Saving precious pennies II

I was recently pondering a trip to Cardiff and the standard Off-Peak return starting from Macclesfield kept coming to £57.90. This was rather more than I was expecting so my mind turned to the idea of re-booking or split ticketing. It might constrain my journey options (a good few good around by Birmingham) but doing the split at Shrewsbury does save money when doing so at Crewe costs even more. The Off-Peak Return from Macc to Shrewsbury comes to £18.80 while the same for Shrewsbury to Cardiff stands at £26.50 with the total cost coming to £45.30, not a staggering reduction but a step in the right direction and at a price that I feel it should be. I don’t know who is setting the prices but £12.60 is still quite a difference.