Riding The Greyhound Bus

Do you remember the Greyhound Bus? Did you ever ride the Greyhound Bus? After a trip to Southern Alberta recently and seeing many huge buses on the highways, I was reminded of several of the trips I took as a Greyhound Bus rider.

It all started when I was 14. My Dad drove me to the Islay corner on highway 16, bought me a ticket at Bills Service Station there and sent me on the Greyhound Bus to my aunt’s farm near Maidstone, Saskatchewan. If you ever travelled on the bus, you would remember all the stops they made. Every little community had a Greyhound Bus Stop. I wouldn’t have known it at the time, but it added possibly “hours” to the trip. The other passengers seemed suspended between places and times, some staring out into the blur of the highway. Even though I didn’t drink coffee as a kid, the scent of coffee seemed a familiar friend that day accompanied by the turning of pages of a book as I remembered my mom engrossed in a book with a cup of coffee at home. The driver had on a dark uniform and cap and handled the curves in the highway with practiced ease; his face reflected in the rear-view mirror every few minutes. The engine’s drone blurred the stories of everyone on board. A young man trying to strike up a conversation with a woman who was scribbling in a battered notebook, and across from them an elderly woman knitting something in its early stages. If we hadn’t had so many stops along the way, the engine’s hum and the gentle sway of the bus might have coaxed me to sleep, but at that age, I didn’t want to miss anything. After all it was my first trip! Some time in the afternoon, the big bus maneuvered into the bus stop and through the wide window at my seat, I saw my aunt and uncle waiting for me.

I had only a few trips by Greyhound over the years. If there is one thing I liked about riding on the GreyDog it would be the view. Looking out the wide windows, I could see well above the tops of cars and small trucks and far out into the countryside. This panoramic view was unobstructed as we rolled along the highway. It’s a vantage point you rarely experience in everyday travel unless you’re a truck driver.

My last trip on the Greyhound was from Calgary to Vermilion. When the driver called for boarding a wave of people surged forward. The bus filled quickly with little space to spare. Some passengers were larger than life, and the narrow, cushioned seats seemed to shrink under them. For those sitting beside them, personal space became a luxury. I made the best of close quarters but let me say, the stop in Red Deer that day was a welcome break. Finally, we arrived in Edmonton. The air felt crisp and spacious as I stepped off the bus. My transfer to the Vermilion eastbound Greyhound bus was already loading and it had many less passengers. It was nighttime and immediately the glow of traffic and shimmering lights marked civilization along the route. The distant flicker of streetlights and neon signs punctuated towns coming and going.

I thank God that I never witnessed any violence on my travels as reported by other travelers. On my Greyhound bus journeys, the experience became as memorable as the destination. Don’t get me wrong, I love my own vehicle, I prefer my own vehicle. I am very grateful to come and go as I please, but I wanted to share a positive story about bus travel. Fact is, in 2018, Greyhound pulled out of Western Canada. On May 13, 2021, Greyhound Canada permanently suspended their operations in all of Canada.