Kylie concert

What a weekend. On friday we (wife, pa and self) travelled to Manchester for the concert situated in MEN Arena, and what a nightmare journey that was. You may recall a previous blog about the travel arrangements and research I did to make it easy. I came to the conclusion that for our sanity we'd go by train. Here's the story:

1020am (friday 12th Jan) we're dropped off at the station as prearranged (20 mins early) to enable assistance onto the train.

1022am A train pulls in, after a brief conversation between ticket office and conductor she says (conductor) get on NOW; so we rush to get onto a train where we have no seat reservations but are okay except for the panic.

Arriving at Newport with 10 mins to walk 20 feet, instead of 3 mins, our next train - the scheduled booking, comes into the station. Someone is sitting in our seats (sounds like a goldilocks moment) so I asked one to move and then as i sat there I realised we were facing the wrong way despite the seat reservation saying "forward facing".

Settling down in a different seat (forward facing) we are heading up to Hereford where the train grinds to a halt; there's a train breakdown up ahead and we're stuck for over an hour just past Leominster. Between there and Crewe the staff dish out complementary drinks and snacks and the very nice conductor shares with us this is the first hour-long delay they've had for 2 years !!

He also shares with us the annoying fact that the train is going to terminate at Crewe; there's a train behind ours, about 10mins, (actually it has caught up by 1 hour), we'd need to catch to go to Manchester Piccadilly.

Luckily, the platform change is no more than 20 feet because the train arrives only 2 minutes later, and apart from a scrabble to grab seats, the event is unremarkable. This is now 330pm, having left at 1020am.

The train arrives at Manchester about 430pm, and we then made our way to the tram station. Talk about confusion, the station has all directions arriving and you needed to know what eventual destination the tram had, to know if it was the right direction for you. The map on the wall was clear, once you understood it. Purchasing a 60p ticket (x3) was the next challenge and involved asking a stranger how the bloody machine worked.

The tram was fun even if it was packed; being almost rush hour. Our destination, 3 stops away, was Victoria Station, behind which was the MEN ARENA. Once we were there and avoided being hit by a tram (!) we decided to get a taxi to our apartment (@ The Edge, a swanky modern private owned block of apartments) because it was too difficult to get our bearings despite having researched the roads on Google. As it turned out, it was only a mile down the road.

So, we got to the apartment at 515pm, having left home at 1010am! The next challenge was getting into the apartment, not having any instructions on how to use a security wireless door fob unlocker, which took me 10 minutes to sort out!

Once inside this magnificent 11th floor apartment we were dreaming of being able to own somewhere like this. After peeing and dropping luggage we made our way down and via a Taxi, went to the MEN ARENA, queuing for the doors to open at 6pm.

The event was supposed to start at 730pm but didnt actually commence until 820pm by which time our backsides were numb from sitting! The first set was 1 hour 10minutes of spectacle, lights and kylie. The second set was 1 hour and something plus 30 minutes of encore; the key song being especially for you...

Back at the apartment we searched the phone book for a takeaway and ended up with a pizza, at 1245am! Next day, we got to Picadilly at 10am and were lucky enough to discover an earlier service (saving us a 2hour wait). The journey home, was pretty uneventful and we staggered in at 4pm.

My other half had a party to go to so i sat and watched TV,, the highlight being Channel 4; Kylie Homecoming Tour....

My head span with deja vue!!