in which jean learns to ride the boltbus...
My, this is lovely. Air conditioned, confirmation number given, and connected a marked contrast to my last intercity hop. I showed up to my preferred bus company's office at 5 to find out the next bus wasn't until 8. I waited around for three hours then that bus was triple booked leading to a scene not unlike lifeboats off the titanic. Seriously a police officer had to push the crowd back onto the sidewalk for the bus to pull up. I made it on the third bus which combined the Philly and NYC routes and left 40 minutes late. After about half an hour on the road, the driver pulled off at an exit and demanded a relief driver meet him since he'd been driving over 12 hours and was not willing to go back to New York. Maybe 20-30 minutes later the bus going the opposite direction met us and they switched drivers. On the road again we drove to the Maryland stop, a highway exit where about fifteen people were waiting for the bus with only six available seats. A few people including a mother with her 4 or 5 year old child in her lap got on the bus and filled in the last remaining seats. Things were tense but ok until about 50 miles outside of Philadelphia a woman took offense at the young folks playing around behind her and got in a fist fight with one of them. Lights went on, bus pulled over to the side of the road and the driver and friends of the combatant got them apart. We started driving again but the one woman kept prowling up to the front complaining to the driver and they were both throwing threats around until sirens started flashing behind us. Her friend had called the cops, we got pulled over, the cops took the women off the bus to get statements. We were of course all exasperated, I prayed and offered peanuts to the passengers around me, a few of whom took me up on it. A little much. At 1 am we got into philly and that's why I'm now on the boltbus. I've been a loyal chinatown bus customer for three years, loved getting buns and cheap produce on the way, and never had problems like that. However, given the grief, I can learn to plan ahead. I still have a little hesitation about renouncing the chinatown bus entirely since Boltbus is far more the starbucks crowd than the corner deli crowd and riding the bus is one of my key moments of rest-- While not having a brawl in the aisle is restful, sometimes having the whole internet at your fingertips is not. For now though, here's to smooth sailing.