#busride - Saffron Walden to Cambridge, a bureaucrat sleeps in the face of calamity...

The rather late Stagecoach bus 7
to Cambridge...

Saffron Walden. Very nice, but I've got places to be, things to do. And where is my bus? Not here, on the High Street in Saffron Walden, and that's the problem. I've got a seven minute connect in Cambridge, and time's a wasting.

It arrives, six minutes late, heading in the wrong direction, which means more delay and the possibility of a missed connection, and when it does finally arrive, prospects of making the bus to Ely have receded further. Ah well, nothing to do but get on the bus and keep my fingers crossed.

Stagecoach in Cambridgeshire offer a Dayrider Plus ticket, allowing unlimited rides in and around Cambridgeshire, which costs just £6.40, and, given that I have three rides on their buses planned, it offers better value than anything else today. I've spent £25.60 on fares already, but my bus expenditure is at least at an end.

This bus is rather fuller than the others I've ridden on, and has an upper deck, so I can pick a seat at the front and admire the view. Our route takes us through the two Chesterfords and Duxford, before heading for Sawston and Trumpington, as we weave through the Cambridge suburbs.

As is typical when you're running late, fate takes an unhelpful hand, as we're caught at a level crossing on the line from Liverpool Street to Cambridge, whilst a man on a mobile phone complains about the behaviour of his ex-wife. He does, at least, give me reason to guess why she's his ex-wife...

The new car park at Addenbrooke's.
Not a car park as we know them...

Sadly, this useful bus service inexplicably avoids the outpost of the Imperial War Museum at Duxford and then, I fall asleep. It's warm, the scenery is uninspiring, and the pint I sank in Saffron Walden has its usual soporific effect. I awake at Sawston and look at the time. We're aren't making up any, and I'm going to miss the next bus.

The bus weaves through the southern end of Cambridge before heading to the Cambridge Biomedical Campus, with its particularly funky new car park. And, as usual, the traffic is less than wonderful, so my connection is doomed. I slump in my seat. What next for the travelling bureaucrat?

To add insult to injury, as I step off of the bus on Emmanuel Street, my planned connection pulls out of the Drummer Street bus station. It's late too...