Testing out the guided bus

The challenge today was to travel to Huntingdon using the new guided busway that had been in operation since last Sunday.

I set of at about 09:50 to the Waggon & Horses Milton bus stop to catch the 10:01 No. 9 bus. It arrived 10 minutes late, though I had allowed for delays. Dropped off at the Milton Road bus stop opposite the Science Park, by Taylor Vinters. This meant a walk to the guided busway stop, five minuts away on foot. I saw one bus round the corner and disappear into the distance before I could reach the stop.

My bus arrived 6 minutes late but was soon racing along the track towards St Ives, travelling past lakes and rivers until arriving remarkably quickly at the St Ives Park and Ride. Here I had to wait for ten minutes or so for another guided bus that was travelling through to Huntingdon. Arriving at 11.21 it was a double decker, packed full with mainly elderly passengers. A whole crowd disembarked at the next stop, St Ives bus station. I used the opportunity to go upstairs for a better view as an equally long queue of passengers boarded.

In comparison to the first stretch, the journey from St Ives to Huntingdon along normal roads was painfully slow, exacerbated by the fact that the route in St Ives and through Huntingdon were both convoluted. We finally arrived at Huntingdon bus station at around 12:00.

I took a walk to the Huntingdon Indoor bowls club to put up a sign reminding people that this week, HBN was meeting informally in the library. Then it was a walk back to the centre to the library, where I arrived at 12:40.

In the end, there were six HBNers sitting around a table in the cafe in the library, engaged in conversation. Mr Wishart was amongst them and also asked for feedback on the design I had prepared for his banner.

I had to depart shortly after 14:00h with the aim of catching the 14:15 from Huntingdon to get to Swavesey. This bus was delayed a full 20 minutes, meaning that when I finally arrived at Swavesey guided bus station, at 15:30, I had missed the connecting bus that could have taken me to Over, for my meeting with Mr Beal and my Tutorcloud colleagues. The walk up the gentle hill and down into Over to Mr Beals office took 25 minutes.

By five, rain had arrived and so I gratefully accepted a lift from Mrs Farndale back to the Swavesey guided busway stop, aiming to catch the 17:43 bus back towards Cambridge. Buses were running in closely spaced groups of three in either direction at this time of the evening. Again, my bus was about 6 minutes late but speedily transported me to the Science Park bus stop. What I did miss were announcements of the next bus stop coming up as it was otherwise so easy to miss one's destination.

I walked to the conventional bus stop around the corner – which lacked a timetable so I was not sure when the next bus would come. Fortunately, the Park and Ride buses to Milton were still running and one arrived within 10 minutes. From the P&R it was then again a 10 minute walk to finally arrive home, about 75 minutes after setting off from Over.

It was an interesting day, where I spent at least four hours travelling plus another hour or so walking. My pedometer indicated an accumulation of 10,000 steps over the course of the day.