We are off on our big
adventure of traveling for 2-3 months! The last week in Cambridge was crazy.
There were meltdowns. There were goodbyes. There were lots of meals out at good
places with good friends. None of us got much sleep, mostly because all the
activity and uncertainty meant that Walter wouldn’t sleep much during the day.
There were too many long nights of packing and cleaning until the wee hours of
the morning.
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| Walter enjoying a farewell dinner with some of my friends at The Old Spring |
Sunday, the day we had
to move, was one of the most stressful days I’ve had in a long time. We ended
up missing our train to Scotland by 5 minutes. It was so frustrating, but there
was nothing we could do. David and I had both gone without full night’s sleep
for weeks, taking no breaks when Walter slept just so we could work on packing
etc, but there just weren’t enough hours in the day. Unfortunately we had to
buy new tickets, at full price, for our journey.
The train journey was
fairly arduous until we reached Edinburgh. For one thing, we had two transfers
and a lot of very heavy luggage + Walter in his chair. For another, the train
that took us from Peterborough to Edinburgh was incredibly busy and the man in
charge was a real jerk. We had boarded the train at a car that bridged first
& standard class. One of the men asked us to move our bags further down the
train, but this was physically impossibly because it was so crowded. So he
suggested that we move our bags into the First Class vestibule, one car away,
as it wasn’t busy. David dutifully hauled all our luggage there, straining his
back in the process. We then had to take apart Walter’s pram to get it down the
aisle. We settled down for the four hour ride...
An hour or less into
the trip the conductor came through to inspect tickets. He started complaining
that we had our things in the first class vestibule. Then he said that we couldn’t
ride there because we didn’t have first class tickets (keep in mind we were
sitting on the floor in a space between cars!). I explained that we were told
to go there, and he called me a liar. Things began to escalate, so
I ended up having to purchase 2 first class upgrades so that we could continue
to ride on the train. He then made us move our bags a third time, into a
luggage carrier-car, complaining all the while that we hadn’t put them there in
the first place. And because he was rushing us and bustling all our bags off
the train to be run down to this special car, the bag containing all of Walter’s
food and diapers ended up getting locked up, which meant my poor little boy had
to brave the remaining three hours of the journey in a wet diaper and with no
food. Can you tell we’re going to be writing a letter of complaint to the rail
company?
There was a crew
change in Newcastle and things began to improve. We made the most of our first
class tickets by eating 3 complimentary lunches between us (we were also
starving from a busy day with little time to eat!). We began chatting with a
man sitting across the aisle from us, and I am certain that he was Saint
Nicholas in disguise (his name being Nick). Every time Walter woke up he would just gaze in Nick's direction, remaining quiet and content for the whole journey. This gentleman then helped us carry all of our luggage into the central
part of Edinburgh-Waverly station. We thought that was the last we’d see of
him, but as we were heading to our Aberdeen train he appeared beside us and
helped us carry all our luggage onto the train, even though he was staying in
Edinburgh!
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| Relaxing on the Aberdeen train |
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| Still relaxing. Apparently Walter really likes trains! |
We were able to use
the disabled seating area on the Aberdeen train, which meant we had more than
enough room for Walter, and we could just relax for the last part of the
journey. Pippa & Andy met us right at our train and we were soon settled
into Andy’s apartment for a very late night dinner and a good night’s sleep. It was so good to be with friends and to be able to relax!
