We spent the weekend in London, seeing friends from university and family. We know someone who is going away travelling for a couple of years and this was an excuse for everyone to get drunk together first.

The drinking took place in serious style in a Bavarian beerhouse. There were women serving beer and sausages while men in strange outfits sang and played the accordion.

Saturday morning journey to London

We decided to do our bit for the planet and not travel by plane. We got the 7.25 train from Waverley Station. It headed west out of the city because the south-eastern line is closed at the weekend for engineering works. The train was going via Carlisle instead.

We got as far as Slateford, which is about ten minutes walking distance from our flat, before the driver decided that there was something wrong with the train and we were heading back in to the station again. We spent about forty-five minutes on the train and didn’t leave the city limits.

Our train was half booked; the later train we were bundled onto was fully booked and had one missing carriage. So there were people standing in the aisles as soon as we left Edinburgh. I think some people had to stand all the way to London. That’s seven hours.