Forty years on, MICHAEL DRYHURST tries to get answers to questions about the fate of a retired Irish Leyland double-decker that ended its days on a fundraising trip across parts of the United States
Saint Brendan was an Irishman and an explorer. He is one of many commemorated for having navigated the Atlantic Ocean and to have landed in the New World. Many Irish people followed in his wake. So did at least one Irish bus.
By now, legendary are those overseas trips made by London double-deckers on official assignments, such as trade weeks, shopping weeks, promotions British of one kind or another, these excursions being not only to European countries but to cities in the Americas and Asia. Vehicle types involved included RT, RTL, RTW, RM and RML, even LT-class New Routemaster in more recent times, and the individual routes taken were chosen after careful study, to ensure the safe passage under overhead structures of high-built UK double-deckers.
In recent months, there have been published in Buses accounts various of unsponsored trips, no official backing, supported only by enthusiasm, determination and…luck?
These have highlighted the extraordinary round-the-world trip of a group of young men, The Es…
