DRIZZLING IN CHESHIRE AGAIN

Poole, easy for photography and lots to see
golden oldie at Poole
Golden Oldie at Bournemouth
not so old

A gentle drizzle this morning after a dry weekend, the first for ages. Saturday we set off at 5.30 am and were in Bournemouth by 9, we'd packed lunch and taken a flask as there aren't that many pleasant places to stop. Bournemouth was its usual self, full of foreigners, heard just one local, an elderly chap whinging about me on the pavement with lots of F words, other than that never heard an English voice. The gypsy beggars were heading out onto their pitches around 10, a mist hung heavily until about 11am making it rather dour. The bus stops were difficult to film at because of road works so I concentrated on the hill and crossing place on the bend. Nothing really startling to report, increasingly Wilts and Dorset are in the new livery , Solos demise continues. The classic open top operation was using at least 2 Bristol VRs which were nice to see. We then continued on to Poole, a hell of a slog, one of the most congested urban stretches in the country albeit only a short distance as the crow flies. By now the sun was out and the activity here outweighed Bournemouth several fold and it wasn't that long before one the Damory VRs came into view. Next on the agenda was Weymouth where we arrived about 2 pm and enjoyed a delicious farmhouse ice-cream, one of the best we could recall, by now temp was in mid twenties and there was a reasonable turn over in buses although the open top VR had appeared mid ice cream, it was Olympian next time around, other than that a successful visit and we followed up with a couple of hours sightseeing along Chisel Beach and the West Dorset coast where we'd never been before. We cut up across country via Axminster and hit the M5 around Taunton and were home by 8pm. After beans on roast an early night after getting the bits ready for Sheffield on Sunday. Another early start and we were parked up at 7.30am waiting for the gates to open, by 8.15 there was quite a queue waiting. It was our first timer at the event, around 100 buses, very new age profile and not a lot of local content but interesting all the same. We had no real local following and most customers were regulars over from Lancashire etc although a few West Yorks fans were also there, the local museum had fractured and evidently most local buses were with the group who did not organise the event, that’s life, bit like Glasgow eh.Meadowhall was no longer overlooked by giant cooling towers which had just been pulled down, the Supertram ran past just a few feet away and the railway was bury, I was impressed by the seemingly new stock which I'd never seen before, although I know nothing of modern railway. I've almost finished Nepalese Trucks in 1998, should be added to the list before next round of adverts get done over next 2 nights. The Dorset material will be on the buses advert, added to list tonight, eBay by tomorrow. Car due to go into garage tomorrow for body work hopefully pick back up on Wednesday. Some progress yet again on family tree with both Mandy's Hardys and my Vincent side.