An entertaining bus ride

25th October, 2011

Today was my trip from Minneapolis to Madison, Wisconsin. The bus left just a little after the scheduled time, which is pretty good for Jefferson Bus Lines. All was well until about an hour into our trip. The bus driver had to turn around and go back (the photo above is where we turned). We assumed he just missed a turning and was going back. He was then on the phone to someone for ages trying to figure out where he needed to go. He went back to the previous town. He then got on the right road. After going 10 or so miles down this road, he found out that he had to go back to the college in the previous town (Winona, MN) to collect people who were meant to be at the bus stop. He went all the way back only to find out that there was nobody there. We then went back on the road we were on. When we were getting into the next town, he had no idea where to stop. Someone on the bus directed him to the college but nobody knew where the exact stop was so he was circling the college for ages trying to find it. It was now clear that the driver had never driven this route before and had no idea where anything was.

He did have some sheets of paper with directions but these weren't much help to him. It was actually quite dangerous as he was talking on the phone, reading the directions on the paper and driving the bus at the same time. There was a woman behind me that was constantly saying how the driver didn't know what he was doing. The driver heard her and then shouted back that she shouldn't say that. He knew what he was doing but just hadn't driven in this area before. There was an old man in front of me who quietly said that this isn't language for a lady to be using. The bus driver was constantly on the phone and swearing after realising that he took another wrong turn. At one stop, he allowed some people to smoke (and almost everyone on the bus smoked). He almost drove off without 3 people on the bus. They ran up and stopped the bus after a few seconds. Then getting into Madison, he took another wrong turn and the old man had to direct him there. At Madison some girls tried to get off the bus to get something to eat because they had been on the bus for over 7 hours but the driver wouldn't let them get off.

I don't know why he didn't have a GPS. At one point a passenger handed me a phone because they thought I would know how to use the GPS on it but I didn't know. It was a pretty entertaining trip, though frustrating for those who had to make a connection in Milwaukee (they had to get to Chicago, though I don't know why they didn't take the greyhound express and it is quicker and way cheaper).

Anyway I made it to Madison just one hour late and met Sarah. We then went to eat before driving up to Green Bay area where we are staying the night.