Trains in Cape Town seriously messed up today

The trains today in Cape Town seem to be very messed up. I was trying to reach the 8:10AM train at Monte Vista station. I was about one minute away when it arrived at 8:04AM. According to official documentation, passengers should try and be there five minutes before a train is scheduled to arrive in case it arrives early. Up to five minutes before or after the scheduled time is considered on time because of delays and catching up.

After that issue, I decided that I have time to walk the 25 minutes to reach the 8:30AM train at Vasco station and with that I would get to Salt River station which is one station away from Observatory station which is where I need to go. I got to Vasco station at 8:24AM, a train only came at 8:45AM.

At Salt River station there was already a big crowd waiting for the train. A bit more than ten minutes later a train came past and did not stop. Normally the intervals that time of the morning are fifteen minutes between trains. More or less fifteen minutes later another one came past that did not stop. After that I decided to walk the fifteen minutes to my work in Mowbray.

Got off at the wrong train station last night

I took the train to Vasco railway station as usual last night which would have been followed by a 2.6km walk. I remember stopping at Goodwood railway station which would have been followed by Vasco railway station. The next thing I knew, the doors of the train were closing at Elsiesrivier railway station which comes after Vasco. That meant that I had to get off at Parow railway station and walk, or wait for a really long time for a train in the other direction. In the end I walked and ran 5.4km to get home.

Metrorail Cape Town ticket checks

This morning I went through three different ticket checks at different train stations. The stations included Vasco, Esplanade and Woodstock. At Observatory when I got off, there was no ticket check.

Walking from Kensington to Monte Vista in the rain

Two days ago, I had the fun and joy of falling asleep on the train and getting off two stations too early. The station that I got off at was called Kentemade which is in the Kensington suburb. The station looks nearly identical to the Monte Vista station that I normally get off at. The train stopped there and I woke up, both sides looked more or less correct based on what I could see. This was the last train for the evening. By the time I realised the station was wrong, the train was moving again.

After that story, I neded up walking toward Voortrekker road to head in the direction of Monte Vista, but I had to pass Facreton first and then through Vasco suburbs. Kensington itself can be a maze, especially at night. After many wrong turns, I finally got to Voortrekker road, then the rain started.

Much walking later with the rain coming and going, I finally reached Vasco, then heavy rain hit. Fortunately that was the last on the route. Since I was running about 40% of the route, the entire trip took 1 hour and 20 minutes.