The Great North Road Bus Trip

Most people don't travel by bus.  Most of those that do do so only because it's the least-worst option available to them for getting from where they are to where they want to be.

But I'm not exactly alone in enjoying a ride on a bus. You don't need to make decisions about which way to go, or continually check that you're going the right way. The driver does that for you. You can eat and drink safely as you go and the bus takes you through all sorts of places that you would never otherwise get to see (although admittedly sometimes you wish you'd never seen them). If gazing at the passing scenery begins to pall you can read a newspaper or a book and there are always the other passengers to watch and conversations to eavesdrop on - or even join in.

Although more people than you might think enjoy a day out on the buses, there is a rather select band of us who enjoy longer trips extending over several days.  One of the first such trips that I made was in 1991 and as the notes I made at the time - and the photographs - have just come to light as another benefit of lockdown I thought I'd put them on the blog.  As with my earlier ramblings about train trips in eastern Europe I'm doing it primarily for my own benefit to produce a permanent record, but anyone who thinks they might be interested is welcome to read it.

LONDON TO EDINBURGH BY BUS - MARCH 1991

As ever with such trips it was necessary to set a few ground rules and the introduction to the notes I made at the time says: "A journey by local bus, with a minimum of pre-planning, from Trafalgar Square in London to the Scott Monument in Edinburgh.  No express coaches to be used and "limited stop" buses only allowable when no other services are available".  The route was to be broadly along the line of the Great North Road, although in practice there were to be significant deviations from that route.  Nor was it a race.  In those pre-internet days it was very difficult to find timetables for services in other parts of the country and not knowing where you might be each night made booking accommodation impossible anyway, so I generally aimed to stop between 5 and 6pm each day to be sure of getting a bed for the night.

DAY ONE, Saturday, 16th March 1991:   London to Bedford

Bus 1:
Trafalgar Square - North Finchley

Although this was to be a solo trip I was joined for the first day by my friend Hugh. After a night in the Royal Adelphi Hotel near Charing Cross (which I doubt has ever been patronised by royalty!) we set off from Trafalgar Square on a  London Transport "Routemaster" at 10.00 on service 13 to North Finchley.  This wasn't the original plan - which was to get a 29 to Wood Green - but was changed when we rrealised the 29 was not a Routemaster.

We had an "unexciting and poorly-patronised" run along the Finchley Road, following a route familiar to us due to it being that taken by National Express coaches to and from the North-West, past Swiss Cottage and Golders Green and reaching North Finchley at 10.55. The fare was £1.10.  On arrival at North Finchley we found a café for a cup of tea.

Bus 2: North Finchley to Potters Bar.

The second bus of the day was again  London Transport, this time service 263 to Potters Bar. Rather more modern than a Routemaster, my notes record this as being a "Scania double-decker", but I've always been more interested in bus services rather than the buses themselves. Leaving North Finchley at 11.33 this route took us through "unremitting suburbia" relieved only by Barnet town centre and some open country to the north. The terminus at Potters Bar was at the bus garage, where we arrived at 12.03 after paying 90p for the ride.

Bus 3: Potters Bar to Welwyn Garden City

The 1990s were an interesting time for bus watchers. The industry outside London had been de-regulated and opened up to competition in 1986 and the state-owned National Bus Company (NBC) had been split up and privatised, leading to a multitude of new small operators appearing. Some of these were owned by former NBC employees, and it was one such firm that provided our next onward bus. To catch it we had to walk to the railway station and there we boarded the 12.27 "Welwyn Hatfield Line" service 302 to Welwyn Garden City. Unlike the first two buses of the day this was a small single-decker (or large minibus) another feature of 1990s bus operation in the UK. The 302 itself took us on a 45-minute run through housing estates and uninspiring 1980s developement accompanied by "Capital Radio" relayed through speakers on the bus in a misguided attempt to entertain the passengers. We were more than happy when we arrived at "WGC" at 13.19 having paid £1.40 for the priviledge. My notes record that I found Welwyn Garden City "quite impressive, with wide open central streets but few useful shops"!

Bus 4: Welwyn Garden City to Hitchin

"United Counties" was a subsidiary of the National Bus Company that had been aquired by Stagecoach, although in 1991 that wasn't always obvious as not all the buses had received the new corporate livery. One such was the Bristol VR double-decker on service 314 to Hitchin, on which we departed at 13.50. We chose this route because it ran only four times a day, something which somehow made it more interesting to us and we were both surprised to find a double-decker allocated to such an infrequent service. We weren't surprised to find it very lightly loaded and in fact we ran almost non-stop all the way to Hitchin, arriving at 14.20.  My notes don't mention what we did about lunch today, but we did spend some time in the Bricklayers Arms, a Charles Wells pub, which might be the answer. I was surprised to find that Hitchin had "a pleasant coaching town atmosphere" despite laying off the route of the Great North Road.

Bus 5: Hitchen to Biggleswade (right)

From Hitchin we could have gone directly to Bedford, which we had identified as our destination for the night, largely because it was known to have a large number of pubs owned by what were then considered the local, independent breweries Charles Wells and Greene King (how times change!). However, we opted instead to catch another United Counties bus on service 177 to Biggleswade, our motivation apparently being that we found the name amusing and that Greene King had a brewery in the town. We didn't see the brewery but we did find time between our arrival at 15.45 and our departure for Bedford on service 176 at 16.30 to enjoy a pint in a pub in the attractive market square.

Bus 6: Biggleswade to Bedford.

The 176, another United Counties route, got us to Bedford at 17.15 and after a short search we found the "Grafton Hotel" near the station as a base for the night.  I was surprised to find that every bus bar one had been a double-decker and also noted that no smoking was allowed on any of them, not something that could be taken for granted in 1991. The scenery en-route struck me as "fairly grotty" on the whole with the London sprawl only really stopping at Hitchin, which I felt was a town that could have been in the midlands. The countryside around Biggleswade with its large, open flat fields reminded me of East Anglia. The weather had been dull and cloudy all day and by the time we got to Bedford it was raining heavily.

On Day One we were underway for seven and a quarter hours of which 3h 57m were spent actually travelling, the rest being waiting, eating, drinking or sight-seeing. The total fare for the six buses used was £8.40. Our route out of London initially took us to the west of the Great North Road, but we rejoined it at Finchley and followed it as far as Welwyn Garden City. Our route via Hatfield took us parallel to the Great North Road, albeit several kilometres to the west, before returning to it at Biggleswade then turning away to the north west to reach Bedford.

to be continued....