Its our first full day in
London, normally we would be going to the
Lord Mayor's Show, but due to the falling of Remembrance Day Sunday on different weekends, we will not be attending the parade this year. This means that this morning we have a little lie-in, so at 08.30am, I head downstairs and meet up with Mr
UKBuses for breakfast. With us checked in to the breakfast room, we make our way to get some apple juice before getting a table and then the best bit, getting loads of unlimited food. With my plate stacked up of bacon, sausage, baked beans and hash browns, I dive in, Mr UKBuses is still working out the coffee machine and the toaster, so I'm about a quarter of a way down my breakfast. With breakfast finished, I have found out where they have moved the yoghurt's to, and eventually get through four of them to fill me up for most of the day. With breakfast over, it's time for a quick freshen up before leaving the hotel and as is tradition on the Saturday of our London breaks, it has started to pour with rain.
We make our way to
East India DLR Station where we just go one stop to
Canning Town, where we tap out and I hear a click of a camera on the escalator, which I'm sure it wasn't the girl behind who did not enjoy the fact that someone was taking a photograph right behind her by the look of her face when I turned around. Out of the DLR / Underground Station and into the bus station where we get a good opportunity to take a few photographs,
see picture above left, before we board a
Stagecoach London service 323 bus at 09:48am which takes us through an industrial estate and also pass a
Stagecoach London bus depot at West Ham, which isn't too far from the hotel. We arrive at
Mile End, where a walk around the corner to Mile End Underground Station, we board a
Tower Transit service 25 bus at 10:12am which takes us to
Aldgate, where we alight so that we can take some more photographs at
Aldgate Bus Station. When we arrive the bus station is closed looking like it is for refurbishments and this once busy plot of land is now eerie as it is so quiet, we do have a walk around the outside of the bus station where it was once a bustling place.
We cross the road and enter
Aldgate Underground Station, where we board a
Metropolitan Line train which is quite freaky when you first get on as you can see all the way down the train,
see picture right, we only have a couple of stops to go before we change onto the
Northern Line at
King's Cross where we travel to
Edgeware, tapping out at 11.31am. When we leave the station, the rain is falling down quite heavy now, so I decline to take any photographs, but Mr UKBuses attempts a couple and he does catch a perfect bad weather shot. We are on the hunt for Stand B, so we head over to the entrance of a shopping centre and after some "fresh air", we can't find our stop, so we make a dash and go on the hunt for the stop. We eventually find out that the stop is a couple of minutes around the corner in Station Road. It looks as if we miss our planned bus, but four minutes late, it turns up at our stop and at 11.49am, we catch our
London Sovereign Service 292, after about 10 minutes, luckily the rain has stopped and we alight at our first filming location from the "
On The Buses" film and at Ripon Park, Manor Way, we make our way down the street.
After a couple of minutes walk, we stop outside of the launderette,
see picture left, where in the film, Blakie is accused of pinching someones washing -
"Oi, he's got my knickers!" - and nearly getting arrested for it. With a photograph taken to mark our visit, we make our way back up to the bus stop and on time at 12:15pm another London Sovereign Service 292 bus turns up, so we board and go past the launderette once more, after a few minutes, we arrive in the main Elstree / Borehamwood centre and alight just past the
Elstree Studios where we see signs for the audiences of
Celebrity Juice and
Strictly Come Dancing to go to when they come to watch the shows being recorded. It is starting to rain again so we make our way to Shenley Road and decide to keep undercover at
J D Wetherspoons "
The Hart and Spool", where we partake in a couple of
Doombar's. Mr UKBuses has only had a few sips when he thinks he has seen Trevor, out of "
Trevor and Simon". We do get quite cosy and do not realise what the time is, we have gone off the plan as we drink up and still have to visit a couple of "On The Buses" filming locations to visit.
We make our way down Shenley Road and on our first corner we have visited one filming location as when the bus turns into Whitehouse Avenue, this is shown on the opening credits to the "On The Buses" Film. We have only a little walk to make back up Shenley Avenue, where we cross the road and turn into Clarendon Road and straight away, we can see the next location which was used as Stan's House in "On The Buses",
see picture right, we make our way up to the end of Clarendon Road, and we also pass an entrance to the
BBC Elstree Studios, which means that the Queen Vic and Albert Square are close by. We make our way closer and I take a picture of Stan's house and as I'm also preparing the shot, I got accused by Mr UKBuses of taking a bald spot picture, I'm not being sneaky, I notice a green bridge behind "Stan's House" and realise that another building that is not in the picture just right of the bridge is a building used in
Eastenders, so we have found two filing locations in one place! We need to catch up on the plan, so we decide to head back to Shenley Avenue, where we wait for a bus to the railway station. When our bus turns up, we are only about twenty minutes behind schedule, at 13:57 we board
Metroline's service 107 and are only on the bus for a couple of minutes as the station is around the corner.
We alight at
Elstree and Borehamwood Railway Station and tap in, making a quick visit to the facilities and we can catch the 2:08pm
Thameslink train until it is cancelled and we have to wait fifteen minutes for the next journey, which also turns up a further 5 minutes late. We do eventually get the train and it is good timing as the rain is starting to fall down quite fast again. We arrive at
Kentish Town where we change back onto the Northern Line Underground and get off at the next stop and come back to Ground Level at
Camden Town. We tap out and go round in circles before we find our stop and wait a few minutes before our Metroline Service 24 turns up and we make our way to Trafalgar Square having to stop a couple of times for a few minutes as the bus was running early as "the traffic is dead". We decide to give Trafalgar Square a miss and travel straight down to
Whitehall, alighting by the Cenotaph, where we will be tomorrow. Mr UKBuses decides he desperately needs to use the facilities at
The Red Lion, so I wait outside whilst having some "fresh air". By the time Mr UKBuses returns, he had time for a crafty pint, we make our way to
Westminster Underground Station where we tap in and jump on the
Jubilee Line to Canning Town and then onto the
DLR to East India, where we head back to the hotel, a little bit earlier than planned and we go to our rooms for a bit of rest and freshen up.
We meet up in the hotel bar in the evening and Mr UKBuses is not feeling very well, so we decide to have a meal at the hotel, Mr UKBuses opts for fish and chips and myself Lasagne. Considering that a few residents were in the bar and were also having food, the service was quick and we didn't have to wait long, I only popped out for "fresh air" and the food was ready. This was our first time trying food at
Travelodge Docklands, considering it is about four years we have been using this hotel, we have missed out. With food over, I finish my drink and Mr UKBuses retires to his room, I decide to pop out into London for a while and just after 7.00pm, I make my way to East India DLR Station and make my way to
Tower Gateway. Tapping out at Tower Gateway, I have a walk to
Tower Bridge and it is lit up in the London darkness and so were the many buildings lining the
River Thames,
see picture left. I carry on with my walk across Tower Bridge and have a rest at the appropriately named J D Wetherspoon "
The Pommelers Rest" and I did get a rest whilst waiting to be served as it took a while even though there were not a lot of people at the bar. I do manage to drink my beer, but considering there was a cask marque on the wall, the beer wasn't that well kept. After finishing my drink, I decide to leave as I didn't want another long wait.
I make my way to the bus stop opposite when I see a bus coming and decide to catch
Arriva London's service 78 bus across Tower Bridge and alight at Tower Gateway and make my way past the
Tower of London to another nearby J D Wetherspoon, "
The Liberty Bounds". At least in this Wetherspoon's, the service was loads better and so was the beer. With the pub getting a bit more busy, I decide to finish my pint and make my way back to Tower Gateway DLR Station, where I catch my DLR and alight at East India and I make my way back to the hotel, arriving back just before 9.15pm. I decide to have a couple of nightcaps in the hotel bar and seeing as we have an early start tomorrow morning, after some "fresh air", I make my way to bed just after 10.30pm and watch a bit of television before dropping off.
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