in operation, even if only from the passing train, which is exactly the sort of niche infrastructure excitement that keeps my two loyal blog readers on edge.

I, and the rest of the train, arrived back into Norwich on time and that’s another journey finished. I may or may not post more random stuff about the trip, I’ll leave that as a surprise because suspense is important in travel writing.

Incidentally, it was too hot in Norwich when I arrived.

July 3, 2026
Norwich to Stansted Airport Rail Journey

This won’t be the most riveting of posts as there wasn’t really any drama. But, I had the opportunity to pop overseas for the weekend and that’s not something that I was going to deny myself. That meant a train journey from Norwich to Stansted Airport which was a very reasonable £14 booked on a complex ticketing arrangement.

Waiting at the platform on a sunny Friday morning. It was already too hot.

Here comes the train sweeping in and it was clear that there weren’t that many commuters waiting to go to Cambridge, which meant for a quiet journey in.

And there’s my meal deal arrangement from the Co-op, very healthy as I’m sure that everyone would agree. Co-op sandwiches are not of the highest quality, the bacon is usually excessively fatty and the chicken has not been lavished with taste, but the prawn sandwich is agreeable enough.

This was my view for most of the journey. Well, specifically I mean the empty seats, I didn’t have my head on the table.

The waiting room at Cambridge railway station where I had a wait for the next train of around thirty minutes. A quick word on my rail ticket which technically required me to get off at Cambridge North and then get onto another operator’s train to take me the short distance to Cambridge. With the guard’s permission, I just stayed on the same train to avoid that change, but it’s that quirky switch to a Great Northern train which is why the ticket was much cheaper than the usual fare even to Cambridge. To be honest, at times it feels that securing agreement for an international treaty would be easier than getting cheap rail fares, the system really is sub-optimal in many ways.

The view over Cambridge railway station from the bridge over the platforms.

The only photo that I have of the second train and it was also relatively quiet. Fortunately, everything was running on time and there were no delays. As a side issue, I note that my bag looks in excellent condition there.

I got muddled up at Stansted Airport railway station and managed to leave the ticket gates at the lift which I’ve never used before. I didn’t expect it to go straight into the terminal, I usually meander around some ramps to get there, so that was some operational efficiency that I hadn’t expected.

With that, I had arrived on time and I could start to think about my flight….

May 9, 2026
Belgrade Trip – Getting Back from Luton Airport

I had a slightly (very) sub-optimal arrangement to get back to Newmarket from London Luton Airport, although I’ve realised if I can get slightly earlier flights back then I can get a National Express bus straight back. Unfortunately, the final leg of that service isn’t operated a night, so I had a few hours wait at the Pret landside with a 99p filter coffee. They have power and seating, that’s all I really required. I was suitably productive though, so the time wasn’t wasted.

The coach can arrive at any of these gates it seems.

As a slight side issue, why are they being that precise that a coach will be leaving one minute late? And I accept there are more important things to worry about in the world, but when you’re meandering around outside an airport at 04:30 these things provide at least a modicum of amusement.

Here it comes.

Four of us boarded. This route just flits between Luton Airport and Cambridge, obviously much busier later in the day taking passengers from the airport. They need more legroom on these coaches, that’s my summary of the service.

Morning Cambridge!

Then a 20 minute walk to the railway station.

It’s all happening now.

There’s the Ipswich Rocket at platform 5 that took me back to Newmarket.

After a quick sausage roll at Greggs waiting for Wetherspoons to open, I then had the £3 breakfast and £1 unlimited coffees. I quite a few coffees to stay awake, but as Tony Blair said, “that is that, the end”. Well, for the Belgrade trip anyway. I’m conscious I’ve skipped great chunks of the history, food and culture that I thought I’d write about, but there we go, maybe I’ll get back to it another time. Oh, I didn’t mention, that was one of the better Wetherspoons breakfasts so all was well with the world.

September 17, 2024
Greater Anglia – I’m Home

This is the outcome of Greater Anglia’s latest little debacle. It has also transpired that one of the largest taxi companies in Ipswich wasn’t contacted by Greater Anglia and they could have got a fair number of people back to Norwich in shared taxis. They’d better be reimbursing this promptly.

Brilliant taxi driver incidentally, very friendly and I got water and crisps since Greater Anglia hadn’t provided either. We had to go via Bury St Edmunds so it wasn’t a quick journey, but some roads are blocked.

October 21, 2023
Greater Anglia – Train Stuck Overnight in Ipswich as “Control Room Fail to Respond”

Excuse the poor quality of the photos in this post, I hadn’t expected to use any of them….. They are blurry, but they’re all that I’ve got at the moment. And this post might be slightly grumpy at I’m still at Ipswich railway station at 02:30.

This was the happy scene in London Liverpool Street earlier this evening whilst waiting for the train to arrive onto the platform before it became the 20:00 service to Norwich.

And here the train arrives in, ready for a quick turnaround so that it can return to Norwich. They were warning that they expected 15 minute delays during the journey due to localised flooding in Stowmarket.

I wasn’t thrilled that it was the bloody Stansted Express service once again, the train that keeps appearing on the mainline to Norwich which has no tables. I’ve asked the Greater Anglia press office and the train crew before why they keep using this train on the mainline and the former didn’t know, but one train guard told me last year “because they couldn’t run a piss up in a brewery”. I appreciated his candour, although it wasn’t quite the answer that I expected. Anyway, I digress.

Back to tonight, it was a train and that’s positive given the weather conditions today, so it’s not really a complaint for today (although I’ve moaned about it anyway). Off we went and the train arrived into Colchester more or less on time. Only then did Greater Anglia’s control room think to tell the driver that there were a series of trains stuck in front of it, meaning a long wait at Colchester. It did occur to me that this would have been useful information to tell passengers at London Liverpool Street, but there we go, we live in an imperfect world. The train behind us arrived into Colchester and then decanted onto the train that we were on.

The train arrived into Ipswich and there was some confusion as to what was happening. After a while they transferred us to the Norwich train on the adjacent platform, which transpired to be the train that had left London Liverpool Street one hour earlier that we did. This was at 22:31 and I’m writing this at 02:15 and the control room have still yet to come up with any information about what is happening. The driver has been endlessly apologetic that the control room have abandoned the train, but he and the rest of the crew are sticking with it. Not once has anyone at Greater Anglia explained what the problem is at Stowmarket or whether it can be resolved.

This is the train (the train in the rear of the photo, which I accept is terrible quality) that I arrived into Ipswich on. I wondered whether this would return to London and I decided that if it did, I’d get on it. The driver on our train then announced the train would be returning to London if passengers wanted it, so some decided that was the first organised communication that we’d had. At this moment, the train pulls off nearly empty and leaves the passengers wanting to return to London stuck in Ipswich, including myself. I remain annoyed (I expect I’ll get over it in a few months) that I could have been back in London in a hotel room ready to return when the railway line was back to normal.

I don’t think it’s a secret or I’ll get anyone into trouble by saying that the train crew have made a series of announcements about the behaviour of Greater Anglia’s control room tonight. To be precise, “Greater Anglia’s control room have failed to respond”. That’s their own train crew, just abandoned along with the passengers.

After three hours on the train, they asked us to move to another one. The train crew then said that they had finally got permission for passengers to book hotels in Ipswich, but there are of course none available. The cynic in me suspects they knew that when giving the permission, but that might be unfair of me.

And here we are, seemingly all night. It’s evident that this is the reality, but Greater Anglia still haven’t communicated this to anyone. The control room has apparently given up and it’s unclear what this train with around 150 to 200 people on is supposed to do. I don’t usually verge into the political and I have been deeply sceptical about the RMT, but it’s entirely unclear what the Greater Anglia management are doing to resolve this situation and I can see why their staff feel internal communications are a real issue from senior mangers. Between 17:00 and 23:00 they had the chance to communicate to passengers that they could stay in London, or return to London when it was realised how bad the situation was in Stowmarket, to get a hotel. I would have returned to London and then not been stuck on this train all night. Instead they just abandoned their train crew to deal with matters and have some social media team trying to respond without being given any information from their own control room.

The weather is evidently not in Greater Anglia’s control, but it’s clear that a better managed operation would have communicated far better. They had the opportunity to tell passengers to either stay in London, or indeed return them to London or elsewhere along the route, instead of leaving them on a train parked up overnight. And not once have they said what is happening at Stowmarket and whether the line might clear to given passengers the information they needed to make a choice. In fairness it’s positive that they have a social media team still on-line, but I can see why the train crew are upset at how Greater Anglia have treated them and their passengers tonight.

But, I will say most importantly, the train crew and station staff have been doing all they can by all accounts.

Oh, and the outcome….

October 21, 2023
Gdansk Group Trip – Day 0 (Norwich to Stansted Airport via London Liverpool Street)

After a successful little sojourn in the Queen of the Iceni we meandered back to Norwich railway station amidst a deluge of torrential rain. There were no issues with late running trains, whatever issue there had been at Romford had been resolved. I do little some adventure when things go wrong, but on this occasion I was just keen to get to Poland without too many issues. It’s more interesting to watch other people have random adventures when things go IRROPS anyway.

There’s our train on the right, ready to board half an hour before departure.

A suitably decadent meal deal from the Co-op of roast beef monster munch, a prawn sandwich and a Dr Pepper, for only just a little bit more than the Tesco version would have cost. I intended to save all this for when I got to Stansted Airport, but I finished the crisps before we left the railway station and the sandwich by the time we reached Ipswich. All the food and drink met my expectations and I also successfully completed the Gogen puzzle in the Evening Standard. I was going to do the cryptic crossword as well but I didn’t know any of the answers.

Our train arrived in at 22:55, just five minutes before the Greggs at Liverpool Street station closed. Fortunately, they were still opening with no early closing going on here. This is the first time that I’ve been here (at this outlet, I’ve obviously been to Greggs before, I’m not a heathen), I was surprised and delighted at the friendly service and how much they had left just before closing which I think goes off to the homeless. All very efficient.

And a sausage roll safely acquired.

I toasted the King’s Coronation weekend with my sausage roll.

I mutter and moan about the Stansted Express train operating the Norwich to London Liverpool Street mainline, not least because it has no tables. This is though its natural home and I thought this would be a good time to eat my sausage roll, I had waited long enough.

I can cope with this lack of table provision on the relatively short journey from London Liverpool Street to Stansted.

It wasn’t overly busy fortunately.

And safely at Stansted Airport railway station just after midnight, with only several hours left before we can go through security. This isn’t the ideal situation, but who needs the luxury of hotels at Stansted when you can meander around the terminal and coach station for a few hours to amuse yourselves? The main thing is that we had arrived safely, ready for the flight in the morning and the delights of Gdansk.

May 10, 2023
Harwich – Greater Anglia Train from Norwich to Harwich

Today’s little pub, history and walking expedition is to Harwich since I thought that I needed a day out. I noticed on-line that the London train before mine was cancelled so thought I’d rush down in anticipation of the actual service I was booked on being full. Fortunately, I got a table just in time so was able to merrily type away for an hour or so. The service inevitably got busier and I got chatting to a confused passenger (they weren’t confused by me, or at least I don’t think so) who wondered why the train was so busy. We then shared our thoughts about Greater Anglia, which is a healthy scepticism I would say mixed with a supportive attitude.

My train arrived into Manningtree on time, but since it was a tight connection I didn’t get time to have a look around the railway station.

Looking to the left, the train was empty. Something of a contrast to the standing room only of the train that I had just disembarked.

Looking to the right, the train was empty. Now, I know I complain, but I hate it when they shove five seats in across. They’re so narrow that it effectively takes out the middle seat of the three so I disagree that there’s any benefit in terms of passenger numbers. Indeed, they’ve just made it more uncomfortable for everyone as it’s hard to navigate down the aisle and there’s a reason why trains traditionally have four seats across.

A couple of other people got on and then got off again at the gateway to the globe railway station that is Harwich International.

I do love a bit of history and they’ve made an effort with the boards at Harwich Town. The sign notes that between December 1938 and May 1940 that 10,000 unaccompanied children came to Britain from Europe. Although many people were involved, it is impossible for me not to mention the work done by Sir Nicholas Winton, someone that I consider to be one of the greatest people of the twentieth century. The relevance is that the children arrived here at Harwich and many stayed locally.

Another board about the Kindertransport.

I’ve been watching a lot of Hi-de-Hi recently and I didn’t realise that the programme was filmed at Warners which wasn’t far from the railway station, but unfortunately it was all demolished in 1992. That was a suitable treat to feel so near to where all this comedy action took place.

It’s a pretty railway station and it’s at the end of the Mayflower Line, with the building being rebuilt between 1865 and 1866.

And an information board at the front of the station, it all felt more remote than I had expected with all this greenery. But I had arrived into Harwich on time and ready to explore the town for my first time in recent years.

April 4, 2023
2022 US Trip – Day 32 (The Final Part of the Adventure)
I use the word ‘adventure’ in the title of this post, but I accept that I hardly went on a solo trip walking through the Amazon or something. Although on the 32nd day away, I was getting a little tired and thinking that it had been an adventure of sorts. But, I’ll tidy up my random thoughts about the trip in a final post. I had a £10 fare to get from London Liverpool Street to Norwich and was able to board first so I had a choice of seats.

I went for the seat on the right, pleased that Greater Anglia weren’t running the bloody Stansted Express services without tables on this journey. The power worked so that was a relief and the conductor came stomping through the train on numerous occasions always looking she was heading to an emergency at the other end. To be fair, she probably was.

Biscuits I had acquired from somewhere that I found in my bag along with my refilled water bottle.

And that was that, safely back in Norwich. I must admit that I’ve rushed through the last few days of this trip to finally get this trip written up for posterity, but I’m pleased to say that other than for one more post with general thoughts of the trip, that completes this write-up. Yay!
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December 30, 2022
Thursday : From Prague Airport, Walk Across London at Night and Back to Norwich

Carrying on from the previous post, this is now late Wednesday evening. After a hot day of public transporting around Prague, I arrived four hours early at the airport, ready for my 21:15 flight back to London Heathrow with British Airways, albeit operated by Finnair.

The security process at Prague Airport is just before boarding, so I was able to get to the Mastercard Lounge quickly and without delay. The staff member politely mentioned that entry was only allowed two hours before my flight, but then she asked who I was flying with and when I said British Airways, she said I could enter immediately. I don’t know whether BA offer a higher rate than lounge pass schemes such as Priority Pass, but I was very appreciative.

I was here a few months ago with Richard, but that was a morning flight and this was one of the last flights of the day, so there was a different feel to the arrangements. It was all clean and organised, there’s a self-serve soft drinks machine, snacks in the fridges and self-pour alcohol. They had a separate beer fridge with a couple of choices in it, nothing exceptional, but perfectly acceptable given it was free. I’m not at all picky when stuff is free, I’ve noticed I’m more inadvertently generous on Untappd. Nathan would no doubt tut at my lack of consistency….

The two hot options were pasta and chicken drumsticks. It seemed an odd choice for a lounge, as the chicken was a little greasy and they were going to end up with bones dotted around the place on places. However, I wasn’t let down with the taste of the chicken, although the pasta was a bit bland.

The food menu and the meat platters were rather lovely.

It’s a relatively large lounge, although it wasn’t particularly busy when I was there. They have very few power outlets, although I was fortunate to find one as I did need my devices fully charged given that I might not get chance later on. They had views over the runways, although no power points in those areas of seating. They also have unlimited popcorn…..

The seating was comfortable, it was practical for those with laptops and the like, although there were some more comfortable chairs for people who prefer just to relax and not always sit and stare at a screen as I seem to.

The flight was showing as delayed by one hour, but after three hours in the lounge I thought that was enough, so I meandered over to the gate. There was plenty of seating available, with a few power points dotted around.

The boarding process was efficient and customers were called in group order.

There’s the Finnair aircraft, which BA are wet leasing as they seem to have managed to not have enough of their own, a situation which seems far from ideal.

And as it was the Finnair aircraft, I opted for my favourite seat with lots of legroom.

Excellent crew again, although the Finnair cabin crew nearly always seem very professional and personable. I had the entire row of three exit row seats to myself. Whilst I was in the lounge, I had received a message from British Airways saying that there would be no catering on board the flight due to operational reasons. I had another chicken drumstick to fill me up in case there was no mini bags of crisps and water on board. It transpired they had water, but no crisps, which I could manage without, although I’m not sure that the Club Europe passengers would have been quite so impressed as they get meals provided. The crew said that the catering lorry couldn’t reach the aircraft due to a crash at Heathrow, which meant that they didn’t have their food either, so they were wondering where they could eat at nearly midnight at Heathrow.

We arrived into C Gates of London Heathrow about thirty minutes late, although I was in no rush. It’s not ideal to be at C Gates usually, as it’s quite a walk as the internal trains don’t run when it’s close to midnight. But I was in no rush and I like walking.

The UK border was moderately busy, but their automated machines were rejecting a lot of people, including myself, which meant a bit of a queue as there weren’t many border control officers. They were doing some quite detailed checks on some people entering the country, but I was waved through after a cursory check of my passport. I tried to look and act as British as I could in case they thought I pinched someone else’s passport or something.

As my flight was arriving late, I decided against a hotel in London, which at the moment are ridiculously priced compared to what they were. I had a great idea of just getting the 06:00 train from London to Norwich, which was £10, and getting the night bus from Heathrow into central London. That meant I wanted my devices fully charged, so this was the arrangement I set-up for myself, I found the chair and moved it towards the power points and refused to leave (not that anyone asked me to) until everything had full battery. This travel isn’t as easy as people think when there’s a fear of devices without power….

The arrivals floor at Heathrow T5, not very busy at night. For anyone who wants to stay the night at the terminal, it’d be on this level, they remove people from the departures floor. It’s not particularly comfortable, but there’s power, wifi, toilets and I think one of the shops stays open overnight.

I was pleased that the weather was overcast and not too hot.

Heathrow still have no date of when pedestrians can walk into the terminal, something they’ve currently banned from doing, although cyclists can cycle in from next year when the tunnel reopens. The free travel zone has been scrapped and they’ve introduced this new drop-off fee, all adding to the expense for many people. But, Heathrow have shareholders who need cash…..

I’ve never caught the night bus N9, but it’s a bargain really at £1.65 to get from London Heathrow to Trafalgar Square.

The bus timetable if anyone should want it, but the services are regular throughout the night and it’s an 85 minute journey from one end to the other.

On time and not very busy.

The passengers who boarded were just using the bus to get to T3, so I was on my own on the bus for a while after that. Well, with the driver obviously as I’m not sure what my bus driving is like…. (although, I have driven a bus without incident when the driver let me near Cromer, but I’m not sure that was entirely within the rules so I best not go too far down that line). It was a very peaceful journey and it’s actually really quite nice to be able to watch the city go by without stopping at literally every bus stop. There was a mixture of night workers coming back from work, going to work, some early morning commuters, party-goers and travellers.

Sad to see the Admiralty pub like this, certainly different to the last time I was in it a few months ago.

The pub was badly damaged by fire a couple of weeks ago and it looks very serious in terms of the repairs that will be needed.

It was gone 03:00 by this time and I was surprised just how many people were still around Nelson’s Column and Trafalgar Square. It all felt safe and non-threatening, although I was careful taking photos as I didn’t want any mugging incidents.

The Royal Courts of Justice. I had intended to pop into the 24 hour McDonald’s on the Strand to kill an hour, but it was at near capacity and I didn’t want all that raucous noise and party excess. I’m over 30 now and can’t be dealing with that.

St. Paul’s Cathedral and it was a real treat to walk across the city when it’s so quiet, it feels like such a different place. Buses still shuttle around the city, so it seems alive and energetic, but yet with a sense of calm.

The Royal Exchange.

It took me around 40 minutes to walk across London, so I arrived at London Liverpool Street at 03:45. I’ve never seen the railway station all locked up, but the side entrance to McDonald’s was open so I thought that I’d get a little snack.

Back in the day, there used to be seating in this McDonald’s, but this is it now, just self-ordering kiosks. They were all switched off and I wasn’t sure what to do, but a security guard came up when I looked confused and got a crew member to come and take my order at the counter.

McDonald’s probably wondered what they’d do with the £1.80 I gave them for two burgers….. But just as I had finished, the gates of London Liverpool Street railway station swung open at 04:00.

It’s not often the concourse is so quiet.

By now it was 04:02 and the first train out is at 04:40 to Stansted Airport, which is where most of the waiting passengers were heading I think.

It’s very hard to get a photo of this statue as there’s often rubbish on or around it, and it’s also used as a seat or somewhere to lean against. I don’t entirely like this sculpture here, it’s not prominent enough and I hope they can rearrange things a bit. Note the uncomfortable seating behind it designed to avoid anyone homeless sitting on it.

Für Das Kind, or For the Children, designed by Flor Kent, which I’ve written about before.

I sat down for an hour in view of where the new Greggs will be opening soon.

There was nearly no-one around after the first train to Stansted Airport had gone.

I was pleased to see that this wasn’t the Stansted Express with no tables.

This wasn’t a busy service at all. I managed to fall asleep as soon as the train departed, but was conscious that the train guard was checking tickets nearly straight away as there were so few of us on the train.

And safely into Norwich Railway Station at 08:00. The blog will be quite quiet for the next month, with the exception of some odd random and irrelevant (not that they ever really cross the boundary into relevant) posts which I’m sure I’ll feel the need to make, as I’m doing nearly no travelling. Expect a few bits about the LDWA AGM weekend, the Summer Poppyline and some pub photos, but not much else.

July 31, 2022
Monday and Tuesday : A Post About One Train Journey

Am I really going to post just about one train journey? Well, yes, I think I will….. After enjoying a healthy lunch of chips, battered sausage and curry sauce on Monday (and being very productive, which is why I’ve caught up on this blog amongst many other things) my Tuesday evening was all about getting the train from Norwich to Luton Airport Parkway. This blog has killer content, it really does, I can imagine the hordes of people wanting to read about such an exciting rail journey. Who needs stories about Amtrak journeys across the United States when you can read about a train journey from Norwich to Luton? Anyway.

The gleaming Norwich railway station at just before 21:00 on Tuesday evening. And to give context, my flight was on Wednesday lunchtime from Luton Airport and it’s an annoying airport to get to in the morning if not driving. There are no cheap rail tickets on Wednesday mornings as it’s part of the peak travel time, so going late the previous evening is really the only way.

This section of the Greater Anglia train always feels to me like part of a haunted house experience, or, at least when walking through it when the train is in motion. I also like the sign “through access only” as if there’s much else a passenger can do in there.

As it notes on the display, this is a service to Cambridge, which was the first part of the journey. I had partly hoped for a delay in the service so that I could claim Delay Repay, but as a spoiler, every part of the journey which involved three trains was on time to the minute.

Cambridge at 22:30, it’s not the busiest railway station at that time, but I like the slight eeriness that exists because of that.

There’s my service, the 22:44 to London King’s Cross. I did have a slight concern about power at this point, or I should specify I only mean mine, I was less concerned about the train’s general power requirements. I had charged every one of my devices at home and on the Greater Anglia train to Cambridge, but I knew that there were limited charging facilities on the final of the three trains and also at Luton Airport. And I knew I would be at Luton Airport for hours and hours.

The Great Northern train from King’s Lynn to London King’s Cross, which had about two people to each carriage.

The carriage had power points, which was a relief.

There’s a joke there about how hard northerners are, but readers can work out their own punchline.

The beautiful King’s Cross railway station. It’s nicer at night when there aren’t people faffing about everywhere.

It’s about a 40 second walk from King’s Cross to St. Pancras, so a delay to my journey here was unlikely.

The impressive station building of St. Pancras.

The final of the three trains, the East Midlands Railway service to Luton Airport Parkway.

No power points…. The guard on this train must have announced six times that passengers mustn’t put their feet on the seats and she then swept through the train warning miscreants who hadn’t paid attention to what she had said. I can see her point, it’s a problem which seems to be getting worse, passengers had their feet on seats on the previous two journeys, but there were no guards saying not to. I must say that the guard did get her way, I couldn’t see anyone breaking her rules. The train arrived in at 00:38, and as mentioned earlier, that was exactly when it was meant to, so no delay at any point for me. Given that I booked this train some weeks ago, and did wonder whether it would be caught up in strike action, arriving at 00:38 felt like a slight miracle.

One thing that isn’t made clear to passengers who get off at Luton Airport Parkway is that they can just walk the 15 minutes or so to the airport. I accept a lot of people won’t want to, especially if they have bags, but it’s very hard to find a way of the railway station at the rear to be able to walk there. There’s a big new development at the station, so it all might be getting easier, but at the moment, they try and get people to pay for the bus to take them to the airport. I got that once, but it’s not necessary for anyone who is happy to walk a relatively short distance. Anyone wanting to walk, just look out for the signs to Kimpton Road.

And here we are fifteen minutes later, the delights of Luton Airport. This will never be my favourite airport, but sometimes needs must….. That’s the story of that, no dramas, all very efficient and everything was clean and organised en route. As a side issue, if I won £150 million on the lottery (which is unlikely as I don’t end the lottery) I suppose that I would have just got the first train from Norwich to Luton Airport Parkway in the morning, but there’s something slightly more magical about travel that isn’t always easy and risk-free. Not that I say this journey was a piece of magical delight, but I do remember these pieces of travel so I must have some attachment to them.

July 7, 2022