"A truly insane odyssey": Man shares wild journey that ensued after UK train cancellation
Travelling often means you have to be prepared for delays and long waits, but one man experienced what he calls a “truly insane odyssey” after his train got cancelled in the UK.
James Nokise, a comedian and podcaster from New Zealand, documented the wild journey in a multi-post thread on X.
I’m not quite sure how to explain what’s happened tonight, because it’s still happening – but here goes…
At 4:40pm I jumped on a train from London to Edinburgh..
It was comfy, it was quiet
In hindsight, too good to last…
— James Nokise (@JamesNokise) September 25, 2023
He hopped on a train travelling from London, England, to Edinburgh, Scotland, on September 25 at about 4:40 pm.
At first, all seemed to be going well. “It was comfy, it was quiet. In hindsight, too good to last,” he wrote on X.
Then, at around 7:26 pm, he received an email that his train had been cancelled.
But that didn’t make sense because he was currently on the train that was supposedly “cancelled,” and it was still moving.
“About 10 mins later the train manager came on the speaker to say they ‘heard from passengers’ (!) that the train had been cancelled and was going to investigate because everything looked fine to them,” Nokise recounted.
The passengers were then told that the train was indeed cancelled and it would be terminating at the next stop, which was Preston, a city in northwest England.
There was hope that they could catch a connecting train to Glasgow from Preston, but that train was full.
The travellers were then told the next train would arrive in about an hour, but it was later cancelled as well.
“It turned out there were no more trains ‘North’ after that and, excitingly, no forthcoming information,” wrote Nokise.
“No one knew anything.”
At about 9:20 pm, staff told them that “alternate transport” had been arranged.
Except we weren’t all going to Edinburgh, because it wasn’t an express train.
Some were going Glasglow, some to Dundee, Carlisle, and other stops.
But all of us queued to be taken away 3-7 people at a time. And if that sounds slow and ridiculous, it was. pic.twitter.com/2LusQ8rHwg
— James Nokise (@JamesNokise) September 25, 2023
“Bus? An extra train? Horses? No. Taxis. For hundreds of people. To a city three and a half hours away,” noted Nokise.
But not every traveller had Edinburgh as their final destination because the train they were meant to be on was meant to stop at multiple stations on the way.
That meant taking taxis was a logistical disaster.
“Take a moment to appreciate how long the trip to Edinburgh from Preston is, how long the return journey would be. Think about how big the fare would need to be, and then try and estimate how many various cabs were needed to shift a couple of hundred people off home,” stated Nokise.
He ended up in a cab with three men who were travelling alone. The trip got even more stressful when the taxi driver asked what the postal code for the Edinburgh station was.
Nokise and his fellow passengers told him there were two stations in the city.
“He explained he is only paid to take us to one station and that is Edinburgh station. We explained Edinburgh has Waverley and Haymarket, but he probably meant Waverley. He said he would drop us there and only there, as though we were trying to trick him. After a bit of light banter, we realized we all were staying near the same station,” said Nokise.
“The oldest of our ‘Cab Team’ asked if the cabbie might drop us at our locations, since he was getting a flat rate, and he was not in fact a train, bound by rail lines. The cabbie refused.”
By now, it was nearing midnight. What was supposed to be a three-and-a-half-hour train ride had turned into a painstakingly long and unpredictable journey.
I will provably give some updates, but also better conserve my phones battery because, as you can see, there’s still 2hrs 20min to go… pic.twitter.com/xvLREGiwEM
— James Nokise (@JamesNokise) September 25, 2023
At around 3 am the next day, they were nearing their destination, and the road that they needed to take was closed, which meant they needed to find a detour.
“Every single one of us now has Google Maps open. The ‘closed road’ sign has deflated the cab. It’s hard to even remember the train now,” he continued.
Eventually, they got back on route until the driver’s GPS acted up, causing another delay.
“Then he turns right out of nowhere and suddenly we’re in Edinburgh’s backstreets. The driver’s GPS has taken him off course again! I’ve intervened,” said Nokise, who added that this was the first time the cabbie had travelled to Edinburgh.
Nokise and his fellow travellers finally arrived but not at the station as previously intended.
“What happened is we made it to this junction, and the cabbie said he couldn’t drive there, and we pointed out he can. But the conversation broke us all, so we just jumped out,” he wrote.
And that’s when Nokise’s journey finally came to an end.
“A truly insane odyssey. [Five hours] late, 11 [hours] after I jumped on the train. I’m gonna have a shower and eat something. Let’s never do this again,” Nokise concluded in the epic thread on X, which has since gone viral.
Daily Hive has reached out to Avanti West Coast, the company in charge of operating the train, for comment.