Unknown to fbb : mini blog (1) ...

 ... But Should Have Known!

The late Donald Rumsfeld took a lot of stick for this, but you can, actually, understand what he was getting at, as the Iraq weapons crisis (possible crisis!) progressed.

fbb prides himself on a good general knowledge of public transport in the UK, much of which he has used personally. But occasionally he comes across an unknown unknown - a snippet of travel opportunity that he has never heard of, never been on and is often quite weird.

The old man has traversed all of the central London bridges, road and rail; ridden through all the railway tunnels and walked through the foot tunnels at Greenwich and Woolwich. He has not used London's river bus service although he knows about it, but has crossed the Thames on the Woolwich free ferry.

But imagine his surprise when he discovered an unknown unknown.

It all started with a YouTube video that fbb enjoyed whilst in bed and preparing to respond to a growing somnolence.

It begins with some guy standing outside a building somewhere in the east of the Metropolis.

The easiest way to get there is to take the Overground (fbb can't get his head round the new names!) or Jubilee service to Canada Water ...

... and there change to bus C10 which will take you, potentially, on a tour of Rotherhithe.

In the past the C10 had an interesting history. It was operated by Limebourne ...

... a company then taken over by Blue Triangle.

These days it has quite posh vehicles operated by the former Abellio ...

... now the Transport UK group led by Dominic Booth, one time MD of Island Line!

As a meaningless aside, fbb has ridden a C10 but only locally in the Victoria area.

Of course TfL doen't publish timetables, believing it is better to keep passengers guessing; but Robert Munster will oblige.

The frequency is every 7/8 minutes so you should not have long to wait. You should alight here ...

...with a stop name that isn't the same as it is on the timetable in print (well, Munster's print), where it is called Rotherhithe Street Hilton Docklands.

As another meaningless aside, since fbb started researching this item, the dreaded interwebnet, in this case Trip Adviser Confounded Nuisance keeps wanting fbb to book in to the Doubletree Hotel in Amsterdam!

fbb has resisted that temptation being somewhat perplexed that Trip Adviser thinks the old bloke would touch anything labelled "Traveller Fave".

Anyway, whatever the stop name we alight here ...

... and that dark slab is the inner end of Nelson Dock which, apparently, has no connection to the noble one-eyed admirable Admiral.

Once a working dockyard the former dry dock is surrounded by yuppie homes with just an old crane to remind us of its original purpose.

Here is a local map from way back when ...

... and here are the long-gone workshop buildings.

Where these are located in the above picture is where we will go next.

Round The Back ...

.... By The Bins.

On the recent holiday, fbb was taken by the.poor provision for coach passengers as motorway service areas. Often the walking route is across busy traffic lanes or ...

... round the back by the bins.

As the majority of coach tour passengers will be "old' and possibly "creaky", shouldn't they be better treated?

===========================

But Not Any More

Confirmation was received yesterday, via a letter to staff from Alf Crofts, owner of Hulleys, that th company will cease trading after business tomorrow, Wednesday 24th March 2025. Sadly, this has seemed inevitable for the last six months or so.

New Derbyshire tenders will start of Thursday 25th, but, as yet, there is no news about Hulleys commercial services.

No doubt more to follow.

===============================

  Next unknown blog : Weds 25 Mar