Date: Saturday 02 July 2011
This trip sees a welcome return for all the WARP's (Woody, Andy, Paul and Rog if you are unsure), and we decide to go to Liverpool, a trip that began to be organised when we were in Weymouth. First of all I meet up with Mr UKBuses, where I catch the 0706 National Express West Midlands (NXWM) Service 276 from Wollaston or should that be 0704!), by the time I get my seat I am halfway across High Park Avenue, so there is no time to text Mr UKBuses to say that I am on the bus. Luckily when I get round to his bus stop, he is there, and he boards the bus, then abruptly takes his seat. We arrive a few minutes later at the bus stop on Stourbridge Ring Road, where virtually straight away, a NXWM Service 246 arrives, which we catch to Dudley. As there is not a good direct service into Wolverhampton first thing on a Saturday morning, we have to go to Dudley, then Wolverhampton! So we are directly off the plan after our first journey, and as we arrive in Dudley, the NXWM Service 126 is waiting, so we jump on that bus. We arrive in Wolverhampton quite a bit ahead of schedule, so we decide to visit JD Wetherspoon's "The Moon Under Water", where Mr UKBuses decides to have a bacon roll. Bacon roll finished, Mr D9 arrives, and he duly orders a bacon roll. His arrives in a much quicker time than Mr UKBuses, so Mr D9 duly finishes off his roll, and we make our way to Wolverhampton Railway Station. On the way, Mr WME makes an appearance and the gang is complete. A quick "breath of fresh air" is needed before we board our train, and whilst this is happening, Mr D9 gets the money out of his account for the day ahead, and some mad bloke decides to pop out of the railway station shouting at other people along the way.
Mr D9 promptly pays me for the tickets (I could have waited, but thanks for the prompt payment), and we head for Platform 1, where our 0919 London Midland train arrives and takes us to our destination for today, Liverpool. Whilst on the journey, I take on the role of Mr D9, and visit the toilet, and Mr D9 coped with not going (his bladder must have swapped places for the journey!), and after a journey time of just under one hour and 30 minutes, we arrive in Liverpool Lime Street, where we are met with Ken and his tickling stick. First of all, we buy our "Saveaway" ticket, which at £4.60 is good value for all the journeys that Mr UKBuses has planned for us today. Tickets purchased, we head outside so that I can get a "breath of fresh air", whilst the rest of the gang take photographs of the city buildings. We head down to the hub of Queens Square, where we catch our first bus of the day.
We head to stand 6 and our first bus service of the day, Arriva North West Service 13 to Deysbrook Lane, takes us to our first destination of the day. Mr UKBuses has done his research using Google Street View, and we alight the bus just after the small cottage building on the corner, and he is as always correct. We walk past said building, and walk up the road a little further, where we have to take a left turn and we arrive at our first destination, a place called "Brookside". We walk through the normal residential housing, and just around the corner, past the now redundant security post, we turn the corner and view a new residential area (Well it is not new as the housing was already built), it is the original housing from a now defunct soap called Brookside. I take a few photographs, as does the rest of the gang, and the thoughts going through my head is that I am now standing on ground that once graced the steps of Ricky Tomlinson, Claire Sweeney and Sue Johnston. Builders are still on site and I'm told they were shouting "Barry" at me (surprised as I'm sure that Barry Grant had black hair), and it is back to the bus stop, but before we do, a group shot is taken at the Brookside sign. Shots over we walk back round to the bus stop and whilst doing this we have to undertake a TUAR (Turn up And Run), with the race earlier in the year coming in handy, I get to the bus first, but we all make it, a good effort by Mr UKBuses, especially with his knee. We board and we make our way back into the city.
We make our way back to Queens Square on Arriva North West Service 12, where we visit our first Liverpool pub of the day, and it is JD Wetherspoons "The Fall Well", a pub that I had previously visited, and as we walk in, Mr UKBuses agrees that this is quieter than the Wetherspoons that they had previously visited. Well it was time for dinner, so Myself and Mr D9 opted for the standard beer and burger, Mr WME had his usual gourmet burger, and Mr UKBuses has his usual Chicken Tikka. Good choices, even though that the prices for a Wetherspoons were a bit steep (probably because it was a very central location). Whilst waiting for the food, a "Homeless" person came up asking for money, I duly gave him a pound in change, but later found out that he was sitting outside with his mates (I'm duly changing my way to charitable causes, but after this experience I was duped and it is a shame for charitable donations in the future). Food has arrived and we duly chomp it down, and we all make a visit to the toilet before our next destination.
Dinner over, we head over to Stand 2 in Queens Square where we catch our next bus to our next destination, a "Cumfybus" C4 service to a place in Liverpool called "Dingle". After a journey of just over 20 minutes, we arrive in Dingle, and even though this was a filming destination, we are not happy being here. Anyway we are off the bus now, and after just a couple of minutes walk we arrive at the top of Elswick Street, the destination being the street where "Bread" was filmed. It looks so different to what it was on television, but we decide to walk down the street, where we walk past Number 30, which was home to "The Boswells". Once reaching the bottom, we have a quick look over to the Mersey, and then we decide to walk back up the street, but we can't decide which house was home to Julie, the girlfriend of Billy. As we arrive at the top of the street, we head back to the bus stop after a surreal experience. This seems to be a close knit community, where everyone is sitting around outside their houses, and with kids playing in the streets, it takes me back to my childhood, where I used to play with the local kids, a scene which is not seen to much nowadays. We arrive at the stop to find out that the bus does not actually stop here any more, and as we choose which stop to stand at, A C5, the bus we are supposed to catch, goes past. Whilst waiting, I purchase a lottery ticket from the local shop, which is all behind a safety screen, which puts me at unease even further, and meet the rest of the gang around the corner at the correct bus stop. After a wait of around twenty minutes, our C5 turns up, and takes us back around the estate, twice! After eventually escaping the estate on where Bread is filmed, we arrive at Grove Street, where we alight to find out the filming location of The Liver Birds, we are unsure which flat was used, but Mr D9 makes sure that he has a picture by taking several pictures of the different buildings standing in Huskisson Street.
We walk to the end of the Huskisson Street, where we are greeted by a TUAG (Turn Up and Go) service of Arriva North West Service 86, which takes us back to Liverpool and the bus station called "Liverpool One". We forget to get off the bus, and we duly arrive in a bus layover area, which we have to make sure that we get out alive due to Health and Safety and no Hi-Vis vests. Out of the lay by area, we make our way through Liverpool One, and we are just outside the Albert Docks, so we have time to visit them, and we ask Mr UKBuses if he wants to do an impression of Fred Talbot doing the weather on "This Morning", obviously without the weather map, for some reason he declines. After a quick look around the docks and failed bald spot pictures by Mr WME and Mr UKBuses, I now present the first Mr SBI Bald spot picture of Mr D9, right, (Mr D9 wasn't expecting that!!!), which can be seen left. We are in need of a drink and visit the pub opposite, "The Pumphouse" which in the end we decline as it is too busy. So we head around to Pier Head, so that we can get our pass for the Mersey Ferry, but as we do, we spot a bar in the same building, but by mutual agreement, we decide to "stay on our own" after seeing the prices and decide it is not fair to include somebody for a round. A quick refreshing drink, and we make our way to the ferry terminal, where after a little wait, and a big crowd of us waiting to get on, I experience my second trip on the Mersey Ferry. As we make our way towards the estuary, we turn around and head to Seacombe, where we have to get off, but whilst on the way, I make my way inside for a couple of minutes before reappearing on the side of the ferry. A few minutes later we arrive, and I cannot get off the ferry quick enough, and quickly make my way outside the building so that I can have a well deserved "breath of fresh air". As I'm smoking, I'm still suffering from the swaying, so we make our way to the bus stand where I can sit down for a few minutes for the bus to arrive.
A few minutes later, our Arriva North West service 409 turns up and takes us on our short journey to Birkenhead. This is where my part of the trip kicks in, and a quick bypass of the shopping centre, we walk past the Wetherspoons, and we head to a pub I visited last time, so I introduce the gang to "The McKenzie", see left, where we have a well deserved rest, and I can get over the experience of the ferry. The gang had reservations about this pub before we even got to Birkenhead, but they soon say that I found a good pub, and after a couple of drinks in the establishment, we make our way back to the bus station. Mr D9 realises that it is a PPPP (Pizza Pavement Purple Pub), which can be titled due to some pizza topping style marks on the floor and walls outside! We walk back to the Birkenhead bus station, and decide to get an earlier bus, even though it is on the same route, and catch First Chester and Wirral Service 1, which takes us briskly back into Liverpool, via the Mersey Tunnel. Even though it is my second time through the tunnel, it still freaks me out that you have oncoming traffic right next to you with no central reservation or no protection.
We arrive back in Liverpool and alight the bus just around the corner from Queens Square, our hub of the day, and we have time to sample a couple of pints before we head back home, so we walk past The Crown Hotel, and enter an Irish-American Bar, "McHales", where we sample a quick pint. We decide to stay in the quieter part of the pub, with Karaoke taking place in the room next door. When the compere speaks, me and Mr UKBuses think it is a blast from the past as he sounds like "Karaoke Dave", who used to do the hosting in The Bell when we worked there, so further investigation was needed. Thankfully it wasn't Dave, so luckily it wasn't a case of "Now it is time for And, Paul, Rog and Woooody!!!". We have time for one more pint before we catch our train, so we pop next door and sample "The Crown Hotel", see right, where Mr D9 confuses the barmaid with the drink order. Drinks purchased, we head upstairs, somewhere I didn't know existed last time I visited, and we get a seat in a quiet part of the pub. With little time to spare, we make our way back to Liverpool Lime Street, where we "do a London", and go into M&S and purchase a sandwich for our trip back. We have little time to spare now, and we make it back onto our Virgin Train back into Stafford. A pleasant and fast journey takes us back to Stafford, where we also down our tea, and we alight at Stafford to change trains to take us back on the slower London Midland train back into Wolverhampton. I try and sneak a cigarette in outside the station, but the rest of the gang realise that we have to go onto Platform 3, so we make our way there to be greeted by a few people dressed in fancy dress. It's a shame the woman didn't do the belly dance for us, she was dressed for it!! After passing through Penkridge, we arrive back in Wolverhampton. Time for a quick cigarette as Mr UKBuses and myself make our way to Queen Street to catch our bus back to Stourbridge, so we say goodbye to Mr D9 and Mr WME.
Our bus is on time, and we are on our way. We get to Penn, and suddenly we hear a bang at the front of the bus, the door has fallen off. We cannot go any further due to the safety features on the bus, so we are stuck in the bus stop for a while. I take this opportunity to have a cigarette or two, and also a chance to pop across the road to The Holly Bush, to use the facilities. After a wait of around half an hour, an engineer finally brings a replacement bus, so we all swap buses, and take our seats ready to complete our journey back into Stourbridge. There is a slight problem, even though we have a fresh bus the air pressure seems to have gone down, so we are having problems departing the bus stop. After a few minutes and a completely understandable driver, we finally get under way, with cheers from the other passengers. We make our way through Wombourne and Kingswinford and finally arrive in Stourbridge. We get off at the stop just before the ring road, and walk to Birmingham Street, where finally at 22:05 our Black Diamond Service 276C takes us back home.
Another good day with all the WARP's, beautiful weather, some good filming locations found, and I have to take this opportunity to thank Mr UKBuses for getting all the locations in a plan on a well though out day out.
This trip sees a welcome return for all the WARP's (Woody, Andy, Paul and Rog if you are unsure), and we decide to go to Liverpool, a trip that began to be organised when we were in Weymouth. First of all I meet up with Mr UKBuses, where I catch the 0706 National Express West Midlands (NXWM) Service 276 from Wollaston or should that be 0704!), by the time I get my seat I am halfway across High Park Avenue, so there is no time to text Mr UKBuses to say that I am on the bus. Luckily when I get round to his bus stop, he is there, and he boards the bus, then abruptly takes his seat. We arrive a few minutes later at the bus stop on Stourbridge Ring Road, where virtually straight away, a NXWM Service 246 arrives, which we catch to Dudley. As there is not a good direct service into Wolverhampton first thing on a Saturday morning, we have to go to Dudley, then Wolverhampton! So we are directly off the plan after our first journey, and as we arrive in Dudley, the NXWM Service 126 is waiting, so we jump on that bus. We arrive in Wolverhampton quite a bit ahead of schedule, so we decide to visit JD Wetherspoon's "The Moon Under Water", where Mr UKBuses decides to have a bacon roll. Bacon roll finished, Mr D9 arrives, and he duly orders a bacon roll. His arrives in a much quicker time than Mr UKBuses, so Mr D9 duly finishes off his roll, and we make our way to Wolverhampton Railway Station. On the way, Mr WME makes an appearance and the gang is complete. A quick "breath of fresh air" is needed before we board our train, and whilst this is happening, Mr D9 gets the money out of his account for the day ahead, and some mad bloke decides to pop out of the railway station shouting at other people along the way.
Mr D9 promptly pays me for the tickets (I could have waited, but thanks for the prompt payment), and we head for Platform 1, where our 0919 London Midland train arrives and takes us to our destination for today, Liverpool. Whilst on the journey, I take on the role of Mr D9, and visit the toilet, and Mr D9 coped with not going (his bladder must have swapped places for the journey!), and after a journey time of just under one hour and 30 minutes, we arrive in Liverpool Lime Street, where we are met with Ken and his tickling stick. First of all, we buy our "Saveaway" ticket, which at £4.60 is good value for all the journeys that Mr UKBuses has planned for us today. Tickets purchased, we head outside so that I can get a "breath of fresh air", whilst the rest of the gang take photographs of the city buildings. We head down to the hub of Queens Square, where we catch our first bus of the day.
We make our way back to Queens Square on Arriva North West Service 12, where we visit our first Liverpool pub of the day, and it is JD Wetherspoons "The Fall Well", a pub that I had previously visited, and as we walk in, Mr UKBuses agrees that this is quieter than the Wetherspoons that they had previously visited. Well it was time for dinner, so Myself and Mr D9 opted for the standard beer and burger, Mr WME had his usual gourmet burger, and Mr UKBuses has his usual Chicken Tikka. Good choices, even though that the prices for a Wetherspoons were a bit steep (probably because it was a very central location). Whilst waiting for the food, a "Homeless" person came up asking for money, I duly gave him a pound in change, but later found out that he was sitting outside with his mates (I'm duly changing my way to charitable causes, but after this experience I was duped and it is a shame for charitable donations in the future). Food has arrived and we duly chomp it down, and we all make a visit to the toilet before our next destination.
Dinner over, we head over to Stand 2 in Queens Square where we catch our next bus to our next destination, a "Cumfybus" C4 service to a place in Liverpool called "Dingle". After a journey of just over 20 minutes, we arrive in Dingle, and even though this was a filming destination, we are not happy being here. Anyway we are off the bus now, and after just a couple of minutes walk we arrive at the top of Elswick Street, the destination being the street where "Bread" was filmed. It looks so different to what it was on television, but we decide to walk down the street, where we walk past Number 30, which was home to "The Boswells". Once reaching the bottom, we have a quick look over to the Mersey, and then we decide to walk back up the street, but we can't decide which house was home to Julie, the girlfriend of Billy. As we arrive at the top of the street, we head back to the bus stop after a surreal experience. This seems to be a close knit community, where everyone is sitting around outside their houses, and with kids playing in the streets, it takes me back to my childhood, where I used to play with the local kids, a scene which is not seen to much nowadays. We arrive at the stop to find out that the bus does not actually stop here any more, and as we choose which stop to stand at, A C5, the bus we are supposed to catch, goes past. Whilst waiting, I purchase a lottery ticket from the local shop, which is all behind a safety screen, which puts me at unease even further, and meet the rest of the gang around the corner at the correct bus stop. After a wait of around twenty minutes, our C5 turns up, and takes us back around the estate, twice! After eventually escaping the estate on where Bread is filmed, we arrive at Grove Street, where we alight to find out the filming location of The Liver Birds, we are unsure which flat was used, but Mr D9 makes sure that he has a picture by taking several pictures of the different buildings standing in Huskisson Street.
Another good day with all the WARP's, beautiful weather, some good filming locations found, and I have to take this opportunity to thank Mr UKBuses for getting all the locations in a plan on a well though out day out.
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