ROLL up, roll up for the number 12 magical mystery tour!

When you jump on to a number 12 bus at Woodthorpe, York, expect the unusual. My trip the other day started with the twice around Woodthorpe routine.

This unnatural act unhinged a stranger sitting next to me who looked on in amazement as he passed the same bus stop he had stood at five minutes previously.

I smiled benignly and tried to explain that for some obscure reason the bus drivers have to go up to the terminus at Acomb Park and then retrace their route around Woodthorpe before heading off via Tesco into town.

Later in the day, as I took the bus trip home, I thought that I had entered the Twilight Zone.

At Tesco we picked up two giggling teenagers. Our route then should have been off the roundabout and over the railway bridge into Moor Lane. Surprisingly, however, we swung around the roundabout and headed off towards Tadcaster and the unknown. Through the steamed-up windows I could see that we were driving along Moor Lane, but that we had missed our usual turning and were heading towards the ring road.

The next time I recognised where we were was when we reached Copmanthorpe and were entering the A64. As we hurtled along the dual carriageway wild thoughts crossed my mind. Had the driver given up on dull routine and wanted to escape into the sunset? Perhaps this really was the Twilight Zone - a surreal dimension of no escape?

Tadcaster loomed ever closer but, thankfully, we veered off over the flyover back towards York and sanity.

For sheer entertainment quality, who needs the TV, cinema or drugs when you get all this for £2.50, the price of a First Day Rover?

Phil Shepherdson

Chantry Close,

York.

Updated: 10:33 Wednesday, December 07, 2005