Taking Greyhounds and Lurchers to London for the day
Archive - Originally posted on "The Horse's Mouth" - 2014-02-23 09:47:02 - Graham Ellis
A wonderful day in London! Lisa, Linda (her friend), my Dad and myself caught the 07:48 from Melksham, changed at Swindon and got into London about 2 hours later. Lisa and Linda went off to an exhibition at Olympia, and Dad and I (and we had the two dogs with us) caught the tube aroud to Embankment and walked over the river - took in some of the sights of London's South Bank and came back to Paddington from Westinster in time for the 16:15 train ... connecting into the 17:36 Swindon to Melksham train, and getting back there on time at 18:02.
It's rather a long trip, so cheap day return fares (which are only availble for shorter distances) don't directly apply, but it's OK to buy the journey in two halves which we did, provided that the train you're on actually calls at the intermediate station. Best value is often a "Didcot Split". We also took advantage of "Groupsave 4", where 4 adults can travel for the price of 2. So that was £77.60 for all four of us, or £19.40 each. As we were headed different ways in London (and a group has to stay 'together') we didn't add a railcard, but rather used a mixture of Oyster for 2 of us and cash for the other 2 on the tube / bus.
So - how was the day? It was glorious. The weather was cold (in the shade) but it was sunny and calm, and the crowds were out. Enjoy some of the pictures of the day!
Would we recommend it?
As a train trip, ABSOLUELY and if you don't have dogs with you there are huge numbers of things to do in London, with a train back to Melksham every couple of hours so you can "play it by ear"
As a trip with sighthounds? Yes, for dogs of the right temprament. Billy and Gypsy were huge icebreakers, made many new friends and would be up for the trip again if offered. You do need to be careful not to go too near to people who exihit signs of not liking dogs, and not to creap up on / surprise people. But - what friends they made and we had a glorious day chatting with people; although many were not native Londoners, most are now resident in the south east of England, and were taking advantage of the weather.
