Today's County in the Spotlight:Part 2

[NewcastleFalcon]

... and a bonus there is a VZ in the video

Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

To bring to a close the slowest participation day yet on the thread my final contribution on Tyrone's day in the spotlight is the restoration of HZ 5711 Tyrone County Education Committee School Bus.

146 photos of it here https://www.flickr.com/photos/52011588@ ... 3912004471

But best to bring into the thread the finished article. Very nice too...




Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

Thanks to those who made a contribution to Tyrone's Day in the spotlight.

__________Tyrone Done___________

Time to select Thursday's County of the day

Only 5 left now...
1 Devon 2 Durham
3 Huntingdonshire 4 Kent
5 Renfrewshire

Random Selection number/County 1 Devon for Thursday.

Definitive map
https://wikishire.co.uk/map/#Devon/cent ... 040/zoom=8

Cities:
Plymouth, a historic port and the largest town of the south-west, and Exeter, the county town.
Other towns
Torquay, Paignton, and Brixham
Ilfracombe and Lynmouth
Rural market towns in the county include Axminster, Barnstaple, Bideford, Honiton, Newton Abbot, Okehampton, Tavistock, Totnes and Tiverton.

Regards Neil

[mickthemaverick]

A very familiar flag to me:

BFTW

devon-flag-1.jpg (7.98 KiB) Viewed 75 times

Details here.

The location:

BFTW

Andvthe places Neil listed plus more:

BFTW

[mickthemaverick]

Apologies for the typos in the original posting which was done on my phone!! All corrected now I think!

Devon has played a large part in my life so I will be somewhat more active than yesterday. My sister moved to Ilfracombe 35+ years ago and my Mother moved there after her second marriage to her childhood schoolfriend a few years after my Father's death and his first wife's death. The four of them had all been friends before the war. Having visited my sister in Ilfracombe they loved it so much that they moved there for the sea air and similarities to the 'old England' they had grown up with.

My daughter went to University in Exeter and then married a Cornish lad and set up home in Newton Abbott. During her time at Uni I made a fair number of trips to deal with things from a non starting car to a leaking toilet cistern in her rented house. The student rented house was a nightmare and after doing anything in there for her I couldn't wait to get out for some fresh air!!

My son lived in Hemel Hempstead for his first few years of married life and then my ex-wife and my daughter-in-law's divorced father got together and all four of them decided to move to Plymouth for mortgage free living. Consequently as I have aged and then my daughter's globetrotting began I have a very peaceful existence with no more emergency calls for tap washers etc!!

So Devon as I said has had a big influence on my life one way or another!!

[NewcastleFalcon]

Vehicle Registration Area codes pre-74 Devon/Exeter/Plymouth and
Bits of Devon that made it to Royal Mail Stamps

The random selection hand has determined that I look for number 10, registration area code UO for an example.

Regards Neil

[Gibbo2286]

Did my national service basic training at Honiton so my memories are of being screamed at by drill sergeants and trying to fasten buttons on new uniforms in thirty seconds to get on parade or get charged for being late on duty. Ironing the boot leather and spit and polish to get that parade ground shine.

Later had a weeks holiday at Woolacombe...............it rained all week.

[NewcastleFalcon]

This is UO 8733, it is a Standard Nine Teignmouth Fabric Saloon 1929, and is an exhibit at the Gaydon Motor Museum Warwickshire photographed in 2016.




Regards Neil

[mickthemaverick]

Mick's Devon connection story number 2:

Not long after my sister first moved to Ilfracombe she asked me if I'd be prepared to go and rewire their house for them. I agreed subject to a survey as I wanted to be sure I could do it before I committed. So I agreed to drive down there overnight to avoid the traffic and have a look. At the time I was running my MK VI Reliant so it was to be a bit of an adventure!! Not long after I left Taunton at around 4 in the morning my headlights began to fade, shortly to extinguish altogether. I stopped and opened the bonnet thinking the fan belt had broken but it hadn't!! The dynamo had given up the ghost somewhere along the M4 I assumed and I had been running on battery ever since. I had deliberately left the engine running while I looked so I got back in and turned off the lights and the radio and waited for another car to come by. I was on the moorland road between Taunton and South Moulton so eventually one appeared in my mirror. Luckily for me it was a very old Austin A30 and I flagged him down and explained my predicament. He said that the best thing would be for me to follow him thereby using his lights into South Moulton and then park at the garage and wait for it to open at 6.30.

All was going well until some headlights appeared in my mirror followed by a white flash alongside me and then a blue light flashing on the car which had pulled in front of me. My A30 friend kept going!! So the officer came and advised me that I had no lights and I explained the situation and what we had been doing. He said that wasn't an acceptable practice and I must not drive the car at all until daylight. He then gave me a stiff telling off for wasting police time as they were the only patrol car on duty in North Devon and had better things to do than stop city idiots driving with no lights!! Must be a runaway sheep somewhere I thought, but kept that thought to myself! So I settled down to wait out the next 40 minutes or so until dawn when I could move on.

Needless to say I nodded off and awoke at around 7.30 when the sun was dazzling me via the rear view mirror. I bump started the car with the help of two passing cyclists and headed off to South Moulton which I discovered was literally 300 yards from my parking point round a bend!! That made me think the policeman had been even more petty as he could easily have escorted me that far and I would have been at the garage 90 minutes sooner!! Anyway the garage mechanic was an old school rural chap who could probably mend anything and it took him just half an hour to replace my dynamo brushes, which were virtually non existent, and a boost charge for the battery while doing it, and got me on my way to Ilfracombe in time for breakfast! Probably the cheapest repair I have ever had, he charged me 50p!!

Once at my sister's I was able to determine that I would be able to do the job although I had to work out the wiring for the 4 floored house landings' wiring so you could turn any light on or off from its own floor and the one above and below!! Once sorted I knew what cables to run and drove back home to order up the parts I would need for the following weekend - but that's another story!!

[NewcastleFalcon]

Devon is a long way from up here, even longer in a hot car in a traffic jam with the car heater on to stop the car overheating as the traditional hoardes flocked to Devon and Cornwall for the summer holidays.

Because its so far away I should be able to recall every visit we made, bit imprecise for some of the years maybe but close enough.

Our first trip would be 1969 to Ilfracombe in July, and yes at the time of Neil Armstrong's famous one small step. Commander Armstrong was subsequently to be freeman of Langholm as we found out in Dumfriesshire's day in the spotlight here https://www.frenchcarforum.co.uk/forum/ ... 43#p717943

Second trip was July 1975 I think, Ed Stewpot Stewart was doing the Radio 1 Roadshow from Torre Abbey Meadows. Stayed at Coombe-in-Teignhead. The aforementioned Sensational Alex Harvey Band ( Nairnshire day in the spotlight viewtopic.php?p=720795#p720795 ) helped nail the precise year down...they played "Delilah" at the roadshow SAHB's charting single released in 1975 at the event (the track "Isobel Gowdie", the Nairnshire link would have been too weird ever to make a Radio 1 playlist at the time except maybe on the John Peel show)

July 1975 confirmed!

Third probably July 1979 I seem to remember Judy Tsuke "Stay with me till Dawn" being popular at the time. That might have been staying at Kingsteignton nr Newton Abbot

Hitch Hiked to Plymouth for a weekend in 1983

Then a 1990-ish holiday staying at Stoke-in-Teignhead.

Some time since we have set foot in Devon, probably would need 3 days either side of a week's stay for a smell the flowers, journey's part of the holiday, drive in the Leaf

Regards Neil

[mickthemaverick]

Regards Neil

Well its been a bit of a journey which has not found the full set. Without resorting to Flickr I have found 8 correct pictures, 1 massaged picture and a tenth for the demon CO using contributer's artistic license!!

plus with license!!

[mickthemaverick]

Mick's Devon part 3

My sister and brother-in-law bought a caravan sited just outside Ilfracombe as an investment to rent out to holiday makers. It was almost always available for the Whitsun half term week so we used to go there with our two children and my friend from Elstree and her daughter who was best friends with my daughter. In the early evenings the kids used to go out and play down by the stream which ran through the site while we adults sat and chilled inside the caravan with a board game.

One evening I was sitting opposite my friend when I saw my daughter through the window behind her waving at me and making the shush sign with her finger over her lips. Once she had grasped my attention she beckoned me to go outside without telling the others where I was going. I made an excuse which I can't remember and went outside. My daughter dragged me away from the caravan and told me that her friend had fallen in the stream while they were playing and her Mother, our friend, would kill her!! There followed a ludicrous half hour which saw us take her friend to the onsite launderette, strip her off and put all her clothes in the drier. We had to sit there with her naked between us and hope no-one else came in or I might have had some serious explaining to do!!

Anyway we got away with it, redressed her and then casually sauntered back to the caravan with ice creams from the site store as a reason for my delayed return!! We got away with it and no further action was ever taken!!

[NewcastleFalcon]

So far today if active posting is to be counted, only 3 FCF viewers and members posting so far have ever set foot or wheel in Devon, or have any associations or memories of the County.

Last orders for Devon, and there isn't even a pub of the day to have them in.

You can lead a Dartmoor pony to water but you cant make it drink

REgards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

Fear not Devon has supplied an appropriate Pub for its Day in the Spotlight. Near Exeter in a village called Doddiscombsleigh

The Telegraph certainly rate it...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/dest ... inn-hotel/

Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

A rousing chorus of Widdecombe fair to finish, Devon is a superb place , happy holidays.



Regards Neil