The Hampshire & Dorset Group

Many of us took for granted the buses on which we travelled to school, or to work, or to shops in the nearby town. We may have memories of red or yellow buses in Bournemouth and Poole or of green buses on the Isle of Wight, of single-deckers or double-deckers, of buses with conductors or buses where you paid the driver.

The Hampshire & Dorset Group consists of a group of friends from the Hampshire & Dorset area and from around the South Coast. Over the last few years, we have preserved and restored various vehicles, from the timeless VRs and Leyland National's, through to Leyland Tigers and Volvo B10M's, still worked in their hundreds all over the country.

The decision was taken to setup up a formal group known as a non profit organisation and so the Hampshire & Dorset Group was born. Each bus is still individually and privately owned, but ran on behalf of the Hampshire and Dorset group. We do not have a formal membership but maintain a list of 'friends' who are interested in our vehicles and who have asked to be kept informed of news and events that we organise from time to time. If you would like to be added to this list please e-mail our General Mailbox using the 'Contact' link above.

Our philosophy is that we enjoy running our buses just as much if not more so than attending rallies so, in addition to participating in a number of organised events each year, we will try and stage a few less formal running days of our own or link in with those being ran by other groups, typically returning some of our vehicles to their old territory along the South Coast and re-creating some of the routes of years gone by.

The rest of this site gives details not only of the vehicles we own, but also events that we plan to attend during the year, a little about the vehicles and some of the plans we have to restore these vehicles of yesteryear. The site is still in its infancy so do check back from time to time as extra features are planned. As with any group we rely upon the assistance of fellow enthusiasts and commercial undertakings alike to help maintain our vehicles to the standard we have achieved and as a way of thanking them I would ask you to visit the websites contained on our links page.

Finally, we are most grateful to those who have helped us along the way to start this group and allowed us the use of some material for this website; The Devon & Dorset Group (Terry, Woody & Graeme), The Stroud RE Group (Mike, Andy, Chris, Dave, Roy, Faye, Rob, Brian and all others), QBE Insurance "Secret Squirrel", The Go-South Coast Group, Marc Morgan-Huws (MD of Southern Vectis), Stu and Elaine, Glenn Whyte, Premier Bus & Truck and lots of others.

Please note that although we do organise events alongside and have a good relationship with the "Devon & Dorset Group", the two groups remain entirely separate in their views, events and personnel.