I happened to find myself in Swindon with some time to spare, so I invited fellow admin bobm to join me for a pint in our preferred Wetherspoons there, the Savoy.

Having enjoyed a couple of beers and a good chat with bobm, I then strolled over to Swindon station to get a return train to Nailsea.  However, it turned out to be not quite as simple as that. 

Firstly, I missed one west-bound train, by about two minutes, so I waited for the next one. That was supposed to be going through to Taunton, stopping at Nailsea & Backwell, but it was being terminated at Bristol Temple Meads 'due to more trains than usual needing repairs'.  In fact, the very apologetic female train manager in her announcement said, rather tersely, 'this unit is going to be used for something else'.

Then, on the journey, the train braked fairly hard and came to a stop somewhere between Chippenham and Bath Spa.  The excellent train manager made another announcement that we had stopped because a couple of children had run across the tracks in front of the driver, and the driver was on the phone to the signaller.  Next, she announced that the driver had got out of the cab and was looking for the children, to make sure they were safe.  Indeed he was: we saw him out of the left hand carriage windows, wearing GWR hi-viz and scrambling down some very steep embankments - I was rather concerned for his safety, frankly.

Resuming our journey, we eventually arrived at Bristol Temple Meads at least 15 minutes down, so my connection to Nailsea (which shouldn't even have been necessary, had that particular train continued to Taunton via Nailsea) was missed.  There was nothing for it but to find a Wetherspoons for a quick pint before the next train to Nailsea.

CfN.