Whither Wanders Winkfield's White Bus (2)

A Bit Of History Compounds The Mystery

Again, thanks to correspondent Adrian, we have some blasts from the past. First, an extract from the 1937 Thames Valley Traction Company (TVT)  route map.

Clearly, TVT's cartrographers were as confused as fbb was and maybe still is. It shows Cranbourne Winkfield roughly where The Squirrels is but does not show Winkfield Winkfield which is roughly midway between Lovel Hill and the 2B label above Winkfield Row.

It also shows Hawthorn Hill Racecourse in completely the wrong place. If you go straight on where the 2B turns left for Winkfield Row, you come to Hawthorn Hill.

Wikipedia tells us that Hawthorn Hill Racecourse is where Birds Hill Racecourse is today but then goes on to say that there is no sign of anything today! Thanks a bunch Wilikedia.

Ju also sends a couple of 1950s fare tables, also from TVT, both of which show a fare stage at Cranbourne Winkfield The Squirrel. One is for a service to Ascot via Brookside, North Ascot ...

... (which is Ascot Royal Hunt) and Fernbank Road. This is the route taken by Green Line 703, which turns right at the end of Fernbank Road and toddles off to Bracknell instead of Ascot.

The other table goes to both Winkfields (tada) and ends up at Bracknell ... 

... via Mushroom Castle. Sadly, no mushrooms and no castle; it is just a suburb near Bracknell.

Confused dot com??

But we need to explore the long-standing route of our omnibological friends from Winkfield (or from Cranbourne)!!!

White Bus 01 starts outside Heatherwood Hospital ...

... on the opposite side of the roundabout from the passing 703. It passes the famous racecourse ...

... before calling at Ascot station (see footbridge in the distance).

This much is easy to find from the timetable ...

But fbb really does need to make that map. Ascot is not in Surrey so the 01 is lost in an area of blissful blankness on the County cartographical offering.

Nothing links Heatherwood Hospital and Windsor. Ascot is in Berkshire which does not exist except as a so-called "ceremonial"county. Berkshire was split into several unitary councils so it is in East Berkshire where you will find Ascot, an area that is bereft of bus information.

Bracknell does not go far enough East ...

... and fbb cannot find a 600 but Courtney Buses (Reading Buses in a thin disguise) operate the 200 and the 162/162A via Winkfield Winkfield.

Thanks to much prodding of the White Bus map, time perusing Google Maps and Streetview and a thorough appraisal of a large scale road map, fbb has come up with this in his "Heathrow" style.

From South Ascot, the 01 runs up hill (as in Sunning) and down dale (ditto). Neither locality has anything of great interest to the bus traveller, both being pleasant ex villages now blessed with more than their fair share of "well heeled" residences.

The route operates a one way loop via Sunningdale, stopping 100 yards or so from the station.

Between there and Silwood Park it passes close by a property called Tittenhurst Park ...

 ... once occupied by John Lennon and later by Ringo Starr. 

In 1869, the property was owned by Thomas Holloway, philanthropist and founder of two large institutions which he built nearby: Holloway Sanatorium in Virginia Water, Surrey, and Royal Holloway College, now known as Royal Holloway, University of London in Englefield Green.

Silwood Park is a rural campus of Imperial College ...

... and has accumulated a number of high-tech facilities.

Our White Bus now strikes off into more open country and provides us with its most interesting "happening" ...

... which we will enjoy tomorrow.

Meanwhile; Bodgitt & Fudgitt Do Some Glazing
fbb built an pub for the layout at the model railway club that he once attended. To make it that bit different, he joined an Airfix (now Dapol) country inn kit to half a bungalow kit from the same source. 

He spent some time installing lighting. This involved lining the rooms to be lit with card or the pub would glow like a Christmas tree decoration.

It even has a little model railway clubroom tacked on to the side. But, in one of those inevitable punch-ups that beset any sort of club, it was decided to change the layout and fbb's pub was summarily thrown out.

It now stands next to Peterville Church and is part of the major scenic rebuilding.

But it was missing a window.

Thus along come the glaziers as mentioned in the sub-heading above. Two Ratio windows were cut and shut and, with a couple of bits of scrap plastic rod, were made to fit - but not quite, hence the slight inequality here and there.

It will be barely visible, once painted, from a normal viewpoint, but at least some young child with prying eyes can no longer ask, pointedly, why there is no window in the window.

 Next White Bus blog : Friday 17th April 

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Short Thought

What we call the Ten "Commandments" should, more correctly, be thought of as a Covenant, a two-way deal between God and Mankind. 

It doesn't take a university grade theologist to work out that, as a community, we have pretty much failed to do what God expects.

So, because of our failure, things will go wrong at a very deep level.

Of course, most of the readers of this blog are not murderers, most will not have committed adultery and few will have had strong kleptomaniac tendencies.

But some people may well have become uncontrollably angry, have done a bit of lusting and cheated others out of their rightful assets. 

When it comes to being deceitful or greedy (false witness, covetousness) most of us can shoulder a bit of guilt.

Extend these failings to infect the whole of our society (or a lot of it) and the badness grows and spreads.

That's what the Bible means by Sin. And it sounds a bit scary.

And experience suggests that all of struggle to deal with it.

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