The best bus ever

The best bus ever
Jason Sievers' awesome Art in Transit bus

Saturday, December 30, 2006

Boldly going where I've never gone before

I decided to break in my new pass yesterday by taking the bus somewhere I'd never taken it before: Bown Crossing, the upscale little neighborhood in southeast Boise where I had a coffee date at 2:30.

It was a pretty easy trip. I left my house at 1:25 and walked five minutes to take the #3 Vista downtown. Once there, I got off the bus to transfer to the #1 Park Center. Whoops! Turns out the Vista bus becomes the Park Center bus downtown. Sheepishly, I got back on. The bus left downtown at 1:45 with about a dozen passengers. I got off at the corner of Boise and Law about 2 p.m. and walked seven minutes to Kessler's Cafe at Bown Crossing, where I arrived a good 20 minutes before I needed to.

Walking back, I was pretty sure I would miss the bus since it was a few minutes after after 4 p.m. and the bus was supposed to be at Federal Way and Bergeson by 4:05. But like me, the driver was running a few minutes late. If I had missed the bus, I could've taken the inbound #1 to the BSU campus, about a 15-minute walk from my house, rather than wait a half-hour for the next outbound bus.

The bus arrived at the airport at 4:19 and again became the #3 Vista. (Hey, I am catching on here.) The three passengers and driver waited five minutes. No one got off or on. We departed at 4:25 and I was back at my home stop at 4:30.

The fact is, I probably wouldn't have done this trip on most days. It would have been far easier and faster just to drive. But on a sunny late December day when I actually had time on my hands, I didn't mind at all.

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