Three Days In Preston
It may seem strange to go for a holiday in Preston. But I had time to spare and so I went to Liverpool last Wednesday and then spent the Wednesday, Thursday and Friday nights in the Premier Inn at Preston, with the extension of exploring the area using the trains and then seeing Ipswich at Blackburn on the Saturday.
I have visited Preston several times and I stayed in the hotel once, because it is an easy walk from the rail station.
The council are sorting out the town with new pavements, road layout and maps on liths.
It is a great improvement and will be even better when it is completed.
It would be good if Preston station was improved, especially as it will become an electric hub for local services all over the North West, with new electric services to Blackpool, Leeds, Liverpool and Manchester and possibly a few others like Colne in the next few years.
Would I use Preston as a base for a tour of the North West again?
I have one problem with Preston and that is the bad provision of gluten-free food in the town. There is only the one Pizza Express that I would trust and the Marks and Spencer doesn’t stock any gluten-free sandwiches.
Perhaps to stay near the station in Carlisle, Liverpool or Manchester would be better!
I used one of UK rail’s Rover tickets, which is called a Freedom of the North West 4 in 8 Day Rover. This is the rough availability.
The rover allows travel to Carlisle from Barrow, Dumfries, Lockerbie and Hexham.
It also covers the area bounded by the Settle-Carlisle, Barrow, Morecambe, Blackpool, Southport, Shipley to Bradford, Leeds, Halifax, Oldham, Manchester, Liverpool, Warrington Bank Quay to Helsby, Chester, Shotton, West Kirkby and New Brighton.
Available any 4 days within an 8 day period.
And you can use it on all the franchised train companies like Merseyrail, Northern, Virgin and TransPennine! It’s a two part ticket.
My Rover Ticket
No ticket inspector seemed to give it more than a cursory glance.
I actually didn’t know the ticket existed, when I went North to Liverpool. So I should have bought the ticket at Lime Street and saved myself about a tenner. I returned via Manchester, so I used the ticket to get from Blackburn to Manchester Victoria after the match.
These tickets are certainly a good way of having a few days away and seeing the country. This map of the north west part of Northern Rail’s franchise.
Northern Rail NW Map
The southern boundary of the ticket I used is roughly defined by Liverpool, Chester, Warrington and Manchester.
The Anonymous Widower 
Neil comes from what was a village but is now a small town on the outskirts of Preston, called Longridge. It has cafe/coffee shop on the main street which is entirely gluten free and I don’t remember what it is called!
Comment by nosnikrapzil | May 5, 2015 |