The Littlest Hobos

So today we experienced our first greyhound bus journey. And by
experienced of course I mean we had our very souls sucked out of us in
the greyhound depot, like being attacked by the death eaters from
Harry Potter (well I suppose they have to be somewhere between
filming). A quick look at some of the other travellers collected there
was enough to know it was already too late.... They might just as well
have been locked up in Azkabhan prison.

The depot (in downtown Calgary) is worth noting if not least for
it's choice of ambient music at 6:00am... First we were treated to
some 70s light jazz (i didn't appreciate at the time that this would
be the highlight but at least it accompanied the decor of the diner
quite well); it was followed by a compilation of tunes which I can
only presume was entitled 'music to annoy people by'... It worked.

People are strange. No more so than at 5:30am in downtown Calgary. The
one that sat next to us looked like he might well have been one of the
founding fathers (think a wrinkly Elmer Fudd complete with hunters hat
and jacket). I can confirm that he has given up trying to catch that
pesky wabbit but has instead taken to drinking pepsi and then
producing deep rumbling belches... with every sip! There can't be
that much gas in a pepsi?!

We also underwent the most pointless security search so far. The level
of searching appeared to be inversely proportional to the difficulty
the security officer (see, I know all the lingo) would have in re-
packing the bag. And since my bag was something like a puzzle from the
crystal maze, I ended up just telling him what was inside! But what
made it even more pointless (and something you could not have known at
this stage, a bit like an agatha christie novel always leaving a vital
clue until the end) was that we had already been on a greyhound for
the previous two hours just to get to the depot!

Now I know that all sounds very negative but as I write this final
paragraph it is 11:00am, we're one hour from our destination and we
are surrounded by snowy pastures & farms with chilly horses and in the
rapidly approaching distance are the magnificent rocky mountains...
We're very happy and excited :-) but not as excited as the bus
Windscreens wipers which seem to have a crazy independant life of
their when switched on. And we're not talking normal. Wipers here...
These babies are pneumatic!! They just have to do everything bigger
here!

Well, that's enough for this blogette, normal service will be resumed
shortly with katy at the helm... Oh, and for those who know him, Les
says 'Hi'.