The Irish Adventure: Part 2 25/04/15

We woke offensively early, with Paul in an unusually positive mood. For around a fortnight before, all he had talked about was this day, and I knew he had got an ace up his sleeve, but would not disclose what this was. He told us to be ready and after a short taxi ride into Central Belfast Paul, Colin, Mark and I found ourselves in the Europa waiting to board the 07:02 train, destination unknown. All I knew is we would eventually end up at the ITH rally at Cultra, but I digress...

I sat there watching the world go by as we sped along, eventually finding myself being deposited in Bangor around an hour after leaving the Europa. As we walked down the platform, we were met by our good friend Robert Nogues from the Ards Bus Preservation Group, where we were ushered to a car and driven up to 'Ards HQ' to be met by the rest of the group. We were once again made to feel most welcome and shown around by the lads before Paul dragged down to look at a bright orange Plaxton Paramount DAF, E645DAU, formerly owned by Barton Transport back home in Nottingham and one of their last batch of buses while still in family ownership. At this point, his smile became wider than usual, when he revealed his surprise...645 was to be our chariot to Cultra, and Paul was driving.

We set off, with Edward acting as our navigator, being one of the first buses to arrive at Cultra. As I stood near the entrance photographing the arrivals to the rally site and wandering around catching up with old friends I've not seen since the previous rally a year before, I heard a loud cry of "DAN!" from across the car park, to turn round and see Paul beckoning me over (we all know how loud Paul can be!) I was told to book a taxi from Cultra to Falls, and we took a spirited ride along the motorway to Metro's depot at Falls Road. Ushered inside, we briefly met Ken Menagh and William Young before being introduced to Ulsterbus 111, their 1978 Leyland Leopard formerly used as Downpatrick depot's towcar which Paul had been entrusted to drive to Cultra so that Ken and William could bring the rest of their collection. We set off, and enjoyed a spirited (and bouncy) run along the motorway. And the noise...wow, it was something else, and is up there as one of the best Leopards I have ever sampled!

So we arrived at Cultra for a second time, to a few bemused faces - why were these two strange Englishmen in an Irish towcar that wasn't theirs?! We continued to wander around photographing and catching up with old friends, Andy Lawless, Glenn Shaw, the list goes on. It was then time to join our vehicles of choice for the 40 mile road run around the Antrim coast, our first vehicle being Richard Davis' Ulsterbus Leopard 285, which we sampled from Cultra to the the Donaghadee checkpoint, before bailing to sample Ulsterbus Tiger 343 as far as Millisle. From here, we joined Ulsterbus Leopard 339 back round to Donaghadee, where there was just enough time to hurl some abuse and have a few laughs with Andy Lawless in his big pink plastic decker before boarding Ken Menagh's Citybus Bristol RE 2547 for some quality RE thrassh back to Cultra.

The rest of the day consisted of more photos, catching up with old friends and meeting new ones, before a couple of trips to Holywood Exchange on Stewart Graham's Citybus Q-type 'Cityliner' Tiger 2644 and the Ards lads' Ulsterbus Bristol LH 1629 (on board which we found the purveyour of fine omnibuses himself Mr Mike Nash), both of which turned heads and certainly did not disappoint! Before too long, the rally was drawing to a close for another year, with the trophies being dished out once again, and we were pleased to hear our good friend Mr Lawless and his colleague John had won the Werner Heubeck memorial trophy for best timekeeping on the roadrun earlier in the day.

Awards dispensed, we were again tasked with taking 111 back to Falls for Ken and William, where there was time for a proper chat and a few photographs before we were very kindly taken back to Cultra to regroup with the Ards lads. We boarded Robert's Citybus Bristol RE 2446 for the trip back to Ards HQ, where we regrouped with Phil, Richard, Edward, Michael and the rest of the gang, with just enough time for a group photograph before heading off to the local cafe just down the road for an evening meal. We then enjoyed a trip around the local region as night began to fall, before being dropped off at City Hall. And there was even enough time to meet up with Mr Lawless for a beverage or two before we returned to The Gregory to reflect on the day's events, our second night in Belfast having drawn to a close...