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Errol's son

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Has anyone travelled across America on a Greyhound? I have only done short journeys on a Greyhound before.

I want to travel from Charlotte, NC, to Las Vegas, NV, at the end of January. I have done long bus journeys before, ie 48hrs etc...

How long do you think this trip might take not stopping and just going for it straight?
 
I met a German couple in 2000 who traveled on a greyhound bus from NYC to San Fran... they said it took some 53 hours!
 
Excellent, so if I allow 3 days I should do it. I'll add another 2 so I can break the journey if poss. Now just gotta work out the route and where might be interesting to stop off.
 
Errol's son said:
Has anyone travelled across America on a Greyhound? I have only done short journeys on a Greyhound before.

I want to travel from Charlotte, NC, to Las Vegas, NV, at the end of January. I have done long bus journeys before, ie 48hrs etc...

How long do you think this trip might take not stopping and just going for it straight?
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Take about four days... I went from NC -> Grand Canyon in 3, and it looked like anothers days travelling to the West Coast. Its the best way to see the US... You get to see all the scenery, as well small-town America that no-one ever goes to. And you get to meet the crazy, crazy people who take buses instead of cars/flying...
 
Route looks like taking in Nashville, TN; Memphis, TN; Little Rock, AR; Oklahoma City, OK; Amarillo, TX; and Alberquerque, NM.

I have always wanted to visit Nashville.

I don't know much about the other places other than Bill Clinton hails from Arkansas (Little Rock?) but this is not a draw, Oklahoma is famed for the musical and Amarillo is in some song I hear on the radio.

Is Nashville a good place to stop? Are the other places good or should I maybe just stay in some small town in the middle of nowhere?
 
If you are interested in music or history, Nashville is a good stop.

Don't bother with the Grand 'ol Oprey. Complete crap.

Andrew Jackson's house is cool. They were excavating the slave's quarters when I was there and were finding interesting things.
 
Memphis is worth a look, Beale St is packed with bars featuring live music and Sun records and Graceland are there too. Albuquerque's a great city, more Mexican than American.
 
I just took a Greyhound from New Orleans back home to Toronto and I had a pretty good trip. Granted, that wasn't fully across the US, but it was long enough. I got on the bus at 4:30 PM Sunday and got home at 9:30 AM Saturday. So a day and a half. I met interesting people and heard interesting stories. I thought I'd go insane after awhile but I didn't at all. The only problem was I didn't sleep the whole time. Oops.
 
Fuck Greyhound!!!

If you can avoid it, do so.

It is not a fun way to see the country, you will end up being extremely pissed off and will entertain the idea of offing yourself.

It is by far the worst way to travel...fuck, you would be better off risking hitch-hiking.

Look to the train if you want to see the country, don't have a car and can't afford to fly.


Flights around the states have become much cheaper, you might have to modify your plans a bit, by flying to smaller airport or by changing your routes, but it will be worth it.


Avoid Greyhound!!!
 
I'd second that, but Errol seems to know what he wants.

I took a bus from Kansas City to Phoenix. It took 27 hours of hard road to get there. It wasn't helped by a food stop in Kansas that gave everyone except me food poisoning. The last hundred miles of that trip was pretty smelly.

Luckily the trip back was uneventful.
 
I travelled from NYC to LA and back again all via Greyhound. I look back now through rose tinted specks (this was 1991 and I was 18) and I seem to think that on the whole it was a good trip, full of interesting (and yes, crazy) people. However, there were times when 'wacky craziness' became outright nastiness and on several occasions, violence....

I took a vaguely southern route to LA - Baltimore, D.C, Richmond, Atlanta, New Orleans, Houston, Dallas, Amarrillo, Alberquerque, Pheonix. On the way back I went north-ish - Oklahoma, St Louis, Chicago, Indianapolis, Pitsburgh.

I was in quite a hurry on the way back (ran out of money) and taking out a few day/night stops would say that it took 3 full days driving if you stayed on the bus all the way from LA to NYC.

The best part of the trip was the south west. From Amarrillo to Pheonix. Very alien to me (at the time) was the desert and made even more so because it snowed at the Grand Canyon and in Santa Fe!!

Hope you enjoy your trip and encounter plenty of weird and wonderful people - hopefully not too many arseholes tho;)
 
If possible I'd agree with the above - hire a car, you see the scenery, and you stop where you want to stop. Just pull into a motel and flop on the bed. A road trip across a nice big chunk of America is just great.

I'm a fan of public transport as a rule, but hanging around in bus stations at odd hours is just miserable.
 
Cerberus said:
I travelled from NYC to LA and back again all via Greyhound. I look back now through rose tinted specks (this was 1991 and I was 18) and I seem to think that on the whole it was a good trip, full of interesting (and yes, crazy) people. However, there were times when 'wacky craziness' became outright nastiness and on several occasions, violence....
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yep - we went from Detroit to LA and back when we were 16... Wouldn't do it again I don't think, but at the time it was brilliant... this was before mobile phones and the thought that at any point you could just get off in the middle of some random town in the desert, and just disappear was exciting... a nightmare for my parents I imagine, but there you are... I think it was 60 hours each way.. and all for 24 hours in LA so we could go to the first Lollapalooza concert :rolleyes: :D
 
Basically, in America only near-destitute people who can't afford or drive a car take long bus journeys. Often such people have mental health problems or are substance abusers. That keeps it cheap and makes for an interesting ride, but also has certain drawbacks.
 
Mrs Magpie said:
I heard Greyhound were likely to disappear as they can't break even...is that true?
Click to expand...

I hope not, I can't afford hundreds of dollars on plane tickets every time I want to go somewhere.
 
walktome said:
I hope not, I can't afford hundreds of dollars on plane tickets every time I want to go somewhere.
Click to expand...

Rental cars are getting pretty cheap. I picked one up for about $26 a day.
 
Mrs Magpie said:
I heard Greyhound were likely to disappear as they can't break even...is that true?
Click to expand...


Never mind, there little cousins are still going strong


gowhippet_image_002.jpg



Although they probably don't cover all the places that Errol's son might want to visit. Mind you Cambridge via St Ives sounds like a pretty odd sort of route to me.
 
I know. I've just always used public transportation and I've sort of been meaning to get my license for years but never really had a good reason to. Now I do, realizing that just having it for the sake of having it is a good thing, and so I have another form of ID.
 
I took the Greyhound from NYC to LA via Canada and crisscrossing the country stopping off at loads of places on the way, it took two and a half months because we had no agenda and could get on and off at will, was the best time i have ever had (apart from NYE at PROD). i wouldn't do it again because you end up in some weird situations or left in the middle of no where with some nutter. That said i met some super nice people who took us to parties, gave us booze and were generally really cool.

Next time i would hire one of those blinging camper vans. FACT!
 
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