There’s been a bit of a donnybrook here lately over boarding trains without having a ticket. The train companies have come under fire in the media for imposing fines (in addition to the fares) to people who board without tickets, even when they board from stations with no attendants and no working ticket machines. There was no way I was jumping on any train until I was triple sure I had the right ticket for my destination. Unfortunately Portchester is a small station with no attendant and only one ticket machine and there was already a woman using the machine when I arrived at the top of the stairs. The train left. I was not on board. I wasn’t really concerned, I did some homework prior to embarking on this adventure and knew that departures to London were fairly regular and frequent. I bought my ticket a few minutes later without incident, but The Road Scholar in me was thinking “this is not a good start”.