Turning to my boyfriend and travel companion James, I told him we had to get off our train.

We were an hour-and-a-half into a three-and-a-half journey from London to Carlisle and I’d surprised him with the announcement.

We were only at Crewe and James’s face said it all.

You may be asking: Why on earth did I make poor James lug his bags onto a cold platform in the middle of nowhere, when we could have just stayed put?

Because, little did James know, within an hour we’d be sitting in bigger seats, sipping complimentary tea and eating shortbread, all because I’d secured us two first-class tickets without spending a fortune.

If you book trains a lot , you may already know about ‘ split ticketing ’ – when separate tickets for different parts of the same journey work out cheaper than

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