Eastern Counties DD5 (F105 AVG) British Bus Day Rally near Norwich – 10 Sep 1989 (100-24)

Sunday 10 September 1989 - The first double deckers bought new in April 1989 by the Eastern Counties Omnibus Company Limited after the company was privatised were five Northern Counties bodied Leyland Olympians.

DD1-3 were painted in the mainly red bus livery with orange and cream stripes and were fitted with 75 bus seats. DD4-5 carried a mainly cream livery with orange and red stripes and fitted with 68 high backed coach style seating.

DD5 (F105 AVG) is seen here at the British Bus Day Rally at the Norfolk Showground near Norwich. The destination display shows the fleet number and King’s Lynn, the garage where it was allocated.

One of its regular duties was operating the Peterborough-King’s Lynn-Norwich/Great Yarmouth limited stop service 794 the forerunner of what became the Excel branded service. In the early 1980s ECOC introduced a small number of quite longish distance limited stop services linking the main East Anglian towns branded as ‘Eastline’ and numbered in the 790 range. I believe the 794 became X94 which later became X1 which then became XL - also known as Excel!