(27 Nov 2022, 6:20 pm)L469 YVK wrote Ok a starter for this thread having come across this on Youtube? I'm sure many who live in GNE territory had the pleasure of riding on one of these.........

https://youtu.be/H5XGF941PFI

(27 Nov 2022, 8:29 pm)Andreos1 wrote Absolute beasts.

Somehow avoided regular use of them until I was a bit older and we moved house in to Wear Buses territory from the GAG area

Dunno if anyone can comfirm. Did the different batches, have different lengths?

(27 Nov 2022, 9:05 pm)Washingtonian wrote As far as I know I think all Olympian batches were the same length. I might be wrong but I'm pretty certain. Loved these buses and the Gardner engined ones too. I used to go on the Cummins engined ones fairly regular when I lived in Houghton when I was very young as they were often used on the X5 or X94 along with the express link Metrobuses. When I moved to Washington the Olympians here were mainly the Gardner engined ones. The Olympian in the video about sounds amazing and still going strong, which is fantastic to see.

(27 Nov 2022, 9:45 pm)Andreos1 wrote Kudos to Johnsons for keeping it going. 

Hit a snow storm drift on the Highway once, coming from Herrington Burn to the Galleries. Driver decided to overtake in the snow... Will have been an X5.

Another time, I somehow convinced a mate that the 185 was the quickest bus from the Galleries to Park Lane. Only because I needed to tick the route off and I knew one of these bad-boys would be on it.

(27 Nov 2022, 10:25 pm)ASX_Terranova wrote Was it the Olympians or the Metrobuses which had coach seats. 

Btw, I wish some modern buses up here came with coach seats i.e Stagecoach Gold.

(28 Nov 2022, 11:54 am)Ambassador wrote I know they were never that popular but I used to love the Wright Handybuses - they really suited the Proud of our Routes and GAG livery

And certainly showing my age, the Mini link fleet - though preferred the Mercs over the old bread vans

(28 Nov 2022, 12:25 pm)wibblejunior wrote Looks like the last of the C---LJR Olympians were withdrawn in August 2006, so I'd only have been 2¾ years old back then.

Though I'm sure a couple of the B---GCN bacth remain in use with Johnson Bros to this day.

(29 Nov 2022, 9:31 pm)BusLoverMum wrote Well I was using the X5 a few times a month about 19.5 years ago, so there is a chance that you have unknowingly travelled on one.

(29 Nov 2022, 9:55 pm)Andreos1 wrote I'm sure the X5 was Spectra operated by then mind.
Pretty certain the Olys had been moved on to other routes by the late 90s/early 00s

(30 Nov 2022, 3:57 pm)ASX_Terranova wrote I did some googling and found these not sure on the year though.
https://twitter.com/k_sum1/status/1129673874210033665/photo/2

(01 Dec 2022, 1:58 pm)Rob44 wrote arriva had some of these too didnt they?  Some with coach seats and others with normal ones

(03 Dec 2022, 7:42 pm)L469 YVK wrote 370-377 (laterly 7370-7377) M370 FTY - M377 FTY - Coach seats (British Bus interior) with Cummins L10 & ZF

410-420 (laterly 7410-7420) P410 CCU - P420 CCU - Bench seats (Smartie interior) with Volvo D10-245 & ZF

7370-7377:
- 1994-2000 - Hexham - 602
- 2000-2001 - Blyth - 308
- 2001 - 2011/12 - Ashington / Alnwick - Various 'X' routes
A few of these did stray in and out of Jesmomd too

7410-7420:
- Predominantly Jesmond based and mainly used on 306, 356 and 56 although less time on 306 when Jesmond got 7430-7435. 7410-7413 did also spend time at Ashington & Alnwick too