Pfff, buses!

Few days/weeks ago, I criticized the trams here, and while I still insist that the trams are far from optimal, they are probably still much (much much) better than the buses. As mentioned already in some of the previous posts, the trams do not really cover all Greater Manchester (i.e. Manchester, Salford, and all the suburbs). There are many places where there are no trams, and no trains, and just nothing more than the buses. Therefore, there are many people (yours truly included) who just have no other option than bus - or car, if you happen to have one (or bike, if you are Dutch crazy enough to ride a bike in this weather & traffic).

Anyway. Yesterday, I have set a new record. I waited for the f. bus for 45 (yes, forty five) minutes. It was cold, and when I came to the bus stop, there were already many people, which is always a sign that there was no bus for some time. However, there was no bus nowhere to be seen. As I would have to walk few miles (in office shoes!), I decided to wait; it seemed that the bus would come every second now. However, only new people arrived, no bus. Not even different lines - nothing.

After some 20 minutes, some buses started to arrive, and guess what - none of them was my bus. So I waited and waited. I was freezing, tired, and more and more angry. And when the bus finally arrived, it was a small bus only - not a doubledecker, and not this long bus which can bend. Just a small, short bus. Consequence - people waiting on my station could go in. People on the next stations could not. The driver kept repeating to them, 'only one please'. I can only guess how so very angry they had to be after 45 min of waiting...

Anyway, I did not really expect the way home to be easy. After all, if the buses are not coming, they are obviously stuck somewhere, and this somewhere must be a traffic jam, and if this traffic jam is not really in the city centre, then it has to be somewhere else, for example on my way home - and oh yes, it was there. Magnificent again, superb, and occupying even places which it never occupied before!

So it took me another 45 min to arrive to my station.

I left the bus, and as I was walking home, I said many, many Czech swear words. Really many of them.