Humble Beginnings and Humble Buses

First off, I would like to say that exchanging a simple hour or so flight (even though the shortest would have taken about two and a half hours due to a layover between Toronto and Montreal) for about 24 hours of bus travel was a mistake. A great, money-saving, mistake. Granted, the $200 plus dollars I spent on busing here saved me plenty of money to do more in Montreal, but I never understood the emptiness of bus travel until today. My convoluted journey from Pittsburgh to Montreal was by way of  Pittsburgh to Youngstown, Youngstown to Buffalo, Buffalo to Syracuse, Syracuse to Ottawa, and Ottawa to Montreal. That ordeal included the use of five buses, a five hour layover in the most barren bus station known to man in Youngstown, and a route that started by taking me further from my destination. It made getting to Montreal all the sweeter when I finally arrived, and offered a much different experience that my previous flights.

Even though I fear this is more of the same, I feel it necessary to describe what I meant by a "barren bus station" in Youngstown. To start off, I am pretty sure that the bus station was actually closed for the majority of the time I was waiting there, and the single guard there was friendly enough to let me stay. There were no restaurants, tiny convenience stores, or any of the usual fare you would expect of a bus station or airport terminal. Instead, besides the central circular desk that was the pulpit of the armed guard, the station's interior has a semicircle of about 7 or 8 vending machines that ranged from the usual snacks and drinks,to a coffee vending machine that reminded me far too much of the one from Better Call Saul's opening episodes. After I had been sitting there for maybe a half hour, the guard suggested I get food from a deli a couple blocks away and told me he would be watching for me to unlock the doors for me when I returned. I happily obliged, and when I got to the "deli" which is deserving of its dubious quotations, I was surprised to see it was a deli/convenience store. Apparently in Youngstown, Ohio, a deli/convenience store equates to fried chicken, cigarettes, a shocking amount of booze, and admittedly, a pretty solid convenience store component. I was a little upset not to be getting pastrami or corned beef on rye, but at least I was able to buy some premade pepperoni rolls and use their microwave. Then I returned to the station, realized I had to kill four more hours on a backless bench, and promptly drained 80% of my cell phone's battery watching That 70's Show while balancing my phone on a window sill and sitting backwards on a bench.

Lake Ontario after we crossed the border.

 It was not until the Syracuse station, at 3am, that I was in a bus station that had real food available since I left Pittsburgh. I excitedly ate a Subway sandwich as I counted down what was supposed to be the next seven hours of my journey. On the bus to Syracuse which then circled back and went to Rochester and NYC after my stop, I actually had my first conversation with a bus passenger. A Brooklyn native who had just returned from his first trip to Toronto, and said New York in just the drawn out and amusing way you would imagine, Manny very eagerly told me about his partying in Toronto. Despite a announcement to silence your phones and speak at whisper levels to allow other passengers to sleep undisturbed, Manny kept showing me full-volume videos and panoramas of Toronto he had taken with his phone. During our conversation, I surprisingly learned that this Brooklynite was an Eagles fan, but on his list of US cities he was interested in visiting was Pittsburgh. He then looked at his phone for about ten more minutes after we had stopped taking, fell asleep almost immediately, and began to snore loudly beside me.

Montreal Street Sign from a gross Greyhound Bus 

Thankfully, I was able to save time at least once. My bus had made extraordinary time between Ottawa and Montreal, and I had arrived at around 6:50am opposed to the expected 7:10am. When I arrived, I quickly harassed the nearest employee to confirm what gate I would be waiting at (something I always do as insurance against making a mistake without somebody else to blame) and to my surprise a bus was boarding. I realized it must have been the 7am bus, and sat down next to the gate with my ticket. The porter then looked at me, said "Montreal?" and at my nod quickly asked "Do you want to go on this one?" In a day of buses arriving late and leaving late, the Canadians were the first to actually accelerate my schedule, and for that, I will be forever thankful.





Then at 9:10am on Monday morning, I arrived at the apartment on Rue de la Peltrie that I will be staying at for the next three weeks with my pleasant host.

My room in Jewell's Apartment (right after I got here)

Same room after I actually used the closet.