Mind The Gap

"Mind The Gap" is on most of the rail platforms in England. It's a warning to pay attention to the void between the platform and the train when loading and unloading. It also was my first lesson-learned about trains - I was trapped, not by the physical gap but the timing gap. After much time wasted by my confusion and the gap between trains and the number of train changes needed, I arrived in Liverpool at 22:20 - missing my 22:00 overnight ferry to Dublin. I knew there was a faster ferry that left from Holyhead at 2:40 in the morning (there aren't any other ferries out of Liverpool except the 7 hour ones). I made it to Holyhead at 2:20 - fortunately the ferry office is connected to the train station and even though it was past loading time, they let me on.

I arrived in Dublin at 6am and took a taxi straight to the train station for my 6:40 tour to Bunratty Castle, The Cliffs of Moher, Burren and Galway with RailTours. Arriving back in Dublin at 9pm and gratefully making my way to my B&B. Other then my own folly in planning, there weren't any problems...well, there was one incident...

I had switched trains in Chester (between Liverpool and Holyhead) and settled down for a nice 1 1/2 hours sleep (I only slept for small snippets of time until I was in the B&B last night). The train was very empty - there was 4 of us in my car and then 2 drunk young men (early 20's) got on. I had just fallen asleep when one of them opened a can of beer (they brought a 6-pack on with them). He managed to spray it over his seat, the seat facing me, and the table and drench my shirt! I guess you could say I've "had" some beer in England ;^)