Victor Meldrew’s Trip to Wembley
posted in A Moose's Life |
When it comes to public transport I’m a total Mardy Bum, I totally dislike it. So imagine my disappointment when my children insisted we were travelling by public transport to the first international match at Wembley today, to watch England Under 21’s v Italy Under 21’s. It is normally quicker to travel 150 miles from my gaff to Birmingham than travelling 15 miles to Central London or 30 miles across London.
Anyhow, the days course of events was as follows:
- £7 to park at the British Rail Station, where the car parking machine didn’t even have prices or times displayed and was temperamental in working.
- There were no seats on the train to Waterloo, infected the old man flu & travelling with kids, we had to stand the whole journey.
- The escalator wasn’t working at Waterloo to transfer onto the Jubilee line, so a nice trudge down the steps.
- Jumped on the train, well at least this time the platform doors didn’t decide to continuously trap me like they did last time.
- However, when we embarked on the underground train, it was sweaty & clammy, yet again there were no seats and the train was packed like sardines! It was awful
- What seemed like the slow train to China, we eventually arrived at Wembley.
- I treated my kids to England flags (£5 each) to wave & a scarf (£5 each) to enjoy the event. couldn’t find a program stand though. Took some photos of the historic occasion.
- Arrived at the stadium turnstiles, only for some security bloke, pleasant his manners were, insisting that children couldn’t bring flags (the sticks to be precise) into the stadium. Great, that’s a tenner down the pan. A bit of a con when they get you to buy the flags at one end of Wembley walk, then prevent you from bringing them in.
- Through the turnstiles we go, daughter had the bottle top of her fizzy drink confiscated/taken away. How petty that was, when if she really wanted to chuck something onto the pitch, she could have simply stuffed a spare bottle top down her sock.
- Before we managed to get to other side of the turnstiles, two security people “a different security company” they claimed, said that sticks under two metres were permitted, well too late, please make your bloody mind up.… However, then they said we were not allowed to use digital cameras to take photos in the stadium? Apparently you have to have a license. Well, you can imagine my verbal response to these poncy security stewards.
- I decided to buy a souvenir programme, until I saw the length of the queues, one I paced at 55 yards, the other snaked around at just under 100 yards, so left that to later.
- We felt peckish, knowing how extortionate food prices are at Wembley, there were no queues at all as most people brought packed lunches & I recommend anybody going to Wembley to do likewise. I remember hearing on Talk Sport radio that morning, how the manager of Wembley boasted about the food product being of high quality. Ermm, what’s difficult about putting hot water into a cup with a tea bag, oh yes, when they forget to add the milk. Bought a jacket spud & some kind of cheese / veggie mix which looked like some fur ball the cat had regurgitated, plus spud wasn’t fully cooked in the centre. We were actually quite jokey with the sales assistant about it all, who said we were her happiest customers all day, yep even a miserable git like me.
- Kick Off, we pulled the camera out to take photos, along with the hundreds of others, I could just imagine security kicking everyone out with cameras or camera phones at that point in time. Blimey it’s meant to be a family occasion. That took about 20 seconds, just enough time to catch what will probably always be the fastest goal at Wembley after 29 seconds.
- It was an entertaining match, 3-3 draw was the result.
- With the masses of people leaving and heading back down Wembley Walk to the train station. I must admit the police had it very well organised, to prevent stampeding, by cordoning off sections & then allowing crowds intermittently through into the station. It was very well rehearsed & executed. Yes, it took a while, but it was safe, especially as there were plenty of families.
- The train arrivals on the return leg of the journey were about every 3 minutes, the platform wasn’t jam packed & there were plenty of seats.
After that the day picked up a bit.
As I chanted to my inner self …
“double seat, double seat, got to get a double seat” .. as the mantra is echoed by other passengers … “double seat, double seat, got to get a double seat”
And to my pleasant surprise we all got one.
On the positive side even though it only cost £6.70 each for adults (1) and £1 each for the kids (2). It still would have been cheaper & more comfortable to travel by car. However i certainly won’t pay Ken Livingston’s congestion charge for the privilege of travelling into London. Probably why, I refuse to attend meetings in London, even if I am being offered lunch by a company. Also, more often than not I come home with a cold, like how this trip aggravated my “man flu” even more.
However the day wasn’t quite complete, as we were disappointed still further by the dire England performance this evening against Israel in what was a lacklustre 0-0 bore draw. To be honest, I think that was expected.
More Importantly, Am I Really A Bar Humbug:
Myself and the children had a really good time. Children as you probably are aware, are not fazed about minor trivialities in life. To them, riding on a train whether empty or full is an adventure, the buzz of the crowds, the junk food, wearing flags as cloaks rather than waving around, wanting to stroke every police horse they passed, and basically having quality time with their daddy. It just puts my Victor Meldrew opinion into a little perspective.
