Saturday 24th September 1988 ... Where were you?

"I basically sat on the Cambrian for the whole of the summer in 1988, like many others, but I singled this weekend out for a
couple of reasons. Firstly, it nearly went extremely pear shaped, and secondly, there is a fot of one of the trains on your
site - with me sticking my head out of the window.

It all started at Rugby just after midnight where a few cranks would meet. Most BR stations had stopped selling Cambrian Day
Rangers from the middle of the summer due to misuse. One of the lads managed to book a few for us at AT Mays travel agents
in Coventry though, so we were alright.

Anyway, once the tickets were handed out, it was off to New St on the 2340 Euston - Wolves for the rancid overnight to make
the 0620 New St - Aberystwyth, a pair of outbased 37/5's from Buxton.

The hours were spent playing a massive game of Footie in Moor Street car park. About 20-30 players were present. We all
made our way back to New St for about 0400 when the concourse buffet used to re-open after being cleaned. Some unruly
youths, who shall not be mentioned decided to continue the football game on the concourse using a bottle of Coke as the ball.
However, when the ball burst, making a right mess. station staff decided to chuck as many cranks of the station as possible. All
exits/entrances were covered and we had about 90 mins to get on the platform.

One of our desperate colleagues came up with a plan. We stormed of to Moor Street again and got in his car. Many traffic laws
were broken in an effort to make the first Wolves - Euston AT WOLVES!!! Sandwell & Dudley was not the best place to leave a
car for a day so Wolves it had to be. Needless to say - we made it. But we weren't home safe yet. The 0554 Wolves - Euston
was a plus two at New St for the 0620 Aber. We made it to Sandwell but left there one minute down. When we got to Monument
Lane tunnel, we were on 'one yellows' all the way into New St. When we came out of the tunnel, we were all flapping profusely,
trying to find the train which if I remember rightly, went out of Platform 6. These were the days before central locking on Mk2
air-cons so the 'leap of faith' was performed whilst running into platform 2 and we all stormed up the escalators (which weren't
working!) and made it onto the pair of Tinsleys finest with seconds to spare.

86259 0048 Rugby - New St (2340 Euston - Wolves)
OJO 43T (Bista's [fast] car) 0430 Moor Street car park - Wolves via the universe.
86259 (again) 0554 Wolves - New St (0554 Wolves - Euston
37688 & 37676 0620 New St - Newtown (0620 New St - Aberystwyth)
37430 08xx Newtown - Shrewsbury (0714 Aberystwyth - Euston)
37174 & 37015 1048 Shrewsbury - Pwllheli (0740 Euston - Pwllheli)
37015 & 37174 1505 Pwllheli - Wolves (1505 Pwllheli - Euston)
86233 2000 Wolves - New St (1505 Pwllheli - Euston)
85008 2108 New St - Rugby (1502 Penzance - Milton Keynes) "

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