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It was not surprising to find that our reception, at a deserted bus station on a cold rainy morning, consisted of a bus driver with a fag in his mouth. He was equipped with a list of places to go and how many people to pick up at each, and not much else. We never even found out his name, but he had come from Brigg (where David’s mum lives), did not know Newcastle and had spent a few hours resting at Washington services (that’s Washington Tyne & Wear, not DC).
With bags stowed - no damage to the marvellous suitcase - we boarded to find that we were not the first passengers, but only just. Debbie, presently doing higher, higher education in Dundee, introduced herself - she’d known David when he studied in Dundee and we’d met - once - when she had stayed at our house (although I could not remember her). Despite my best contrivances, I could not get her to admit that her course of study (Geochemistry) involved anything at all to do with my line of work, and I was therefore left to make normal conversation - my search for people, who understand the subject of Electrophoresis, in day to day life is seldom fruitful.
We chatted on for a while and then Nick arrived, followed by Phil. As each person boarded, we introduced ourselves and found out how we all knew David. Phil didn’t! He had met David twice, and one of those occasions was the stag night. Apparently, Phil knew David through someone else who was also going to be at the wedding - Annabel - a paint restorer. After a few moments, it sunk in that she was not a chemical compound, but some sort of artistic paintING restorer.
With the full complement of Novacastrian passengers, it was time for the bus to leave. However, Houston, we HAVE a problem. The driver didn’t know how to get to the A19 from the bus station. So, I was elected to go and give him directions. PROBLEM - I didn’t know how to get out of the bus station… in my defence, I’ve never driven a bus and never needed to know!
With one slight false start, which involved missing a right-hand turn to leave the bus station and ending up at a dead end, we arrived at the traffic lights at the exit for the bus station. It is my considered theory that these traffic lights stay on red after the buses stop running, since we sat there for several minutes before the bus driver decided to carry on regardless. We were off. We travelled to the Haymarket interchange in town, took a right towards the Civic Centre and then we told the driver to take another right - Phil had joined me, since he also knew the way.
Phil is a languages teacher - French and German - he drives to work in the general direction we were pointing and so has seen every inch of the roads. He teaches plucky kids in an area not renowned for academic excellence. You’d think we’d have been prepared for anything!
It was when the driver took the right we requested by attempting to drive the wrong way up a two-way street (separated by central reservation) that we realised that we might have been a bit naïve when we boarded the vehicle. Our quick alert to our predicament meant that the driver took corrective action and bumped over the central reservation to get onto the correct side of the road. This manoeuvre having been performed, without injury, we continued on our merry way.
At 3.30am, we arrived in Murton, County Durham, where the greater part of the passengers boarded. Among them, Peter Gibson - who I’d known while at University - who had brought his mother - Anita - with him in preference to a partner. Don’t take this the wrong way. Anita Gibson is a lovely, cheerful person, who enjoyed the wedding very much and who partied with the rest of us. It is only mentioned now, since it was of note then. Nice, we thought, that mother and son had vaguely rhyming names, Peter and Anita - it kind of rolls off the tongue!
After an abortive attempt to get everyone to declare their name and relation to David, I gave up being a loud-mouthed fool and dropped to sleep - managing to use my folded arms as a pillow (a use I’d never discovered before). This is impossible for me, except on buses. Drifting in and out of consciousness allowed me to ensure that I’d not dribbled down my shirt and in a matter of moments, we seemed to arrive in Brigg.
It was about 6am when we arrived at David’s mother’s house to pick up the remainder of the party. I’d not had much sleep in the past 24 hours - this usually makes me rather giggly. To add to it, I was having amusing thoughts and the occasional (and sadly forgotten) quips were coming from Phil and a few others.
It’s hard to describe the sensation of sitting in a bus full of bedraggled, sleep deprived people at 6 o’clock in the morning, in someone’s cul-de-sac! The bus had reversed into a place where buses are never seen. I was trying to work out how I’d feel if I lived in one of the houses in “The Copse” in Brigg and looked out of my window to find that one of the neighbours had established an ad hoc bus stop. The still of the morning, the calmness of the street and the sheer size of the bus, in contrast, added to the disbelief. It seemed the most surreal event of my life and I had to stifle much giggling.
After the Brigg passengers - David’s mum, sister, grandmother and some friends, had boarded, off we sped (well, crawled probably) and I fell asleep some more. The aeroplane was due to leave at 11:20 and all seemed well - it shouldn’t take too long to get from Brigg to Stansted airport.
When I regained some of my senses, I could tell that something was wrong. It wasn’t just that my sandwiches were going stale in the fridge while my stomach was singing a dirge about them. People were a bit tense, mobile phones were in use and there was a hush. It was after 10am.
Apparently, there had been a diversion off the A1, since there had been flooding. After a convoluted set of diversions, the driver had finally gone out of his mind and plunged into a series of country roads. This latter event explained the countryside around the bus, which did not look like the motorway I’d been expecting. This driver’s insistence on his route, despite pleas to turn back (I suppose I would not like to 3 point turn a bus on a country road), meant we were in the middle of nowhere with a plane to catch.
Not caring much, since I was not organising things, I sort of drifted in and out of reality until Stansted airport was located and we were at it. It was about half an hour before take off.
Written: May 1998
Posted: 29 October 2001
Ashley Frieze