Friday 29 November 2024 (1214) – Thandi Coaches, Smethwick TH18 NDY, a Mercedes-Benz Tourismo new to Shearings Holidays (148) in June 2018 registered BU18 YTC, seen in busy Friday traffic on the A11 approaching Fiveways, Barton Mills.

It was working the 0910 Megabus service M87 from Birmingham to Norwich (due 1315) via Coventry (1000), Cambridge (1135) and Norwich (University of East Anglia) (1305). The coach returned from Norwich to Birmingham as the 1425 service which, on paper, was shown as through working through to Bristol (2035). In reality it would seem the service was split at Birmingham because TH18 NDY often appeared on the 0910 Birmingham-Norwich and 1425 Norwich-Birmingham journeys on consecutive days, as it did on the three days of this weekend, confirming that the service hadn’t run through to Bristol.

Prospect Coaches of Lye, Stourbridge had operated the service for a couple of years or so before I noted that Thandi appeared around September 2024. During this time coaches had run to/from Liverpool via Manchester rather than to Bristol.

It had been announced that Megabus would withdraw most of its services in England and Wales after service on Wednesday 4 December 2024. Since service M87 had become Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays only in the late summer that would have meant the final day of M87 operation would be Sunday 1 December 2024. After photographing the 0910 Birmingham-Norwich run on the three days of the ‘last weekend’ I discovered the service was being run for a while longer on a new timetable. (The Megabus website, which seemed haphazard at the time, suggested operation on just December 6,7,8,13,14,15 and 21 with no further dates – but who knows?)