Guatemala isn’t the only country where highway travel sucks!

from Tom, Broomfield, Colorado

I spent eight years teaching in China and got to see much of the country, traveling to lesser-known spots, such as you favor doing. One thing I enjoyed tremendously about your ride to El Salvador, was your inclusion of highway numbers on your route. While reading, I followed along on Google Maps and had a sense of being on the trip with you. I easily found Highway 12 and could visualize your description of the major bottleneck. Many of my trips in China used multi-modal transportation methods and frequently incorporated hitchhiking. As I read about each of your delays, I tried to think of what I might have done differently, had I anticipated the delay (which I admit, you couldn’t).

A few years after the 2008 Sichuan, China earthquake, I was in Sichuan Province, traveling one way from Jiuzhaigou (valley of nine villages), one of China’s most beautiful national parks to Chengdu, the provincial capital. At that time, there were only two buses per week, and one took twice as long as the other. I had no choice but to take the longer one due to my departure date. Because of my poor communication ability in rural China, I could not understand why my bus was going to take 14 hours instead of approximately seven.

We were making good time for the first five or six hours, and, by my calculation, we were within about two hours of Chengdu when the shit hit the fan. The traffic came to a standstill when we approached the town closest to the 2008 earthquake’s epicenter. I think it was five years later and the country was still clearing the debris from the highway. We spent hours trading the sole lane with oncoming traffic. Instead of queuing in a single lane while waiting, many drivers from the rear advanced to the front of the line to gain an advantage. This, of course, required untangling the mess when the oncoming stream of opposite-direction vehicles arrived. This comedy repeated itself every time another one-lane situation presented itself. I later found out that the shorter-duration trip on a different day of the week, traveled on a more easterly route, avoiding the earthquake mess. 

158 earthquake relief workers were killed in landslides as they tried to repair roads near the earthquake’s epicenter.  Maybe that’s one reason it took them years to clear and fix the highway.

A collapsed building at the Ying Xiu Middle School was destroyed with children inside during the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.  It now forms part of a solemn memorial.  Photo by Will Mahoney, 2012.

 

I also spent a year in Senegal (West Africa).  I took only one long car trip by myself. It sounds like their transportation system in Senegal is a variation of the Guatemalan version you described. In lieu of intercity busses, they have parking lots with cars lined up in lanes, each one going to a distinct destination. You grab a seat in the lead lane car for your destination, and when the car is overfilled, they depart. I couldn’t get the front seat for my trip, but I did grab a door seat in the second row. The guy in the middle tried to wrangle it from me and eventually did so when the last passenger for the third-row seating arrived. My middle-row partner and I both refused to be the first to reenter the middle row, thus forfeiting the window seat. The driver got so pissed off, he announced he was leaving without us. This resulted in a game of chicken which I lost to the other passenger.

 

Comment from Will:  Yup, Tom’s travel situation in Senegal reminds me of my experiences travelling in Niger (West Africa) when I was a Peace Corps volunteer in 1989-90.  Public transport was by often-rickety vans called “dix-sept places” (17 seats, in French).  Yeah, 17 – hahaha.  I never rode in one that had less than 22 passengers and oftentimes there would be people hanging out the door because the vans were so crowded.  And – no surprise – they often broke down in the middle of nowhere!  Ah, the joys of travel in developing countries!