Magic

Gads, this takes me back. The Times looks at the Magic Bus, which introduced a generation to cheap, exotic travel.

They do a pretty good job, though they miss out on my favourite memories: the quiet cool of the pre-dawn departure; the friendly camaraderie of a bus-load of young people setting out for adventure; the all-pervasive smell of urine due to the lack of rest stops; the blare of the Greek driver's appalling tranny, which was only mildly less disturbing than the cloud of hashish that followed him everywhere; and the amazing sounds the clapped-out Routemaster would make as it banged and clattered down steep mountain roads on brakes that sounded so tortured and the driver so panicked that even the atheists were clutching rosaries.

Happy days, happy days.