Seem as Go North East were holding a family fun day with See it Do it 5303 in attendance I'd thought I'd make a day of it. Here's what went down.
0823 7 Newton Aycliffe - Durham (ANE 7540)
Starting the day on the accidental Sapphire 7 branded Enviro 400. Annoyingly a bin lorry pulled up just in front of the bus stop I was waiting at so I had to stand in the middle of the road to ensure the driver saw me, thankfully he did although had to pull slightly further up the road. When I jumped on there was no-one else on upstairs so for once I got the front seat on the drivers side with the brilliant amount of legroom, two lasses decided to join me at the front who I think were already on the bus (someone must like me!). Pretty standard E400 journey on the 7 although we did arrive in Durham a little late.
0941 20A Durham Bus Station - Sunderland, Barnes Park (GNE 3982)
Well I say 0941, he didn't actually pull on the stand until 0942 and we left Durham Bus Station at 0944! Michael is probably going to think I'm on something here but I thought it was actually fairly fast on straight flat roads which was a good thing thanks to our late departure. Now the thing you are all wondering, how did it get up Houghton Cut? Well, it was struggling to begin with and to make matters worse there was passengers wishing to board at the stop here so we had to set off from a standstill to get up here and it was a pretty poor attempt really. Seemed like everybody was upstairs on this journey, when I jumped off there was only a few on downstairs.
1131 3 Sunderland, Barnes Park - Sunderland, Vine Place (SNE 28009)
After getting some photos in the area including 5303 in Barnes Park I headed for the stop so I could have my first ride on a Stagecoach gas bus, I enjoyed it but it was a really short journey so I can't think of much to say about it really I'm afraid but it seemed nice and also sounded pretty quiet. Hopefully I will be able to get more of a bashing of these another day although it's tricky when you don't know any of the Stagecoach Sunderland routes.
1210 9 Sunderland, Fawcett Street - Jarrow Bus Station (GNE 3879)
Another Vyking on this run, was quite liking this journey as Vyking's are a novelty for me as they don't tend to appear on the Go North East services I normally use so they do provide some novelty factor so I don't normally see them at their worst, I'd hate to have them on a regular basis, someone I know who lives in Chester-Le-Street said he hated the "Pink Angel" buses and claimed they regularly broke down. Anyway back to this journey, I sat at the front upstairs on this journey and I had the whole top deck to myself for the entire journey to Jarrow. Was surprised to see the driver open the centre doors in Jarrow Bus Station, especially as I went out of them and had to shuffle off the stand sideways because of the glass stands giving us not a great deal of space to use.
1332 9 Jarrow Bus Station - North Shields, Rudyerd Street (GNE 5154)
Spent around 45 minutes in Jarrow as I wanted a shot of SimpliCity 8326 on the 9 and to my relief it came back to Jarrow so I got so photos of that and other buses, the things I do for this hobby! Anyway after seeing BusLoverMum's post saying a bus that was on the 9 to North Shields had been taken off in Sunderland I was fearful that I was going to have to throw my plan out of the window as I didn't want to spend another half an hour here, but thankfully 5154 turned up bound for North Shields. Bit shaky when stationary but other than that it wasn't too bad although the seats were a bit hard. Question - do Go North East get charged to have service 9 run through the Tyne Tunnel?
1422 333 North Shields, Rudyerd Street - North Shields Ferry (Phoenix Coaches A20 OJD)
Pretty standard short journey on a Solo really so not a great deal to say although the driver seemed friendly. Was a few passengers on this journey but still plenty of space to sit.
1430 North Shields - South Shields Ferry
Look I know some of you will call it by some fancy name but I don't actually know what you call it. My first time on here so was pretty keen to see what it was like, I sat on the top deck so I could clearly see the views although it was a bit nippy especially as I only had a polo shirt on today but I didn't let the breeze get to me. I decided to tke a photo of a cruise whilst I was on here, not sure if I'll ever bother uploading it to Flickr. Quite enjoyed my journey on this, will have to do it again sometime.
1515 20 South Shields - Sunderland, Park Lane Interchange (GNE 6100)
Saw 3982 enter South Shields at around 1450 and I knew that 6100 was around 20 minutes behind (providing it hadn't been removed) which thankfully it hadn't so I got to have the joy of this back to Sunderland, deep cushioned fabric seats and free WiFi, bliss! Bit shaky on some of the roads out of South Shields but the road surface is terrible, much preferable to my last journey on this section of the 20 route with a branded Solar which sounded like it was going to drop to pieces.
1615 X21/21 Sunderland - Peterlee - Newton Aycliffe (ANE 4812)
Was quite pleased to have this as my ride for the long journey home as this has some brilliant high backed fabric seating was is good when you are spending 90 minutes on this and it also has the provisions of free WiFi (which actually works!). Sad to say this journey left Park Lane with only 3 passengers (including myself) although it arrived with a decent amount though, in fact this whole journey was pretty quiet, I was the only passenger on the 21 at one point.
Well that was my review for todays trip, please make sure to view the photos I got today:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/127079988@...015/08/07/
Thanks for reading (if you made it this far).
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