Bowes Museum Park & Ride

 Cumbria Classic Coaches operated on a Park and Ride contract for the Bowes Museum in Barnard Castle on the 21st and 22nd December 2013. Below is the 1955 AEC Regent UTC 672 turning into the gates of the museum on one of the many trips it carried out over the weekend.

Click pictures to enlarge

 1959 Bristol Lodekka 627 HFM makes a departure from the museum on 

Saturday 21st December 2013

As an added bonus 1950 Leyland PS1 LFM 302 arrived on an excursion
 from Kirkby Stephen and carried out at least one run on Park and Ride
duties whilst its passengers visited the Bowes Museum Christmas Fair.

 The buses worked hard over the weekend and above we see
 the Lodekka entering the museum with a healthy load of passengers.

Fleet Addition - 1950 Leyland PS1

Cumbria Classic Coaches have added a new vehicle to their fleet. 

LFM 302 is a 1950 Leyland PS1/1 originally new to Crosville and numbered  KA 226 in their fleet. The Weymann bodywork is configured to seat 31 passengers in a body that is classed as a coach, but is more bus-like in appearance. The seats are low backed bus type seats with a deep chrome hand rail above the the back rests.

When new, LFM 302 was one of a batch of 35 vehicles originally destined for Midland General but directed to Crosville and used initially as buses, painted in dark green and black with a cream band. They were re-designated as coaches in 1952 and re-painted cream and green.

Subsequently they carried cream above the waist-line and green below waist-line express livery during 1958-61, and the all over green with black wings bus livery (i.e. no cream band) during 1962-64. They were all withdrawn from service by October 1964.

Latterly LFM 302 has been a long term member of the Quantock Motors fleet owned by Steve Morris. It was in fact the first vehicle that Steve preserved so it must have been a difficult decision for him to let the vehicle go.

In the meantime check Facebook for more information

A report from Will Hamer.

On 20th June 2012 we were engaged by Langwathby CofE School to take about 154 pupils, staff and parents from the school to the coach park at the new Sainsbury's in Penrith where space was reserved for us. The school chose CCC because they wanted the children to experience some of the atmosphere of the last time the Games were held in the UK, i.e. London 1948.

Photo 1 shows some of the children and torch with their teacher, Mrs Labbett, who carried the torch through Penrith centre, posing in front of the buses. All the passengers were given a special souvenir ticket showing the buses, an Olympic Torch, date, school name and "Mrs Labbatt, Torch Bearer"

Photo 2 shows how to park 4 classic buses and coaches in a school lay-by just big enough for 3.

Photo 3 shows our Anthony trying to separate a torch bearer from his torch. Note the disconcerted look on the poor fellows face whilst he hangs on with 2 hands. The background just shows the state of a lot of Penrith. If the Queen was visiting, the buildings would have been spruced up!

Will Hamer

AEC on the move

Cumbria Classic Coaches have acquired a 1953 AEC Plaxton coach for use as spares for other members of the fleet. On Friday 11th May the vehicle was collected from its home near Carlisle and it made the 40 mile journey to Bowber Head.
Here's a selection of pictures showing the coach being retrieved from the barn where it had spent the last 18 years and also on the road during the journey.

Will Hamer moves out of the way to allow Anthony to
steer the AEC to the door

 We stand back as the coach eases into the sunshine

 The team pause for a photograph

 Ian looks happy and relaxed- no fears about the heavy steering

 Tight squeeze through Penrith

 We stop for a chat with Gordon and Ann

 Passing through Orton - nearly home now

 Arrival at Bowber Head

 Tucked away safe and sound between two other AEC's

More information and pictures can be found on the Focus Transport Blog
 http://focustransport2011.blogspot.co.uk/

David G

Spring Around the Corner

Spring is just around the corner and Cumbria Classic Coaches are busy preparing for another hectic year. 2012 sees the start of a new Wednesday contract to meet a steam special at Appleby station with one double deck vehicle and two single deckers to take passengers to Ullswater for a cruise on the lake. After the cruise passengers will be returned to Appleby to rejoin their train. This service commences on Wednesday 6th June and runs on certain Wednesdays during the summer. Wednesday is also the day that Cumbria Classic Coaches run their market day service to Barnard Castle via the picturesque route via Middleton in Teesdale, so on the Wednesdays that the steam special runs they will be using their other double deck vehicle on this service, maybe even boosted by a duplicate vehicle if numbers dictate this. Wedding and other private hire bookings are flooding in so another busy year for the buses - and the crews! David G

CUMBRIA SUMMER SERVICES END ON A HIGH

AEC Regent UTC 672 at Barnard Castle ((click to enlarge)

Cumbria Classic Coaches summer service to Barnard Castle ended on a high on Wednesday 26th Oct when so many passengers wanted to travel on the last run of the summer / autumn route via Middleton in Teesdale that a duplicate vehicle was called for. CCC have a policy of using duplicate vehicles whenever the loadings exceed capacity of the normal service bus to ensure that passengers are never left behind. The scheduled vehicle, ex Bamber Bridge AEC Regent, had already set off with a healthy load of passengers from the Bowber Head Bus Depot to the Fat Lamb where a significant queue was encountered, with more joining at Kirkby Stephen Station, so by the time the 1955 double decker reached Kirkby Stephen Market Square it was a forgone conclusion that a duplicate vehicle would be required.

Ian the conductor gives directions to alighting passengers (click to enlarge)

CCC had already prepared ex Preston Corporation Leyland PS1 and this was swiftly despatched to Kirkby Stephen to pick up the excess passengers. The 1946 PS1 set off in pursuit of the AEC Regent which had also left intending passengers at Winton and Brough, so, to their relief the Leyland PS1 stopped to collect them before making its way to Barnard Castle. Although the service to Barnard castle runs all year round, the normal summer timetabled service is via the more lengthy and picturesque route calling at Middleton in Teesdale before setting off again to Barnard Castle, with its thriving Wednesday market and shops.

Having dropped its passengers, the AEC heads for the coach park (click to enlarge)

The Cumbria Classic Coaches Tuesday market day route to Hawes also came to an end during the same week and unlike the Barnard Castle route, it ceases completely until Easter time when it re-starts again and this years final run using the AEC Regent to Hawes was also heavily used on the final day, but didn't require a duplicate.

David Gambles

Is there anyone there?

Well, it's gone very quiet on the Cumbria Classic Coaches blog so I thought I would post a few pictures from the Easter Kirkby Stephen rally. CRN 79 Visited and was posed alongside CRN 80, the first time they had been together for many years The steam bus also attended and it is seen here at the Cumbria Classic Coaches depot

Florence update

I just thought as I'm stuck in a car on my way over to Newcastle to look at bikes that I'd use the time to bring the blog up to date.

Well on Flo work has not stopped, all the side panels are recovered and back on. We've replaced the lino on the floor too. The roof lining has been stripped and the back replaced with new leathercloth and we are going to fit a new liner to the sunroof this week. Then it's seats back in and back on the road next week. Fingers crossed.

Ant has also been hard at work on the exterior of Rosie restoring the front and repainting round the windows.

I'll take some photos when we've finished and upload them, got to go now feel a bit car sick!

posted from Bloggeroid

This weekend

We were cooking with gas this weekend and on Friday we managed to finish the passenger side panels and refit them. On Saturday we stripped the drivers side, the framework was very good on that side and only a couple of pieces of wood needed replacing, so we soldiered on and fit those pieces, made the new panels and covered and refit them in just the one day! It's pouring down today so I'm having a lazy day. Front panels tomorrow.......

Todays Challenges

Its blowing a hoolie here tonight! Never mind the renovations I think everything is going to blow away. It was a good days work today. Whilst my extremely capable assistant carried on making wooden trims, I finally managed to recover the rear quarter on Flo. It looks great if I do say so myself! Just the trims to varnish and that will be the back end finished with. I also took some photos.... before and after, beware it's a bit of a shock.

More work on Flo

Today we did manage to put the windows back in with new rubbers, We made some more wooden braces and I've started work on the sewing and cutting of the new headlining. I plan to fit that tomorrow and the moquette arrives so we are going to do some panels too! In other news, the bus couldn't go to Barney today there were accidents on both the A66 and the Middleton road. It's probably a good job really as the wind was so bad this afternoon I'm sure it would have been shut on the A66 to high siders. Also have to mention a Happy Wedding Anniversary Anthony and Pensri!

Florence Renovation

Well we started work a couple of weeks ago on the interior of Florence. The side trims were getting a little bit tatty and as she's the most popular of the buses for hire I thought she was due for a bit of TLC. The plan is to renew the side trimming panels, the back quarter roof lining material, some of the leathercloth on the roof and parcel shelves and finally replace the floor lino. Firstly we too out all the seats and stored them in Rosie. We have started at the back end and renewed the wood around the window frames. Getting new window rubbers has been a bit tricky but I was directed to a company called Baines and they had 2000 profiles to choose from so the rubber arrived today and I plan on putting the back windows in again tomorrow. Next we have replaced whatever wood framing necessary down the passenger side. The new trimming material will arrive on Thursday, it's not ideal but getting hold of appropriate green moquette has been a bit of a trial, the best suppliers so far have been AS Cummings of Gateshead. So I hope to have at least 3 panels back on by Friday. In the meantime Anthony has been repairing, repainting and generally making better the bodywork on Rosie. So far he's repainted the wheels, wheelarches and radiator. He started on the window frames today. It sounds simple but it all involves lots of gouging out, rubbing down, fiberglassing and a steady hand with the old coachpaints. So anyone looking out for her next season best tell Ant what a good job he's done.... just so he'll carry on and do another! Oh and we've nearly got the new doors on the bus shed! Will post pics soon Anthony has taken some photos so far of progress so I'll try to upload them soon.

Low wood wedding fair

Attended the wedding fair at the Low Wood Hotel today. It was a really great event and we had lots of interest in the buses and cars. Karin sang there too with her new band 'Once scene' . Looks like its going to be another busy year

A very belated Merry Christmas!

Hi Everyone, I really must apologise for not attending to the blog more often, I'm going to make it my New Years Resolution to write here more often and let everyone know whats going on. Firstly Happy Christmas and Merry New Year to you all. We had a really busy Christmas on the buses with quite a few weddings in December in all the snow which was a bit of a worry but we managed to get out for every occasion. We didn't even miss any of the timetabled routes either. We has a great staff dinner at The Hayloft in Barney, enjoyed by all and Dad didn't even make his usual long speech but limited himself to a much shorter one. Thanks to everyone who helps at Cumbria Classic Coaches, 2010 was a great year. January has been busy but I'm going to tell you all about that in the next blog. It just remains to attach our newsletter to this one. Hopefully this will work as I've only put in pictures so far....nope I'll have to put it up on the website page. all the best Ali

Bio Fuel

There's been some recent postings on the Focus Transport website about the use of bio fuel and Tony Wilson has pointed out that the entire Cumbria Classic Coaches fleet runs of bio diesel obtained from a local supplier. His posting shows some good pictures of the vehicles in action in various locations and they can be found at http://www.focustransport.org.uk/news04.aspx#lat02 He also mentions the faint odour of 'frying tonight'! David G

Video on youtube

Was just having a mess around on the internet tonight and found this great video of a job I did earlier this year, thought some of you might like a look http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Oo7YNrUmF0

COMMER RESTORATION

Well in an exciting move, after receiving an interesting introduction letter, work on the Commer restoration has finally, after 12 years been resumed.

We bought our 1949 Commer Commando first in a flush of enthusiasm when we started Cumbria Classic Coaches and although work progressed rapidly in the first 6 months, when we bought the already restored Leyland Lion the business of actually operating our classic fleet took over and the Commer was put on a back burner.

Therefore our fans will be delighted to know that Rusty Trucks aka Paul Brooks of Warcop are manufacturing a new front end and we hope to get it fitted by the end of November, hopefully also, time willing Alison will be looking at the interior this winter, (first Paul has to fill up the holes on the bulkhead and then the cat can be kept out!).

Details of Pauls work so far can be seen on http://rustytrucks.tripod.com/

On the Buses

A fortnight ago one of the passengers on the Wednesday trip to Barney, Frank Dixon from York handed me a piece of paper. He said I could put it on the blog and share it with you: The Seven C's Cumbria Classic Coaches create cleaner country conditions (less cars!) (I) Come with us and travel by bus, off to the town ho-ho. After your shopping we do the drop offs wherever you want to go. (II) Rolling along on the open road, everyone's chatting with our happy load. There's no need to speed let the fast cars lead We'll happily trundle behind. Past people, they're waving while we do the saving in Cumbria's clean open road. (III) 'Meet the Fleet' Florence and Lawrence Rosie and Peter Klipper and Harvey too There MUST be a bus (Just get onto us) to suit whatever you do! Hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did, thanks Frank.

2010 a bumper year!

Well we are coming to the end of the season for 2010 and it's been a really busy year. We've had lots of wedding bookings and the Barnard Castle route is well established with lots of locals going shopping as well as the odd tourist not to mention the Hawes route which still enjoyes bumper numbers.

Don't forget to put in your diaries the last trips of the year to Hawes and Ribblehead on Tuesday 26th October, your favourite conductor Gordon will be onboard (I know lots of you have missed him this year in his second retirement). The Barnard Castle route will be changing after the Wednesday to the winter timetable. We have had some of the ladies asking about any possible changes the govenment might bring in to the passes but we know of no changes and will definately be running the winter wednesday shopping spectacular regardless!

We have had lots of very interesting private hires this year with Ant and Gordon going as far as Arisaig in Scotland and Dad staying in a castle near Edinburgh. The second box file of thank you's is bulging, with 3 coming in for Dad's jobs just this last week! We now have a competition going as to who gets the most.

Florence in Edinburgh with Dad.

Favourite Pics

Hi everyone, Mum has been doing some closeup pics of the buses for our keyrings and I just thought I'd share them with you. I'll let you guess which buses they're off!