Day Seventy Seven, a trip first to Ilford for the No 123 and then back to Catford for the No 124

Two Class 315 units at Ilford

Class 315 unit leaving Ilford

This trip required another visit to Stratford, via London Overground and Jubilee line where I caught the TFL Rail train at 1227 to Ilford. This service was comprised of a couple of Class 315s. Once out of the station I had to walk a fair distance along the High Street to reach Hainault Street. On arrival at the bus stop a No 123 arrived immediately and I boarded the bus at 1246, which was DW494 of Arriva.

The Hainault Street bus stop at Ilford

The bus turned right past the station after exiting the High Street and headed towards Gants Hill.

Approaching the A12 Eastern Avenue at Gants Hill

Across the A12 we headed off to the Charlie Brown roundabout where the bus briefly joined the North Circular Road until Waterworks Corner.

The North Circular Road climbing from the River Roding

 From here the bus used Wadham Road, this being the only bus route utilising this road to Walthamstow and then on to Tottenham Hale which we reached at 1340. After leaving Tottenham Hale it was very slow going to turn right onto the A10 where the bus heads towards Bruce Grove.

Bruce Grove Museum

 From there the bus swung northwest and west to Wood Green via Turnpike Lane and it arrived outside Wood Green underground station  at 1412.

Wood Green Underground station in distance

To reach the No 124 from Wood Green necessitated catching the Piccadilly line to Finsbury Park, then Victoria line to Warren Street before switching to a Northern line to Charing Cross. From Charing Cross I quickly boarded the 1445 to Hastings as far as London Bridge and from there I crossed to platform 1 where I boarded the 1501 to Hayes alighting at Catford Bridge. I arrived at about 1520 and walked right after climbing out of the station and under the Catford Loop Line to St Dunstan's College.

Bus stop in middle of triangle

The No 124 bus starts from an island in a triangle outside St Dunstan's College and I had to wait ten minutes for a bus to arrive.

The initial No 124 that arrived

The first bus stopped and then almost immediately another Stagecoach Dart arrived and this was driven by an engineer who swapped with the driver with the other Dart. The second bus was a 2018 example No 37508 which departed at 1533.

The fairly new Stagecoach No 37508

The route was a very convoluted trip around southeast London suburbs of southern Lewisham. At one stage it was running around the last estate that had been comprised of pre-fabs before the bus then moved on to Downham and into Grove Park. From there the bus moved through Mottingham and finally reached Eltham via a large loop around the grounds of Eltham Palace.

Eltham fire station

The bus came to the end of the route at Southend Crescent Eltham at 1637.

The final resting point of today's journeys

To get home I boarded the No 314 from the same bus stop which took nearly an hour to get to Hayes. I changed there for a No 119 but unfortunately had a fifteen minute wait before reaching home at 1900!

Day 76 a trip to Woolwich once more.

This trip started with a visit to my optician in Bromley to get a replacement side for my glasses. After this I caught a No 227 to Crystal Palace Parade, thereby reaching the starting point of the No 122, the first time I have been here since catching the No 3 on the first day of the odyssey.

Stagecoach 12391 AD E40H AD Eniviro400H

Crystal Palace Parade with 'Borismasters'
waiting to provide a No 3 service

Crystal Palace transmitter mast from first bus stop on route

Stagecoach 12391 approaching the bus stop from the layover point

Thus it was 1347 before I was boarding Stagecoach's 12391 in the direction of Sydenham. Whilst descending Westwood Hill towards Sydenham I noticed a blue plaque for Ernest Shackleton which is apparently where he moved to at age ten from Ireland. At Sydenham station the bus turns north for Forest Hill and after joining the South Circular for a while it again heads north up Brockley Rise. After passing Crofton Park station the bus turned east beyond Brockley and Ladywell cemetaries and finally down to reach Lewisham fire station at 1415. Once through Lewisham High Street the bus headed east along Lee High Road towards Eltham until it reached the South Circular and then the bus followed that to Woolwich. Through Woolwich the bus turned east and ran along to Plumstead bus garage or at least the bus stop before the garage as the garage is located within the centre of a large roundabout.

The final bus stop at Plumstead bus garage

Plumstead bus garage AD E40H and
 Volvo B5LH from service No 53

Two 15 year old TransBus Tridents
ALX400s used on route No 472

Crossrail industrial diesel No 2

Crossrail industrial diesel built by O and K of Dortmund No 26880
registered also as UIC 98-80 017 0012-5

This diesel seemed to be off the rails and looked at from
 a different angle I could see the rear was on two little bogies

Prior to going home I noticed the Plumstead railway yards where there were a few industrial diesel shunters. Three were painted yellow numbers 2, 3 and 5 whereas there was another obviously german looking shunter that was red.

Day seventy five to Enfield for the No 121

I left home at 1140 and changed at West Croydon for the 1201 to Highbury and Islington. At Canada Water I took the Jubilee line to Stratford with the entire journey taking less than an hour. From Stratford I needed to get to platform 11 in order to take a train to Enfield Lock and luckily there was only ten minutes until departure at 1300. The train was held at the junction south of Tottenham Hale whilst trains to Stansted airport and Hertford North ran across the junction ahead of us. This meant the train arrived at Enfield Lock at 1324, three minutes behind time. However, the biggest hold up was yet to come as in order to get to the start of the route at Enfield Island Village, I needed to catch the No 121 from just along the road from the railway station. This bus didn't come until 1339 despite the service being supposed to be every 7-11 minutes.

Barge advertising Royal Ordnance factory with converted
factory buildings behind

Factory building converted for accommodation

The Island Village is built on the site of the original Enfield Royal Ordnance Factory and some of the buildings have been nicely converted into living accommodation.

DW560 awaiting departure at Enfield Island Village

Bus stop at Enfield Island Village

The route is operated by Arriva and the Daf with Wright bodywork DW560 was waiting as my bus arrived. As I boarded at 1354 I asked the driver how long he expected the journey to Turnpike Lane to take and he said he anticipated to be there about 1527, so over an hour and a half. He did intimate he would get there quicker if he could and he certainly set off at a pace.





The level crossing at Enfield Lock station provided a considerable barrier to traffic as I waited earlier, but on our route west we only waited for one Stansted express to rush through and then we were on our way.

Ordnance Road

 The road we travelled along was called Ordnance road but at the 'T' junction at the end we turned left and headed south along Hertford Road through Enfield Wash until we reached Southbury Road where the bus turned west once more.

Awaiting the time to depart outside Enfield bus garage

Upon reaching Enfield bus garage the driver informed us we would need to wait three minutes to regulate the service so we lingered until 1417 before heading on through Enfield town and up the hill past Enfield Chase.

Semi rural route betwixt Enfield Chase and Oakwood

The route became increasingly rural as we passed the huge Trent Park country park to the north and rather waterlogged fields to the south.




At Oakwood Piccadilly line station we turned south towards London and left the country behind reaching Southgate at 1455. From Southgate the bus made its way to Palmers Green

Broomfield Park Palmers Green

and once we had turned left at the triangle we then headed along the A105 across the North Circular Road and on to Wood Green and finally reached Turnpike Lane at 1519, a full 8 minutes before the driver had expected to arrive. I complimented him on his time keeping as I left the bus.

Views of Alexandra Palace were frequent as we continued southwards.

Approaching Turnpike Lane tube station from the direction of Wood Green Shopping City.

From Turnpike Lane I caught the No 41 to Tottenham Hale and then the train to Stratford and returned the way I had come reaching home about 1730.