THE M & D AND EAST KENT BUS CLUB
The South Midlander 19 May 2001
Tour report by Colin Hicks
(first published in Club News Sheet 587 Jun '01)
For our first tour of the year, 44 members were picked up in the Medway towns, Maidstone and en route to Northamptonshire and West Midlands area. The transport for the day was provided by New Enterprise and the vehicle was a J-registered DAF/Duple 340 coach.
After an uneventful journey on the M25
and M40 our first visit was to Jeff's Coaches at Helmdon, located in a former
station yard, here was a mixture of withdrawn vehicles and others in for
maintenance - and on leaving the yard, how many of you spotted the old
railway viaduct?
Next stop was in Banbury where
Stagecoach Midland Red South were the dominant operator with a Leyland-National
Mk1, Volvo B6s and Mercedes-Benz minibuses in evidence although Cheney Coaches
do run stage services during the week.
We then moved on to Stratford-upon-Avon
and to the Guide Friday depot, where we found one of the Mercedes-Benz Citaro
vehicles operated on behalf of Warwickshire County Council and other
interesting vehicles in the pleasant green and yellow livery.
Next stop was to the Museum of
Transport at Wythall - well, what can I say? Numerous vehicles of interest and condition, highlights here
for me were the Soudley Valley Leyland Tiger Cub/Willowbrook and the two Walsall
Daimler Fleetlines, well worth a visit!
We next boarded JOJ 976, a 1953
Birmingham Guy Arab IV, for a run into Solihull, very nice. Here we had a break for more
photography before joining our coach for the final visit of the day to
Coventry, where we had a brief look at the Travel West Midlands depot and then
on to Travel de Courcey who have a smart mixed fleet of buses and coaches in a
livery of blue, orange and white.
We then headed back home to Kent.
Thanks
to David Cobb for a very enjoyable tour and special thanks to David Hatcher for
help in locating the depots.