tl:dr - everything worked out. The outstanding issue: a miscreant bogie (or the track, or something...)

What I thought would happen: £££, 'cos, to London and back on a friday, needed peak time travel as this was to a funeral and I then needed to be back at the end of the afternoon.

How it worked out: £25 advance single on the 06:02 up from Bath. On arrival at Paddington, to the ticket office for a £42 off-peak single for the 16:30, the last train before the evening peak -the person behind the counter, whose customer service skills were beyond  excellent, reserved a seat too. So, a return for £67, with some flexibilty to cater for a less predictable return time, so, could be worse (but this does depend on the availablity of advance fares).

On the day. Not many at all travelling on the 6:02am train from Bath, or from Swindon or from Reading, so even the buffet trolley person was on time. Paddington was quiet at 7:25am, as was the (transformative) Elizabeth line, Farringdon and Thameslink somewhat busier but London Bridge and the surrounding felt quiet even at 8:15. Lovely sunlit morning and what appeared to be a group of Danish people in  touring rowing boats, heading downstream inside of HMS Belfast before disappearing beyond Tower Bridge.

The return journey: the journey back began with some bus confusion, mainly owing to unfamiliarity with the service but also not helped by boarding a bus which had the destination board arse-about. Once onto a service heading slowly towards Thameslink's core things were more relaxed and once again a quick though steppy change at Farringdon onto the Elizabeth line and to Paddington. At the gate line, despite not being damaged my ticket jammed the reader, which resulted in a quick visit from staff to retrieve the situation (and the ticket).

The 16:30 to Taunton surprised me as it was not full and standing, no stampede needed to get aboard, and it ran to time back to Bath. The seating was in good nick and I took a photo to remind me which generation of seating they belonged to (and to admire the idiosyncratic position of the gangway handholds, most people continue to use the tops of the seats which are far better placed).

Running at speed and east of Grove for a few miles, the leading bogie experienced an almighty outbreak of hunting, which went on for a few minutes, not sure what it was there that it didn't like but it got everyone's attention.

Leaving the station and on to the buses, that is where the 'Fun' restarted, but let's draw a veil over that as it would be a shame to include it in what was otherwise a good day's travel. It would be useful if everything heading north stopped at that stop in Manvers Street - currently 50% of its capacity is taken up by the city tour buses.

Incidentally, for good measure there is a 'Bus stop suspended' notice on that stop in Manvers Street, but I didn't get close enough to see the dates, or whether this was connected with the alteration works to the former Debenhams store there.

Anyway, a photo of said seats...

Mark


https://i.postimg.cc/x8DdhsB5/iep-seats-800.jpg