The Number 206 Route

 Monday 14 September 2009

With barely time to cross the road after alighting from the 32 at Kilburn Park Station, we were aboard the 206 at 11.15.  ‘We’ were Mary, Renee and me, Renee standing in for her absent daughter.

It wasn't particularly sunny, but at least it wasn't raining, as British people tend to say at almost any time of the year.

We were bound for St Raphael’s Estate (or ‘where’s that?’) to those of us who don’t know the Wembley area too well. Our single decker bus made its way through parts of Kilburn, including the massive and rather intimidating bulk of Kilburn police station, and along Brondesbury Road into Queen’s Park.  We passed the Islamia School  as well as Brondesbury College  so we could be sure that both boys and girls from the Muslim community had private education available to them on their doorsteps.

Smart looking 1930s semis were interspersed with homes of the Brenthousing Partnership, and we remarked on how much of our two journeys had been in the borough of Brent.  

After passing several Roman Catholic Schools and the Church of the Five Precious Wounds, which told us we were in the RC diocese of Westminster, we came to the Swaminarayan School and Temple.  This is a good bus route if you want to talk about concept of Faith Schools, though of course only the Catholic Schools are actually state schools.

The 206 went round the huge Ikea, and wriggled into and out of the nearly-as-large Brent Park Tesco, and then we were allowed a few quick glimpses of Wembley Stadium before entering the St Raphael Estate, where our journey ended at 12.05.