Like many of you, I have been entertaining the idea to use the bus to start a tour. But this story is merely of a simple need to get just myself form Portland, Oregon, to Mt. Shasta, California. There is no Greyhound bus station in Portland, just curbside pick-up. My bus was scheduled to leave Portland at 2:20 AM on Thursday, May 22. The bus was late by 45 minutes, the driver explained that the fuel card necessary to gas up the bus did not work. We left at 3:14 AM.
The bus reeked of dried up old human excrement and Pine-Sol, and it was very near full of passengers. At about sunrise, 5:30 or so, a couple of the passengers got into a skirmish. Each combatant threw one quick and feeble punch, with no sign of any harm to either participant. The driver was obligated by company policy to immediately stop and remove unruly passengers. This meant we stopped in the small town of Sutherlin, Oregon, not normally serviced by the bus companies.
While the bus driver was talking to the police in Sutherlin, the bus overheated or perhaps caught fire. The automatic fire suppression system kicked in, and the bus was no longer mobile. We were told to walk the few hundred yards to the Motel 6, where we would be treated to a free room for the "night". It took five hours - until noon - until the Motel 6 had the rooms ready and graciously let us in.
Greyhound said there was no way to immediately rescue our group of refugees, and that next bus from Seattle to Sacramento, which run every 24 hours, would pick us up between 6 and 7 AM. This was curious, as the rescue bus would need to be very near empty to accommodate everyone.
Nothing really beyond the pale had happened. I gladly set my alarm for 5:20 AM to catch the "next bus through".
7AM came and went, with no rescue bus. Our refugee spokesperson was told there would be another bus arriving soon. At 9AM we were assured there was a bus coming, it was slowed down in traffic. At 10AM we were told the bus is coming, it's almost certainly going to be showing up any minute now. At 11AM Greyhound said that there were no plans on getting us out of there over the weekend, and that the next two nights in Sutherlin Motel 6 would be paid for by them!
By now the refugees had dwindled down to just about 10 people, most of the folks who had a functioning credit card had departed by then. I believe I may have been the last normal person (as opposed to street person) to depart the Motel 6 via Uber. I caught a ride to Roseburg, rented a car, and drove the 4 hours home. Two days and almost $300 wasted on this journey.
Greyhound emailed me the usual "How Was Your Experience?" questionnaire. Then another email came apologizing and offering me a voucher for another ride. They couldn't pay me to ever again set foot on a Greyhound bus again.

Poor old clapped out bus, not properly maintained, run into the ground.

I saw Jonathan in concert a couple of months ago. Great show. He closed with Cold Pizza.

And yet, many people consider bicycles a crazy way to travel!
Very often getting to the start of a tour really makes one appreciate riding.

Reminds me of my cross-country Trailways trip in 1983 to join a Bikecentennial tour! NH > Boston > DC > Grand Junction CO. Their slogan was "$99 anywhere!"

The first night out of DC the driver comes over the PA saying "If I smell any of that wacky-tabacky I'm pulling over and you're getting off!" That set the tone for the next several days.

Incessant loud Spanish chatter between a mom and child behind me. Endless pit stops at fast food take out diners with subsequent pop bottles & trash rolling & drifting around the floor. A bus driver in Colorado who scared the heck out of me going 10 mph above the speed limit down twisty mountain passes at night!

The bike ride from Grand Junction to Durango to meet the group was heavenly!

you are thinking of this wrong; if you repeat this performance indefinitely you will never need to pay rent again

You mean, "Like probably 2 or 3 gluttons for punishment..."

I have never considered a bus for beginning a tour, or ending a tour, or going anywhere.

Your trip was worse than the worst trips I have ever had. Major bummer.

A decade ago two of us rode a bus from the Oregon OR Amtrak station to Astoria. Was not a Greyhound, I do not know what it was, we might have gotten the ticket for them through Amtrak. Service was good.

I have ridden a bus from Madison WI to Chicago a few times, had good luck with them. Was not Greyhound. Photo below, the driver was getting my bike out of the luggage compartment last summer. Their website however says that in some states they do not carry bikes.

Perhaps you are right. But, perhaps you, more than any of us, need to rub elbows with the new world everyman.
OK, maybe I'm a glutton for punishment, maybe the few brave souls who throw caution to the wind and board a bus are the exception to the rule. But it is on this very sub-forum that I got the idea to ride the grey dog. It is easier to get on a plane with a bike than Amtrak. In the 1980s I got my bike boxed and got on the bus in Minneapolis, and had a nice early winter bus ride back to Michigan. I believe that, in theory Greyhound (and Amtrak) should be a fantastic alternative to flying. A man can dream...

Sorry to hear, sounds frustrating.

My experience with Greyhound was much more normal. This was December 24th 2019 and my bicycle crank had snapped about 30 miles south of Junction TX. An hour and a half of walking before I caught a ride to Junction where I got a motel for two nights. The next Greyhound was December 26th. I left behind my bike and got one way ticket on Greyhound. The bus was on time. There was a transfer in San Antonio and both buses were almost full. Otherwise a basic bus ride home where I rented a car and went back on the 27th to retrieve my bike.

I did have a non-Greyhound bus experience where a bus broke down. In May 2008 I got selected as a delegate to a state political party convention in Colorado Springs CO and they had arranged a rented charter bus from Fort Collins or Loveland, CO for our county delegation. I decided to bicycle to Colorado Springs for the convention (two days, 145 miles) and then take the bus back. On the way back, the bus broke down ~20 miles from Fort Collins and we were stopped on I-25 with a broken down bus. While there was a rescue bus on the way, some passengers decided to phone family and get picked up. This gave me the idea that since my bike was in the cargo hold, I could also ride home rather than wait. So I got my gear and biked the rest of the way home.

All I can say is I am grateful for the services provided by Transwa here in Western Australia, which I have used numerous times to get to a starting point to ride back home.

My only ever niggle was a grumpy bus driver in Kalgoorlie which was arguing he couldn't carry by bike (he could and he did and I had booked and paid the fee) oh and well because there is a train service from Kalgoorlie to Perth there is no bus on this route. The train does not bikes so the trip to Kalgoorlie involves a seven hour detour to Esperance, an overnight stay and then a few hours on the bus to Kalgoorlie or vice versa. Only had to do it once, so not the end of the world.

by https://www.flickr.com/photos/aushiker/, on Flickr

The white sand beach almost makes up for it.

It depends on the route and the stations you are leaving from and going to. Prior to last year all my Amtrak bike trips were with a boxed bike. But last summer rode on a route that did not require boxing the bike. I pasted the below from a post I made last summer:
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Maybe you have had better luck with airlines than I have had. Photo below is in Minneapolis airport at 3am when Delta decided that I should spend 24 hours in the airport instead of get to my destination on time. If you have been in the Minneapolis airport, you probably have been where I took the photo but during normal hours that area is packed with hundreds of travelers rushing from concourse to concourse.

OP: Things happen. But Greyhound promising multiple times that a rescue bus was coming and it never arriving, is unforgiveable. If a bus had actually been coming, they would have been in contact with it. Either a bus was never coming, or it passed you by because full. One or the other.

The bus: Prevost used to make a real quality bus. But you don't want to just sit and idle that one. Old workhorse MCI 102-DL3 was the last that had radiators designed like the old days of dirt roads; The radiator was the top half of the rear and full width, huge, pulled in air high from the sides, through the radiator, and blew the hot air straight out the back via two enormous sucking fans driven by huge fan belts from the engine, could not be better. Both MCI and Prevost got rid of that design to save a couple feet aft length for more passengers. So now they have a radiator lower left side of the engine compartment with half the intake area and twice the thickness (which doesn't work, as that air halfway in is then already hot), with a puller fan on the inside *blowing the hot air directly onto the hot engine*, TERRIBLE system. When moving fast enough, the air flowing under the engine compartment is enough to vent things. But stopped, no, they overheat. Dumb@sses. They had a good design, them 102-DL3s would power up mountains all day and not overheat. And they don't educate the drivers about this, who are willing to idle the bus all day so they don't have to turn the key to start it again. It's not 20 below where it might be hard to start an old diesel.

I'd REALLY publicize this particular Greyhound screwup. It really seems like no help was coming and they just waited for you all to disappear on your own.

EDIT: Too bad Pete B no longer runs DOT, he'd be worth writing to. But still, transport, I think Greyhound never sending a rescue bus may have violated the law or CFRs. Talk to a lawyer.

EDIT: I think the law recently changed with airlines, that they must offer you a refund, not just a voucher for another flight. May also apply to buses. Look online for info and also talk to a lawyer. Here's an article about flights, my memory was right:
https://www.cnn.com/travel/new-feder...ash/index.html

My flight through Minneapolis next month was supposed to have a 3 hour layover. Delta changed the schedule. It’s now 5 hours. The last time I flew through there I found an out of the way spot, set my phone alarm and took a nice nap on the floor. Planning to do the same this year. My morning will start around 3 am, so it should not be hard to sleep.

Depends which Amtrak service you ride. Services like the Pennsylvanian, Keystone and Vermonter are easy. You simply hand your bike to a member of the crew of the Pennsylvanian and he or she hangs it on a hook in the baggage car. On the other two trains, you walk on with your bike and stow it in the designated area. Try doing that on a plane.

I had to do that on a layover in Cleveland in the wee hours, airport was pretty much shut down after midnight. I knew about it in advance, had packed my Thermarest, easily found a quiet place and slept.

Earlier that same day, 3 hour layover in Denver, I put on my running gear and went for a jog.

Maybe I am the lucky one. I have used buses maybe 5 or 6 times over the decades and never had any major delays, damage, etc. The strangest I got was when a Jefferson bus stopped in some small itty bitty town in Minnesota and all of a about half the bus (all Mexicans) got off the bus and literally ran away leaving their luggage. Only a few were supposed to get off. While the bus driver was trying to figure out what to do because of the left behind luggage (could not bring it with him and he didn't want to just leave beside the road), a guy in a pickup pulled up and said he would take the luggage. So all those remaining had to get off and claim their luggage so the left over luggage could go to the pickup guy. We reloaded our luggage and on our way. About a 30-45 minute delay overall. Other than that, have had no issues though I freely admit a "People on Greyhound" could definitely outdo the People of Walmart website as to strange folks.

I’m scheduled to arrive at MSP at 8:04 AM. Maybe I’ll pack my mattress in my carry on luggage.

OK, Greyhound isn't the same company as it was 10 years ago. An investment group bought the whole shebang for one reason, the real estate holdings.

Some cities still had stations in desirable high dollar neighborhoods. Other cities, not so much. Unless there was a local or federal subsidy, Greyhound sold off all the properties and used curbside service like a city bus.

They probably meant to shut down completely but the feds realize they provide a needed transportation network between under serviced areas, so more federal dollars.

Their busses are the worst. The drivers are overworked and usually contract employees (saving the company on insurance, etc.)

I was recently forced to take a greyhound to Nashville after a car broke down. I sat next to an ex-employee who spelled the whole thing out. Its a shame, but thats the Gordon Gecko way. Find a company worth more in pieces than whole, buy and divide, regardless of the outcome to those who work there or the customers who depended on them.

[QUOTE=Tourist in MSN;23530197]It depends on the route and the stations you are leaving from and going to. Prior to last year all my Amtrak bike trips were with a boxed bike. But last summer rode on a route that did not require boxing the bike. I pasted the below from a post I made last summer:
.

I am the everyman, basically poor, I just don't like Greyhound. For you to imply that I am some elitist, is offensive to me. I probably spend more time rubbing elbows with the masses than you ever will, in many third world countries, as well as in my own back yard. That I do not like Greyhound has nothing to do with insulating me from the masses. I have spent time rubbing elbows with the masses in countries you will probably never see, in Asia, Africa, South America, and Europe, though the Europeans probably do not qualify as your everyman, and I enjoy my time spent with the people I encounter. My job takes me to these places, not my wallet, and I do it often. Go ahead, continue to prejudge. You took a joke post of mine and turned it into something other than what it was.

At 3am, a bit difficult to find any food service that is not a vending machine. And most of the seating has arm rests designed to make sure that nobody can use them to sleep. I do not recall if the mezzanine area was locked or not, but for some reason I did not use it. That was a decade ago when I was stranded there for a day.

I used to fly a lot for work, this website was pretty bare bones when I was flying. But now it is much better. Just in case this comes in handy for you:
https://www.sleepinginairports.net/g...port-guide.htm

A decade ago I found a coin op locker that I could store my carry on bag for the day I was at the airport, but I do not remember exactly where it was now. I think renting the locker was over $10, but for a full day I did not want to be hauling around my carry on bag.

This is a different thread and I can't do it every time, but for me Amtrak *is* a preferred alternative to flying. Less boxing/unboxing, seats with legroom, etc. So I've done that more often than riding the bus. I've filled in with one-way car rentals vs. flying in some other cases. A drawback not mentioned above I have for the bus is the seats can also be more cramped to fit a 6'4" inch person.

On those overnight sleeps in an airport, I've been most comfortable if I can bring an inflatable and a pillow. The seats are often hit/miss due to both arm rests and hard surfaces.

I thought I had that problem licked one time by booking an in-airport hotel in Atlanta. The problem was the in-airport hotel was inside the concourse. Delta didn't want to check my bike or luggage all the way through to my destination because the layover was ~10 hours. So that meant receiving my gear - somehow finding some place to store the bike or taking it and gear into the back through security to the concourse hotel. So instead I cancelled the in-concourse hotel and went to the international terminal and created a "fort" with bike box and slept behind it on the floor.

I also had a different time when I was connecting overnight in LAX to an international flight to Manilla. Again, too long to book my bike through to destination. In that time I found a service that came with a van, picked up my bike to store overnight and then rode the local city bus to hotel not too far away for the night.

I'll put that in carry on, too. (See the photo in the Insomniac thread.) I remember MSP having lots of space to stretch out on the floor where you were not in the way. I will also keep my Kindle with me.