All ten B12 Paragons were in action on the X1 today again, the last full week in which this will be possible it would seem. They all behaved well except 20503 which was failed at King's Lynn bus station for K1 06.29 to Peterborough with a water leak. 20107 was called to take over, but this left things in a desparate situation. K4 was already allocated (and got) 65532, while the Norwich turn which comes back light (K20) was 65528. As a consequence the last turn - K6 07.59 to Peterborough was given schools vehicle 20131. Next event was 65528 in trouble at Narborough with its doors refusing to open (passengers would probably have preferred to wait for a coach on the following service), the problem was alleviated though and it was able to proceed.
20131 was removed from K6 at Lynn at 10.07 and a revived 20503 left at 10.12 to Lowestoft.
K20 turn which does the Lynn - Norwich commuter service and then returns light to Lynn can get away with a Scania like it did today, but not so the afternoon part because it does a schools turn before returning light to Norwich to do the 17.17 thence to Peterborough and of course school buses have to have SEATBELTS !! Because of this in times of shortage, a coach is removed from an X1 to do the afternoon part of K20 while a Scania rattles off to Lowestoft without seatbelts of course, on the X1. Have YOU ever seen a school bus full of pupils wearing seatbelts ? Don't get me going on that one........... anyway today thinking ahead, Lynn decided to take 20123 off J11 at 12.07 and 65531 duly toddled off to Lowestoft on the 12.12, however, they had not bargained for another failure and quite a bizarre one at that. I passed 20118 at Walsoken on Y14 12.48 Peterborough - Lowestoft running 17 late and minus its front valance which contains its registration plate, yes just a black hole (possibly caused by those scientists messing about with protons yesterday !). 20118 was removed at Lynn and replaced by 20123. Lynn fitters then hastily refixed the front valance back on to 20118 (presumably it had been lurking in some dark recess of the bus) so that it could be sent out to do the second part of K20 instead of 20123. This all left me wondering whether it actually fell off and if so, was there a big bang ?
20107 as I mentioned earlier did K1 07.48 P'bo - Lowestoft, I then could swear I saw it doing K2 16.31 Wisbech - Peterborough, mind you I was several yards away but it looked like 20107. Tonight though 20107 turned up again on Y14 17.55 ex Lowestoft instead of 20123. This begs the questions was it taken off K2 at Dereham and turned round here to come back west, or is it simply the fact that I need my eyes tested and it was 20124 I saw on the 16.31 ? I guess we will never know (or care they cried). 20106 mysteriously surfaced at Lynn tonight, so i'm going to stick my neck out and guess that 106 did K1 12.25 ex Lowestoft and was replaced at Lynn by 20105 which was missing tonight. Agatha Christie would be proud of all this I suspect. Apart from the above, it was just a normal day ! No blog for a while now as I'm off to Edinburgh until Monday evening, but do keep in touch as ever with your reports and sightings.
This is the unofficial blog for the Peterborough - Norwich XL bus service operated by First Group. Originally reporting the introduction of the 'Gemini' double deckers and the phasing out of coaches, the blog is now incredibly in its twelfth year and in 2021 the new fleet of state of the art double deckers enter their second year in traffic. To contact me with your observations/experiences on the XL, email gerardtcc@gmail.com .
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