Another fascinating BBC 4 documentary on the 1950s hey-day of coach travel was a real eye opener. Imagine Victoria coach station in London overcrowded with thousands of excitable people, all in their best clothes and hats and hundreds of coaches to-ing and fro-ing.On the coaches, it was quite normal to have a sing song. Sometimes you would travel all day but it didn't dampen people's enthusiasm.
They loved coach travel.
Factories in the industrial towns would often close for a fortnight in the summer, and the streets would be empty. Everyone would have gone off on a coach holiday. They loved it because they could save up during the year for their ticket, get collected virtually from the doorstep and travel with their friends and family.
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I'm not overkeen on coach journeys, I must admit (although the old version sounds a lot more fun than National Express these days!), but I do love a train trip.
I used to love going on coach trips when I was a kid. The men would all be drunk on the way home, and would get up and entertain us. My grandad used to do "through the years". He'd get us singing songs from the old days but he'd never really remember what year they were made, so he just made that up as he went along. Nobody cared, as long as they got a good sing-song out of it. I remember The Halfway House they showed... been in there for a pee many a time on our way to Southend. Ah, the memories :)
We used to call them charabancs!
Yes, I was a little girl then!
Maggie X
Nuts in May
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