There are three 'T' buses, which nip around the outskirts of Croydon, and Linda, Mary and I resolved to travel them all in one day, since these are short and frequent routes. We also decided to travel in reverse numerical order, as a bus which starts at West Croydon is inordinately easy for us three Overground users.
So the T31 was the third of our buses on a beautiful, sunny day which made us wonder if we had imagined the horrid rain of the past few days. We walked the short distance from Park Way to Homestead Way, and set off to Forestdale at 11.10.
There were fine views of the countryside to the south of London as we turned back towards New Addington, and passed a house already decorated for Christmas. (Since I got home to find we had received our first Christmas Card, I suppose this is not entirely surprising) Arnhem Drive is mainly semis, some with their original brick, some with pebbledash or white paint, and brought us to the centre of New Addington; we travelled along Central Parade, picking up a number of shoppers, who knew one another and chatted as we swept along, parallel to the tram lines.
As well as flats with a Lidl underneath - a reminder of 'that' Tescos in Orpington with the flats above which we had visited so often earlier in the autumn, we came to Wolsey Primary School, with its cheerful notice: 'if you care, park elsewhere'. The school appears, however, to have other reasons to be less than cheerful in the recent past.
Now we turned into the estates, and went up hill and down, through substantial areas of public and formerly public housing, passing a small parade of shops. Then we came to the transport hub, where we had been less than two hours before, and headed straight out to pass the Randall Tavern. It had had a bit of excitement back in 2010 as you can see here, but seemed to be thriving now. Courtwood Lane brought us to the end of the route, at 11.35, after a brief but pleasant ride.
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