Wednesday August 4th 2010 ~ The Cupboard Is Bare

This fine illustration was spotted by our man in the canteen at Lowestoft today, such a shame it wasn't on standby at King's Lynn at lunchtime !

Thanks to Grahame Bessey for this picture of 20501 at Norwich today conveying punters to Banham Zoo.

The worst case scenario (predicted by this blog) came to fruition today, when King's Lynn ran out of buses. This phenomenon had already taken place at Lowestoft last week, when passengers were taken off collision damaged 20107 and transferred to a Service 1 as there were no suitable spare vehicles. Today B10M 20127 expired at Lynn on K16 with oil and exhaust problems at just after 13.00 and as a result nothing could be found for the 13.15 to Peterborough **. Whether something came to the rescue to work the 16.02 to Lowestoft is unknown, Bruce reported 37570 on the forecourt at Vancouver Avenue, but still with white off road ticket in the window so this didn't look likely. 37158, the only other possibility was on Hunstantons at 15.00, but could possibly have been purloined if all else failed. At Lowestoft, 37564 & 37569 were both stopped today and 37160 came back home on L11.

Meanwhile Des says "Have spotted 20107 in Norfolk Showground, Mon & Tues, on Scout jamboree work". Wot ?? How dare they borrow it for such trivialities ! As if the situation at Lynn wasn't bad enough, it was further rubbed in by the appearance of Paragon 20501 on a service from Norwich to Banham Zoo - see Grahame's photo. I think the X1 ought to recall a few players in from loan clubs - hark at me and the football hasn't even started yet.

**Oh Dear What Can The Matter Be, Seven Old B10s Locked Up at Saddlebow, They Were There From Monday to Saturday (Sunday actually !) And Nobody Knew They Were There - well apart from Bruce that is and actually there are only six but it doesn't sound as good.