Return To The Bus

As I write this, I am around fourteen hours from getting on a Greyhound bus to visit my family. By the time you read this, I will be better than halfway there. This is something I have done before, and enough times that I know fairly well what I am in for. There are apt to be surprises, since it's been a couple years, but I doubt things have changed so much that what I write here becomes entirely invalid. If so, I'll say.

By the time I'm on the bus itself, there's a fair chance that the trouble will be over. One thing Greyhound is not overburdened by is customer service. If things are going fine for you, you probably won't notice, but if you run into trouble, you may rest assured that you are on your own. If a ticket machine is broken (which assumes that there is one there), it's doubtful that you'll be warned or helped. If your reservation is missing or they overbook a bus (which happens), you are probably not going to get relief.

Neither is Greyhound encumbered by a lot of security, which is really very nice except that they are not as consistent on that as I would like. Sometimes they do a security check before people board the bus. Mostly they don't. They do often enough do a cursory kind of check in between the ticket counter and the waiting area, but seldom do they do one directly outside the bus. In general, the absence of consistent security is more a plus than a minus in my experience, though I've seen it be both.

I don't want to paint an entirely unflattering picture of things. Traveling by bus is an interesting way to do it. The bus stops in these small towns that happen to be on the way. You see people that you never would otherwise. You get to use your phone the whole way if you want to, and there may even be outlets and WiFi. There's a certain charm to it, although I confess it's not for everyone. What is bound to be for everyone is that it's cheap.