Preface Next Day Journal Home Gear List Home
This is the third trip for this year, but unlike the other two, this wasn't a road trip, but a hiking and backpacking trip. The Pacific Crest Trail or PCT begins in Campo, California; however, a 36-hour Greyhound bus ride would have to rendezvous me with San Diego.
The large urban bus stations have a certain mystique- I can’t guess whether this was good or bad. It was both similar and unlike the airport: In one sense, there were many travelers, however, on another sense, much less organize. It’s like the mall in a way also: a place to see people, but not a place to hang around on a hot day.
A Vietnamese man claiming he was abandoned by the people he was with asked for money for a bus ride back to Beaumont, Texas. I determined by his tattered shoes and fresh clothes, he was most likely a local. Initially, he asked for $3.00 of the $12.00 cost. "I would like to help, but this is obviously a scam since he asked for so much," I considered. The man must have singled me out since I was also Vietnamese because he didn't ask other travellers for money. Then he started to ask for less and less to no avail. He walked away politely thanking me, making me blameworthy inside as though I had just turned down a hungry child panhandling for food. As the bus left the station, I saw him walking across the street.
The long trip will pass through San Antonio, Fort Stockton, El Paso, Tucson, Phoenix, El Cajon, and many small cities. The crowded 10:00 pm bus out of Houston was not a problem except I sat adjacent to the restroom. None of the Greyhounds I've been on had running water in the restrooms, but luckily I can generally wait until breakpoints or transfer stations (terminals).
In Fort Stockton, the border patrol came on the bus, but no one was taken into custody. The uniforms would be a common fixture at certain junctions on buses this far close to Mexico. Each person would have to speak in English declaring his citizenship, and for those who were questionable, those individuals carried some form of documentation. I didn't peek to see if people were displaying their driver's license or green card or supermarket card or Blockbuster video rental card. I suppose an Asian would most likely not sneak through Mexico to get into the United States, so I was never hassled.
The bus ended the Texas marathon at El Paso, a city I've driven through 2 or 3 times, but never actually visited thoroughly. Because of a one hour, twenty-five minutes layover, I walked down the street to discover a tourist area where merchants sold mainly clothing and stuff generally found at the dollar store. It was fun to walk down the street in the late spring heat.
Sitting down at the El Paso terminal, I was promptly greeted by a man who asked for change. The guy looked very capable of working, maybe not the job he’d like, but he was very capable of working. No change here today.
Immediately before pulling out of the El Paso station, a young Mexican woman hopped onboard the bus asking if anyone has seen her daughter. There was a look of anguish and urgency as though she would break down in tears soon, and it deeply troubled me. Unfortunately, her daughter was not on the bus and the station was fairly empty at this point. Where could her daughter be? Recently, in the news, there have been 2 or 3 high profile incidents of child abductions.
To be honest, I had lost most of the desire to start the PCT
thru-hike. The ticket leaving Houston
was purchased only 4 days ago, almost the minimum time to get the cheapest
Greyhound fares. Somewhere between the
dream and the reality, something got lost. Nevertheless, I knew regrets would settle in if I didn’t set foot
on the PCT and make an effort.