Jovvi's Bus Ride!

The Gautrain station is known for its, well trains, kinda obvious really, but did you know they have a bus service as well? I wondered what it would be like to take one of their nifty looking buses? I haven't been on a bus in ages!! What do you suppose it would be like? Well, here's a bit of a nibble for you to find out as Jovvi does her first Gautrain bus ride!!!

The buses are kept inside the train station parking lot. A rather creepy, dismal place that has a dark and ominous feeling to it. Hey, what would happen if there was a power failure and all the lights went out? It was with a little trepidation that I set foot inside and began to scan the rows of buses for the chariot that would take me to heaven on earth, namely home and a soft bed!

Here it is!! Doesn't it look lovely?! Quite a posh little bus! But oh, 12 minutes until it leaves the station! Let's explore around a bit! For those who'd like to know, the bus station did not smell of dank and mildew and bodies long forgotten as I sort of hoped it would.

Yip this is definitely our bus! Either that or the suburb of Randburg has gotten really small lately! This is the second pic I took! The first one had the flash on and succeeded in blinding me so much that for a moment I couldn't see hair nor hide of anything and may well have wandered into the road and been mercilessly flattened! Except of course that I just stood still and the glare eventually went away! Hence why this is called Jovvi's Bus Ride and not Jovvi's Trip to The Morgue!

I think movie blokes could do an awesome chase scene down  and around these pillars! Bad guys shooting, people swearing, kids screaming and dodging between buses! It could be just like the average South African political get together!

When we entered the maw of the bus I received a nasty shock! I was told the ride is R12, which it was, IF, ah the catch, IF you'd already caught the Gautrain in the last hour. If not then it shot up to R20! Day light robbery and I wasn't even in the daylight!

Inside the bus! It was pretty empty so a choice of seats were mine for the taking! And one of these fine looking, if rather narrow and uncomfortable, seats ended up with my end up on it! The sign you see above the bus assured us that the next stop was Sandton! Brilliant! Well it would have been only we had just come from Sandton! :P

I sat opposite the seat they'd stashed the fire extinguisher under. I happily regaled stories of bursting extinguishers and tanks and what would happen to the person on the chair if it ever did go KER-BLEWY!!!! 

I then suddenly had the urge to move to another seat.

Ok the pics not great, but this shadowy hulk would be the train station. I snapped the pic as we whizzed past. Granted you can't see much of it, but aren't those clouds something?

Here we are stuck in traffic! Now it's not so fun being stuck in traffic, lordy don't we know it, but it is kinda nice if you know YOU aren't the one driving, or the one who has to pay attention. Drive forward my good man and pedestrians? Let god sort em out!! 

What is there to do on a bus? Well I:

looked out the window, 

speculated about the people on the bus, 

speculated about the people not on the bus, 

remembered previous bus rides, 

compared it to the ride I had in a truck once, 

complimented them on having nice low straps that us short people could hold onto if we had to, 

worried about the price of  petrol, 

wondered what exactly the difference between petrol and diesel is?

dissed people who used diesel,

favoured my listeners with tales of my childhood not at all related to buses,

mentioned I was hungry,

watched a lady demand to get off the bus before the stop and asked her silently if she'd like us to get her laundry at the same time?

and wondered if I could get away with dancing naked on the golf course to New Age twinkly music... 

And all the time that "Next Station: Sandton" sign flicked reassuringly above our heads.

Gautrain ride - September 1 2011

Guess what? Guess what? Guess what?!
I got to ride the Gautrain for the first time ever, ever, ever, last Thursday! Now it was already my first day of work, so there was excitement enough, but then to have to go on the train all by my lonesome? What if I got lost? Got on the wrong train and ended up in Albuquerque?!
It was terribly exciting!! Want to go on a virtual ride with me?

Well then first we need to get you a ticket! Well a card more likely! You go to these semi-automatic teller type machines, where a bored guard who looks like he's seen it all in life and nothing could surprise him, helps you select the amount to put on the card and which buttons to press that won't cause a serious malfunction and have you being taken into the station where a duo of "Good cop, Creepy cop" give you a cavity search!
The amount on the card then gets deducted each time you swipe it to enter or leave a station! We're all loaded up - let's RIDE!!

The stations are actually very well marked and I think you'd have to work at it to get lost. Worse comes to worse, you'll get to see a whole 'nother side of Joburg in the complete opposite direction of where you were going! And even then the trains are so fast, stop frequently and kinda tell you where you're going, so chances are you could do all that and still get to the office for that annoying 9am meeting you just HAVE to chair!

Here comes the train!! "Stand back from the edge" intones the pre-recorded female voice. I suppose people falling onto the tracks and getting squished would be a bother, it's hard to remove bone fragments from those tiny wheels...
Race you on!!

Here are some of my travelling companions from my first ride ever! They're a bit blurry cause the jolting of the train is not a photographer's friend! Funny thing was that there were some open seats but people got spooked and decide they'd rather stand then sit near strangers. I got to stand right by the door and freak out this skittish lady with my cell phone snaps! (She has nice hair don't you think?)

On my ride back home the train was much emptier and I got to sit down. I tell you, standing is way more fun! It feels like you're surfing, whereas sitting makes you just feel lazy! The chairs are pretty comfie and clean. You get an R700 fine if you smoke, eat or drink on the train! Hooray!! I mean you never know what's out there in the dark tunnels and anything that reduces my chances of being set on by giant mutant cockroaches is grand by my standards!

This pic gives you an idea of the speed of the train. The frame is all in focus and dandy but wow, check out how fast that grass is just whizzing by! I think it goes around 160km an hour but it really feels more like 60 - 80km! Deceptive!!

Below is a pic of the warning sign on the sliding door, reminding people that the doors are automatic and that, should you decide to lean on them in abject bliss, well, falling out will be your own problem! (And whomever the luckless CSI chap is who removes the bone fragments, please don't overwork our police force!)

But it is sort of nice to just look out the window and day dream the trip away...

Oh here is our station and so soon!


Wasn't that fun? The real life thing is so much better! Want to ride with me next time? We can have a grand old gossip about terrible train accidents and OH MY GOD WHAT'S THAT SOUND?!?!?!?!