On the road

As the title of the blog hints, Im travelling via Greyhound bus. I bought a 2 month explorer pass to give me a free ticket on any bus till the 12th March (which Im assuming was financially a good deal - and refusing to check with any other bus company), this has kinda turned into a double edged sword.

The buses themselves are frequent, easy to reach and get there reasonably quickly - of course when I say reasonably the distance does have to be taken into account. The leg room is ok, and since any given bus will often be half full I normally get two seats to myself. Every now and again if Im lucky I'll get a new bus. These have plug sockets and free wifi, which makes a trip much easier and a lot less stressful.

The one thing I really enjoy is that once in a while the bus driver will be amazing. I cant possibly qualify that statement without talking to you guys about James (not me, and not another James Gray). James was my driver on the way into Chicago, and got everyone off to a good start by making everyone learn his name, and would then complain panto style we wouldn't say it loud enough. What made the journey, though, was a mixture of life advice and personal tales he felt it appropriate to give along the way. A sample: "Dont surround yourself with negative people, that in turn will make you negative. Only stay with positive people and your life will improve". Does anyone else think that bus drivers should be taught to do this more often? I normally can't stand bus drivers, but this guy was amazing!

Before I left I was warned by a few people about some of the characters who get on the Greyhound. This wasnt something I really experienced until I left the east coast. I will admit the people I spoke to have in general got a little crazier (Ive been told on at least 4 occasions of a persons regret at the death of Princess Diana), but Ive met some real fun people on the bus. One lady kept talking out loud about how her ex-husband was boasting to her he was living with her sister, only for her to laugh back that she had made up with said sister, and knew he was lying...

Perhaps the thing I dread most is sleeping on the bus. Im not great at sleeping on transport in general, but Ive averaged 2 hours a night while on buses so far. This is entirely my own fault, as I assumed that this was something I'd get over without any problems. The effects arent too bad though, it just means an early night whenever I get somewhere. Next week I have a 36 hour bus trip featuring 2 nights on the bus, its gonna be great.