Super-fan Cliff takes the bus to Colchester

Reporter: Gillian Potts
Date published: 01 August 2014


GETTING to the first game of the season is never a simple affair for Latics fan Cliff Taylor.

When the retired headteacher hit 60 and received his free bus pass he decided he was going to make use of it.

Getting to watch his beloved home-town team play their first game of the season seemed a good opportunity.

So Cliff (65), who now lives in Bournemouth, decided he would make the annual journey to the opener — no matter how epic — on the bus.

He’s currently limbering up — Latics shirt at the ready — to climb abroad a three-day, 13-bus bonanza for Oldham’s away game at Colchester, 180 miles away, on August 9.

But that’s not even the most arduous trip he’s completed; it took him 17 buses in three days to get to Tranmere in 2009.

Cliff, who taught at Yew Tree primary, in Chadderton, and Limeside, before moving south and becoming a head teacher in Dorset over 20 years ago, combines another of his passions with the journey by staying overnight on campsites.
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