CELEBRATIONS 10th anniversary for couple who found love on board coach
A COUPLE who found love on a National Express coach are marking 10 years of wedded bliss.
Like many travellers, when Matt Elwell boarded the coach from Torquay to Cardiff 14 years ago he put his bag on the seat next to him to stop anyone else sitting there.
When Gail asked if she could sit there, Matt begrudgingly obliged – and four months later the pair were living together. Gail, a liaison nurse for people with learning disabilities and a single mum at the time, sat her two children down and spotted a seat next to Matt across the aisle.
Matt said: “She asked if she could sit next to me to keep an eye on her kids. I moved my bag off the empty seat with a scowl and apparently her first impression of me was that I was rude!
“Anyway, it was a two-hour ride and we just got talking. I knew I had to get her phone number before we parted ways at our final destination and I managed to do it.”
Gail admitted she impressed with Matt.
Gail, from Aberdare, said: “My first impression of Matt wasn’t that good, but then one of us broke the ice and got talking and I realised he was a lovely guy. He told me he was a film and TV student and I managed to squeeze out of him that he was single.
“I realised during the course of our conversation that I really liked him and could see myself with him long term, so we exchanged numbers. Then, when we changed coaches at Bristol, to my disappointment I wasn’t sitting next to him. I texted him to say ‘are you lonely?’ and he said ‘yes’ and I knew he was interested.”
Matt said: “I have never spoken to someone on the bus before, but I managed to get her number down on a scrap of paper. I was feeling pretty nervous, I didn’t really know how to approach it, but I just thought it’s make-or-break time.”
Although he managed to overcome his nerves, Matt said the first date in wasn’t best Newport didn’t quite go to plan. Matt, originally from Worcestershire, said: “The first date – well, I was a student at the time, and it was awful, really. She had to pay for the meal because I had spent all my money on the train getting to Newport, so it wasn’t my finest hour.”
After the whirlwind four-month romance, Matt moved from Torquay to Pontypridd to be with Gail and all of a sudden became step-dad to her kids and had a family. Three years later they married in Lapland.
They now live in Graigwen and this month they are celebrating 10 years as a married couple by going to a Robert Plant concert in Portsmouth.
Matt said: “It’s quite scary to think that if I had not sat in that seat I would never have met her. I would not imagine being happier any other way.”
Gail added: “We still love each other very much, it’s been a lovely 10 years so we are both very happy we got the National Express that day!”
To celebrate their anniversary National Express is giving Matt and Gail a pair of coach tickets to go anywhere they want on the UK coach network.
National Express coach managing director Chris Hardy said: “We are thrilled that Matt and Gail are celebrating 10 successful years of marriage after meeting on one of our coaches. It’s not every day you hear of couples marrying after finding love on our services.”