Warwick to Leicester

6th August 2019

Plan "A" at Warwick was always "optimistic" with a zero minutes connection between my train arriving and the bus to Leamington departing. But the bus started back in the town centre and the stop wasn't far from the station, so I thought there might just be a chance. In the event the train was a couple of minutes late and the bus, as always in these circumstances, must have been on time.

The Warwick to Leamington bus at the Parish Church

Plan "B" involved a walk towards the town centre to pick up the X18 to Leamington Spa which was due at 1218, 1219 or 1221 depending on which source of information you believed! I think it was 1221 when it arrived and I caught it easily but it meant only a 4-minute connection time at the central bus stops in Leamington for my onward journey.

Fortunately, the two routes met before the terminus at the Parish Church, where I would have nine minutes between buses; a much more certain connection, even if it meant I wouldn't see very much of Leamington Spa.  In the event the 63 on to Rugby was running 10 minutes late anyway, presumably caused by the time taken to take on the large number of passengers it was carrying. In fact it was so busy I couldn't choose any of my favourite seats!

The route from Leamington broadly parallelled the Grand Union Canal at first, through Radford Semele and Stockton, where we crossed the cut at the Boat Inn. This brought back memories of a winter hire-boat trip in the early '70s when we were halted by an emergency stoppage at the locks and forced to take refuge in the pub where we drank some of the best Draught Bass I've ever encountered and which remains in my "Top Ten Pints" of all time, even today. (Those who can remember say that it got even better after we'd emptied the barrel and the landlord put a fresh one on!)

By now it was raining and a combination of rain, spray, condensation and being on the low-floor section of a single-decker meant I didn't see much of the rest of the route on to Rugby, but I don't think I missed an awful lot.
I did notice as we passed through Dunchurch that the village was situated on the former A45 trunk road - the same "Holyhead Road" by which I'd entered Coventry from Birmingham earlier in the trip. Dunchurch must once have been a staging post for the stage and mail coaches heading for the port with Ireland-bound passengers.

The Clifton Cafe: Highly recommended

I had an hour to wait at Rugby, which was just as well as I hadn't yet had time for any lunch. Fortunately, the Clifton Cafe, opposite the bus stop on Clifton Road proved to be an excellent choice - well cooked and presented food, reasonably priced and somewhat more up-market than many bus station cafes I've had to use!

The next stage of the journey had proved problematical at the planning stage. Depending on which website you looked at Arriva operated either a through X84 to Leicester, An X84 to Lutterworth connecting with another X84 on to Leicester or an X84 to Lutterworth from where you could get to Leicester on an 84 (without the X)!  The information at the bus stop was similarly unhelpful. The timetable suggested an X84 to Lutterworth only, whilst an adjacent poster promised a service to Leicester!

I had, in any case, decided to break my journey in Lutterworth  as I'd never been

The X84, that does go to Leicester

there before. The X84 (which did indeed go through to Leicester!) provided a fast ride through open countryside as far as "Gibbett Lane" where we joined the A5, which hereabouts follows the line of the old Roman road, Watling Street.  Gibbetts, or Gallows, marked places of execution and were often sited on major highways as a deterrent to highwaymen of old.

The county boundary runs down the middle of the straight-as-a-die A5 for many miles, so as we were heading north (on the western carriageway) we remained in Warwickshire until we turned off into the Magna Industrial Park, where we entered Leicestershire.

LEICESTERSHIRE    County Town: Leicester

Leicestershire's boundaries have remained largely unchanged since the time of the Domesday Book give or take a few minor adjustments. The 1974 re-organisation of local government saw the neighbouring county of Rutland forcibly incorporated, an arrangement that suited neither party and which lasted only until 1997 when Rutland's independence was restored.Leicestershire is also one of those counties whose county town is also its largest settlement and that settlement, Leicester, is centrally located in the county. Not many English counties are so logically organised.

Having decided not to proceed straight through to Leicester I had an hour to spend in the town, which, for once, was just about the right length of time.

I saw the Town Hall and found that it had been designed by Joseph Hansom, who also designed Birmingham's rather bigger and better-known Town Hall and also the Hansom Cab!  The main street very much has the air of a coaching town with a number of former coaching inns although these days public transport is banished to a side street. At least being deposited on said side street meant that I got to see the town's monument to one of its famous sons: John Wycliffe, who first translated the bible into English.  (Is it just me, or does translating your main product into the language spoken by all of your target market not seem an obvious thing for any religion to do?)

Lutterworth Town Hall

The Wycliffe Memorial

A Hansom Cab

A choice of buses to Leicester:
I chose the double-decker!

The 84 and X84, both operated by Arriva, despite their similar route numbers follow different routes into Leicester. Neither is very direct - in fact they both take almost an hour-and-a-half and the 84, which I chose purely because it was a double-decker, takes a particularly tedious route through a succession of Leicester commuter villages, which must once have been pleasant rural communities until all the people who like living in pleasant rural communities moved there and turned them into suburban housing estates. (Oh well, at least they have better bus services as a result!)

I stayed in Leicester in a Travelodge that is allegedly built on the site of an earlier inn in which Richard III spent the night before the Battle of Bosworth.  I hoped that tomorrow would be a better day for me than it had been for him!

Shrewsbury to Warwick

Leicester to Oakham