TALES FROM THE HILLS

(Ashmansworth and Crux Easton)

The last bus to Newbury (in fact the last bus to anywhere from here) will soon be leaving from the end of the lane. Perhaps it deserves a send-off: a parish outing, a crate of beer and all the old songs. We can always roll home by taxi.

On the bus we were a random crowd, briefly thrown together, and on the move – like Stagecoach without the Indians – but with the journey unpredictable and always entertaining.

A few small things stay in my mind.

Once, at Newbury, the driver announced there’d been a crash at Highclere and that the road was closed. He would decide what to do when we got there. Sure enough, at Blind Man’s Gate, a barrier completely blocked the road. He turned into Penwood and consulted ground control. Their first idea was straight down the A34 and on to Andover. Concerned, I spoke to the driver who then announced to control (and to the whole bus) “There’s an elderly gent here wants the Three Legged Cross.” So they told him to take the bus round the back lanes and re-join the A343 beyond the crash, which he did. I don’t mind the ‘elderly gent’ bit, when it gets results.

Another time, it was pouring with rain at Newbury bus station, the bus steadily filling with people, and shopping trolleys stacking behind the driver. Then a mother couldn’t get her buggy past the trolleys. There was gridlock, with the rest of the queue still stuck in the rain. The driver said would somebody shift the trolleys. Nobody moved. Feeling fragile myself, I looked furtively round and found that this time I was the youngest on the bus. I shifted the trolleys.

On the way to Newbury, we stopped at the Penwood estate. People got on and one chap beamed at us all and announced cheerfully, “I’m on day release.” Release from where? He was probably joking, but we clutched our possessions a little tighter.

One day the bus was plastered outside with an advert for ‘Vitality’ with stirring silhouettes of the young, the lithe, and the athletic. Inside was quite a different story: all the usual suspects, with bus passes.

But the bus wasn’t all wrinklies. Some very un-wrinkly girls clambered aboard one hot steamy Saturday, heading for the town and wearing so little it seemed barely legal.

We’ll miss them all.

Agricola, November 2025