Glasgow Queen Street Station To London King’s Cross Station For £52.40
My plan this morning, was to come home via Hartlepool, so that I could take pictures of the nuclear power station there.
I intended to take a train from Glasgow Queen Street station to Newcastle and then take local train to Hartlepool and back to Newcastle, from where I’d buy a ticket and take a train to London King’s Cross.
Things went well until I left Edinburgh on my train for Newcastle.
- I’d bought a ticket from Glasgow Queen Street station to Newcastle for £21.20 with a change to LNER at Edinburgh.
- I even had a reserved seat after Edinburgh.
- I found a good unreserved seat on the 13:00 Glasgow Queen Street to Edinburgh train, which left on time.
- It arrived in Edinburgh a minute late.
- As Marks & Spencer was by the platform of my Newcastle train, I was able to buy a lunch before I got on the train.
It was then that I noticed that my train took over three hours to travel to Newcastle, when I know they normally take under ninety minutes.
As the train left Edinburgh, it passed through Haymarket station, which confirmed we were going for a Grand Tour of the Southern Uplands of Scotland.
Note.
- The train took the fully-electrified line from Haymarket to Carstairs junction, where it joined the West Coast Main Line.
- I amused myself by taking pictires of the large number of wind turbines along the route and motorways and arterial roads, that share the route.
- It is certainly a route where the hills are alive with spinning wind turbines.
Eventually we arrived in Carlisle, where I took more pictures.
Note.
- The train waited at Carlisle for about 10 minutes.
- It looks like Northern Trains might have been running a pair of Class 158 trains on the Settle and Carlisle Line to add capacity. Real Time Trains confirm that they were.
- The last picture has an LNER train going North in the background.
- Some passengers joined the train at Carlisle.
By the time we left Carlisle, we taken an hour and twenty-eight minutes from Edinburgh.
Our train, then took the Tyne Valley Line to Newcastle, where I took these pictures.
Note.
- It’s not called the Tyne Valley Line for nothing.
- I didn’t see a wind farm between Carlisle and Newcastle.
- The Tyne Valley Line can handle a pair of five-car Class 800 trains.
- The train was powered for 61.4 miles on diesel.
By the time we arrived in Newcastle, we had taken a minute over three hours from Edinburgh.
I decided that I didn’t have enough time to go to Hartlepool.
- I decided to buy a ticket for London King’s Cross.
- I paid £31.20 for a ticket on the 16:55 Lumo.
- Two hours and 49 minutes we arrived in King’s Cross.
- We were seven minutes late.
But it was an average speed of 95.4 mph.
I have a few thoughts on the journey.
