I had a bit of an awkward encounter whilst I was out bashing the DalesBus network last Sunday...

I rode the 856 from Northallerton to Hawes with another enthusiast joining me for this journey, we had not taken any pictures or anything prior to boarding the bus however the driver knew the other passenger I was with, we sat at the back of the back of the bus and conversed whilst also doing some browsing on our phones, when we reached Bedale however the driver stopped the bus, got out of the cab and started to tell me and my friend as it was suspected that we were recording on board the bus which was not the case, I admittedly took a quick pic on my phone whilst on board the bus just to highlight I was making the journey on some of my social media accounts, I honestly didn't know how this was picked up considering the subtlety I deployed into doing this although my friend did later point out he was staring at us in the mirror near constantly throughout the journey.

Felt so embarrassed by this and now reduced my desire to board another Dales & District bus as I've had issues with their drivers before and sods law those are the ones you always seem to encounter, before losing work to Hodgsons I had one that would regularly make hand gestures towards me, sometimes didn't even need to take a photo to receive this.

Worse thing is someone else said the exact same happened to them and I think another enthusiast highlighted this happening to them but was actually filming, another claimed to have a rude driver on the same service (potentially the same one but can't confirm that case).

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Another moment of embarrassment was around Christmas time when I visited South Shields Interchange for a few pics, and within two minutes I had a Stagecoach driver stop the bus at the exit to the Interchange and demanded that I delete the photograph which I was reluctant to do so and I insisted that it was within my right to take the photo, as the stand off was preventing any other buses that were forming in a line behind from leaving, in the end I had to say I had deleted it to which he thanked me by saying "if I see that pic anywhere, I'll do you!" Charming! No idea what became of this incident as Stagecoach never got back to me about it!

Anyone else had similar instances to the above whilst spotting?