Okay so an overnight stay on a bus is not the way to do it.
We hardly slept. We arrived in Cleveland at 3am and the initial plan was to pop
into town for the day. Our connecting bus to Niagara Falls was only due to depart
much later that same day. We locked up our luggage, (which cots more than buying new luggage) and opened up our Uber app.
No sun, No Uber.
Believe this: Not everywhere in the USA has Uber. Some large
towns don’t even have it. We walked out of the bus station with not one single
Uber within a 50 mile radius. Damn it. We are hungry, tired, smelly and
starting to really work on each other’s nerves.
Another balls up is that we don't have a sim card (remember from Day 2?) so I had to run after the bus as it departed to keep my wifi connected. Literally jogging after the bus as my only form of internet connectivity. That failed. So, we had to wait for the next bus to come into the station and repeat the homeless-wifi process. I stalked bus after bus for about an hour before giving up, all the while Barbara is passed out on the bags in the bus station. Not much of a security guard.
Fortunately a very friendly security lady called a friend
of hers who owns a metered cab to come and pick us up. The fare was reasonable
and he dropped us off at the only 24 hour food spot we could find on google. So
picture this: it is around 4am. Pitch black outside. Barbara and I are looking worse
for wear and we stumble in from the street into this restaurant. We sat down
and ordered some water. The waitress gave us both the eye and said “Just water
huh?” then we clicked how this must look: “No, no sorry maam. We are not
hobo’s. We are tourists, we just need a place for breakfast and somewhere to sit
until sunrise.”
We ate breakfast and now, being more central and with the
sun in the sky, managed to summon an Uber. Our plan is to head up the hill to the
closest laundromat. The clothes on our back were starting to get a little…erm…crusty,
never mind the clothes in the bags.
24 Hour Laundromat, 2 Star Accommodation
We ended up at a 24 hour laundromat. Parked off in the far corner, we chucked in a few quarters and literally fell asleep on the floor next to the
machines. I cornered Barbara in, she used a bag as a pillow and we were asleep for about an hour…or however long the wash cycle was. Shoved the cloths into a
tumble drier and went straight back to sleep. At one stage there was definitely
some lady that walked in, walked up to us, said something I can’t recall and
then disappeared. Odd little experience.
With clean and tumble dried clothes we walked to a shopping center (how I miss that Harley)
and watched a movie at the local
AMC. Oh, the comfort of a cinema chair. We ate some cinema nachos for lunch.
Just what the body needs after falling asleep on a laundromat floor hey.
Walk of Life
After that we headed out to the center of Cleveland town,
had a little walk about the tower City Center and found out that the Rock and
Roll Hall of Fame is nearby. Walk, walk, walk and did I mention I miss the
Harley?
The hall of fame is right on the lakes edge. An impressive
structure with a great museum come entertainment center. We couldn’t afford
admission to the center so, in true Saffa style, we just used their bathrooms
and loitered about.
Walked even more down to the waters edge and walked back into
town again for a roof top bar drink. Then we walked through the Play House
Square which has some pretty awesome art pieces, smashed in a bucket of Coronas
and (you guessed it) walked back to the Grey Hound station. Big day. Feeling it
in those calf muscles.
Our last little section by bus. This time we had a dog on board, a grumpy scank lady taking up 4 seats and a bust heater. All of that aside, with being awake for 20 hours and 20 odd miles of walking under the belt, this time we slept like babies. It is a few hours up to a terminal in Buffalo that dispatches a smaller bus to Niagara Falls.
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