This journey started rather later than usual but as the journey was readily accessible this wasn't too much of an issue. I caught a No 410 to West Croydon station and boarded the 1316 London Overground train to New Cross Gate. The Sainsburys where this bus and the No P13 start is adjacent to the station on the site of the engine shed in days of yore.
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| London General's EH8 waiting to depart |
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| Austrian Airlines OE-LZP |
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| Two buses start from this point |
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| HB-JBC of Swiss Int'l a/l |
A beautiful blue sky revealed the glide slope into Heathrow passing right over the Sainsbury. At 1349 I boarded EH8 and we headed left towards Greenwich for a while before turning right along with the route Nos 21,136 and 172 just prior to New Cross station. Soon the bus headed left though, leaving the No 172 to go straight on and drove past the building that was Deptford Central library.
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| London General's EH8 approaching |
At 1359 we stopped on Loampit Hill at the stop called St Johns station but is actually situated right next to the Lewisham Road station overbridge. This station closed 107 years ago along with the other ones on the LCDR branch to Greenwich Park.
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The remains of the station building of Lewisham Road.
A class 465 networker just disappearing
around the corner to Lewisham proper. |
From here we descended into Lewisham town centre passing the police station at 1404 and then heading left at the top of the High Street to follow Lee High Road. The bus was now on the A20 and was accompanied by routes 122, 178 and 261. The No 261 turned off at Lee Green and we were left with the No122 and the No 178 as far as Kidbrooke. On the way to Kidbrooke we passed from the London Borough of Lewisham into the London Borough of Greenwich.
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| Approaching Eltham parish Church |
The A20 peeled off to the right to meet the South Circular, the No 178 went left into Kidbrooke, whilst we continued straight on toward the Yorkshire Grey, now a McDonalds, where the No 122 pulled away and we were joined by two of the Bexley cluster of routes the B15 and B16 for the run into Eltham. Eltham High Street has so many buses use it, that there are bus stops grouped in pairs along its length. We were using the bus stops where buses would turn tight and head for Footscray Road, which we did at 1428.
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| In Footscray Road there was a house with just the legs of Santa hanging out of a closed window. |
This road I had travelled recently on the No 314 and this route was repeated by the No 233 as well. The No 314 left us at New Eltham station whereas the No 233 continued for while but finally left the No 321 on its own for the run into Sidcup town centre, having passed the building site that will be the site for Cray Wanderers next stadium.
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| Residue of Storm Henk the day before on the approach to Sidcup |
We reached Sidcup town centre at 1442 and after a little aggravation getting past parked cars or delivery vans we were off down the hill towards the site of the Barley Mow at Footscray (closed 1974). Years ago this site was the starting point of many buses as it was close to Sidcup bus garage which closed in 1988. Here the bus turned right to get to Crittalls corner and again was alone on the run along the 'old' A20 route to Foots Cray Tesco where the bus terminated at 1452.
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| Site of the Barley Mow bus stop |
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| A No 321 on its way back to New Cross |
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| Ready to return |
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Journey's end but no actual bus stop sign or
timetable |
On disembarkation I queried with the the driver the duration of the route advertised on the bus stop at New Cross Sainsburys which had said 40 minutes. I did not think he had been held up much at all and he said he had arrived at the right time according to his schedule. So the bus company accept the journey takes an hour but whoever creates the timetables does not know this.
From here after a coffee and sausage roll I walked back to Crittalls corner, just missing a No 51 in the process so caught a R11 to the Crescent and went to see daughter and boy friend to assess damage after storm Henk. I subsequently caught a No 353 to Addington and then a tram and finally a No 407 home arriving home at 1750
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