Today was going to be a more relaxing trip with my mum, just to take her out of the house following the events of a couple weeks ago, mainly a day of looking out of the window of various trains in Devon with some minor exploring of a couple places. Compared to my previous weeks it would be a more relaxing trip for me as well (no early start, nor long walks), and after checking the website in the morning before leaving home, noticing that there was issues in Basingstoke due to a large signalling failure, but the 08:28-odd Exeter train was due to run but starting from Andover (instead of London) so we left the house, and headed to the station (thankfully getting lucky with the weather not being that wet).
Although once we arrived at the station, the Exeter train was showing as cancelled and the following train towards Salisbury was showing as delayed [before that changed to Cancelled] so I put a call into the help-point and got told they would order a taxi to take us to Salisbury. The taxi never came but around 09:00 I spotted a blue coach coming down the road for an unexpected replacement coach service to Salisbury (featuring a driver who needed directions to reach Salisbury as he was meant to be heading to Farnborough). Arriving at a busy Salisbury where we purchased the tickets (I didn’t want to buy them from Grateley when the trains were showing as cancelled as during the time waiting I was coming up with an alternative idea of where we could have headed just in case nothing arrived [for I didn’t have high hopes on the taxi actually arriving]).
The unexpected Rail Replacement Coach
On the (busy) platform at Salisbury, it was a wait until the unit arrived from the depot, and a late notice platform change [from platform 3 to 4] before we boarded the Exeter service, quite busy from the word go, but at least it wasn’t just SWR having issues as trains from Warminster towards Salisbury were also being heavily delayed with a single 2 coach 165 spotted heading towards Portsmouth [assuming it made it there!] running 65-odd minutes late with the following service being 30+ minutes late. However for the 159 towards Exeter the damage was done with a 15 minute late start as it was held for ~10 minutes near the former Wilton South station due to the single track towards Tisbury, then again at Gillingham for a late running service from Yeovil Junction, but it was nice to look out of the window.
Another delay as the unit got put into Chard loop, then again as it was held at Honiton before heading towards Exeter Central where it emptied out and running down the hill to Exeter St Davids where it went into platform 1 for a short turnaround [personally I was expecting it to get spun at Exeter Central and dumped in the bay platform]. Along the way after the delays I came up with an alternative plan as the Barnstaple train was already gone, however when we got into St Davids I noticed it was still sat on platform 3 waiting for a late running voyager allowing us to somehow made the connection to a 3 coach 158 for the run towards Barnstaple. My first time on this line with a 158 and where they do suit the “end to end” nature, I do feel the 90mph top speed is slightly wasted. The train called at all the scheduled request stops and was only a minute or 2 late by the time it reached Barnstaple, where we had a little break.
A 158 at Barnstaple
After a walk to the nearby Tesco for lunch & supplies, we went towards the river, passing the new leisure centre under construction to reach the “Long Bridge” before heading back towards the station to have lunch before the next 158 arrived from Exeter which took us back to Exeter St Davids for a short wait before a busy 166 arrived from Exmouth to take us to Paignton [lots of suitcases of people alighting at both Dawlish stations]. Seeing a 166 in this part of the world just looks so out of place, especially considering it hasn’t been that long since they were working out of London on stopping services towards Reading & Oxford.
A 166 at Paignton
A fast connection at Paignton (somewhere on my list to revisit for a decent look around one of these days) over to the opposite platform to take a seat on a 800 for the short run back towards Newton Abbot where we left the station, and I headed to a nearby KFC which was very slow, so slow that the 25 minutes I gave ourselves was missed (however after noticing the Waterloo train it would have connected with had been cancelled at Yeovil, it wouldn’t have mattered even if we made the connection!) We had the food sitting on a bench outside Newton Abbot station before taking a pair of 150s to Dawlish where we exited the station to get some sea air (and an Ice-cream, because you need to have an ice-cream when sitting by the sea)!
Back at Dawlish station, it was a short wait before a short HST set arrived from Penzance which took us back to Exeter St Davids for another short wait before a pair of 159s rolled in from the siding. Considering the previous service got cancelled I was expecting it to be busy, but it wasn’t that bad for loadings in coach 4 of 6 and by the time it reached Yeovil the coach only had a couple other passengers in. Time passed before it arrived at Grateley, and once more we got lucky with the weather as it wasn’t raining (unlike those who alighted at Honiton into a heavy downpour!). A gentle walk home and a relaxing remainder of the evening, where I didn’t rush to unpack my bag because due to the poor weather forecast for the Sunday I decided a day at home (featuring a trip to the dump to get rid of some old stuff from clearing out an old cupboard) would be more of benefit. The main thing is that mum enjoyed her day trip to Devon :)
The Sea at Dawlish
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