Trains...
I had booked this trip to Cambridge and back well beforehand.
According to my intinerary, I should've been able to get a train from
Cambridge to London King's Cross at 17:28. Unfortunately, today London
King's Cross is closed because of 'engineering', a eufemism for we
need to work on a few things without knowing what the fuck we're
doing
.
I had known that they were going to be closed today, since it was announced yesterday. However, I had (incorrectly) assumed that the train which was assumed to go to King's Cross would go part of the way and that I could take the underground from there, or that at least the train would be diverted to another station. Apparently I was wrong; instead of helping me out, they simply cancelled it. So now I had to figure out another way of making it to King's Cross.
While I was considering forking out an insane amount of money to a cab from London Stansted (at least there was a train that could get me there from Cambridge), Cambridge Station staff suggested me that I could make it to Tottenham Hale from Stansted using a connecting train with Liverpool Street as its final destination, which would get me right next to an underground station. A ticket from there to London Waterloo, where the Eurostar leaves, will cost me slightly more than one from London King's cross, but at least I'll still be on time -- and I won't have to pay a cab.
Lessons learned: next time, ask right away when you see something
about engineering
that might interfere with your travel schedule,
so that you can actually get there in time without issues, and
without unnecessary stress...
...and the fact that engineering
in the UK is not
done sensibly, as opposed to Belgium; this type of insane work should be
done during night hours, when no trains have to be routed to that
station anyway.
But in the end, I think it was the best for you not to come to Mexico. Enjoy your shiny, planned first world!
Sure; I know that, and I'm not contesting it. However, had they done this type of thing at night, then nobody would've had any problem.
That's what they do in Belgium for this kind of thing.