Well, that was... fun?
14.25 from Oxford to Great Malvern (13.21 from Paddington). Booked for a 3-coach Turbo and that was what turned up. It's a busy train any Saturday - there's a two-hour gap in service beforehand - but I've never seen it like today. I didn't take a picture but a couple of people on Twitter evidently did:
https://twitter.com/fliss_fliss/status/944571033377484800https://twitter.com/michaelbeddoes/status/944576500652761088Apparently passengers were detrained at Paddington (presumably those bound for Thames Valley stations) and requested not to board at Slough and Reading. At Oxford the train manager asked for Hanborough, Charlbury and Shipton passengers to leave the train and taxis would be laid on.
We chose to stay on (betting that the train would still stop at Charlbury) because we had our 18-month old with us - we wouldn't want to travel with him in a taxi without a child seat at any time, but particularly not from Oxford to Charlbury, where the drivers rarely know the lanes north of Woodstock and have a habit of hurtling round them at unsuitable speeds (been there, done that).
The train manager, Sara from Worcester, was absolutely marvellous - a real credit to
GWR▸ . She went up and down the train at each stop checking that everyone who was trying to get off was able to do so; she brought our little one two bottles of water and made sure that he had somewhere to sit; and she asked passengers to open all the doors at each station to help get some cool air into the train.
It'll get better in January when there's a new service to fill the 2-hour Saturday gap, and the
IETs▸ can't come soon enough. But the Cotswold Line is not a great place to travel right now.
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