Going for gold

 How delightful to spend some time in Geneva with Tim and his family and to be able to take all the Scouseland kids as well.

There is a fair sized crew now and it made an ideal opportunity for a family football match the first morning we were there. Unfortunately I and SWMBO were confined to barracks, so we were on VAR duty, but in a hard fought game Sofia cracked in a 10 yarder to clinch the game. Soon to be Emma's husband, Nick, showed his skills have not deserted him, and JB excelled in goal. Luckily VAR was not called on so I was not the subject of any decision debate in the restaurant later.

Tuesday saw us take a trip to Annecy on the lake of the same name, where we wandered round a very French town and took a boat trip around the lake, which was a bit fresh I have to say. Dinner was in a restaurant at the base of the Jura skiing complex but as the resort is fairly low lying, there was no opportunity for Winter sports.

Our final trip took us to Lausanne and specifically to the Olympic Museum. What a wonderful experience that is. In the gardens surrounding the exhibition complex are artworks and olympic icons, like the current high jump and pole vault bars, together with a four lane 100m track over which the kids took on the adults

Inside were exhibits going back to the original meeting in Paris in 1908, every Olympic torch was there and costumes and equipment showing how times have changed. Usain Bolt had his shirt there, and Jessie Owen and Michael Johnson had donated their running shoes.

In one of the cinema presentations was the image of Mohammed Ali lighting the flame in Atlanta in 1996, an event which SWMBO and I witnessed in a bar in downtown Buckhead. It is a moment which still sends goose bumps down my arms.

Sounded like a plan

I have been attending international matches at Twickenham for over 50 years, always with a group of chums called 'The S Club'. This season though I decided to embrace the events in a different way.

For some time now we have said that the match has been the low point of the weekend, and, with kick-off scheduled for 16:45, the night life has become less appealing to a group of 70 somethings at 9pm than it is after normal 3pm kick-off  times.

Couple that with hotel room's now costing in excess of £120 per night, and the match tickets themselves being between £130 and £150 for an 'average' view, and the whole experience needed to be revisited. 

So, my plan was to catch an early train from Liverpool, have a few beers and a meal with 'The S Club' and then travel back to Liverpool watching the game on the train. So first part of the plan was executed as I got a cheap day return ticket and was all ready with technology and food supplies for the train journeys.

Imagine then my nervousness when the day before travel I got a warning note from Avanti North West trains saying my train may be cancelled. OK I thought I can get the earlier train, albeit that was 07:40.

So an early alarm got me up only to see that train had been cancelled. My scheduled train was still running but the train afterwards had also been cancelled. Then just as I was about to leave a notification informed me my scheduled train had been cancelled too. To cancel one train is unfortunate, to cancel three is carelessness, even incompetence.

So what options? Drive to Crewe? Ah, go from Chester, but then found out the Birkenhead to Chester service was delayed so I could not get a connecting train by going that route. So I am now consigned to a day at home watching on the television.

I don't use the train very  much these days so am not sure how often this sort of disruption occurs, but Liverpool Lime Street must be mental today with three train loads of people trying to find alternative ways to get to London, whether or not many of them are going to the rugby.

And what of Avanti and their bed fellow the dinosaur which is the Unite union. Their members are trying to bring the Country to it's knees when they are over paid already and clearly underworked as they have no trains to drive most of the time.

Virgin trains were never as poorly operated as Avanti but given there is little chance of the Avanti franchise being renewed, they don't give a toss about customer service.

Now I see three of the four evening return train services have been cancelled out of Euston so goodness knows whether I would have got back tonight anyway. Come on England  prove us wrong about the match and make our day!!