Cardiff to Gloucester via Bristol

[ValleyLines142]

Evening all,

I have a very complex ticket enquiry for my cousin, and I just want to check if it's valid!

So, my cousin is planning on catching a train from Cardiff Central to Bristol Temple Meads, break her journey for a meal, and then catch a train from Temple Meads to Gloucester later that evening. Staying overnight, she then wants to go onto Birmingham the next day, and then in the evening board a service from Birmingham straight back to Cardiff.

Now, I'm wondering whether it's worth purchasing an Off Peak Return from Cardiff to Gloucester, which allows travel via Bristol as the journey planners show it, but the question is whether it would be valid to break her journey at Temple Meads. If not, I think her best bet would be to buy an Advance single from Cardiff to Bristol (£5.10), an Off-Peak single from Bristol to Gloucester (£6.75), then have an open return from Gloucester to Birmingham (£18.65), and then maybe another Advance from Gloucester to Cardiff on Saturday - though for the latter, whilst she would be travelling from Birmingham straight through to Cardiff, she would have a combination of a return portion of a Gloucester to Birmingham ticket and an Advance from Gloucester to Cardiff.

The spanner in the works is because we're attending a meal in Bristol, otherwise a simple Cardiff to Gloucester and Gloucester to Birmingham split return would suffice.

Any other suggestions?

Thanks in advance!

 

[island]

An off-peak return from Cardiff Central to Gloucester does not permit break of journey.

The enforceability of this restriction is debatable, as is the question of whether or not staff involved would know about it, or indeed what would be suggested in terms of excess fares if they sought to charge one.

”Using station facilities” does not count as a break of journey.