Two New Experiences; a Sleeper Bus and a Chinese Dorm

I took a sleeper bus from Dali to Kunming on Friday night.  There were no sleeper train tickets available so I decided I needed the experience of a sleeper bus.  What I had heard of them was OK so I wasn’t concerned.  I just forgot that I don’t sleep on moving vehicles.

 

The purple line shows the route between Dali and Kunming

I was told to report to the travel agency where I bought the ticket and I would be taken to meet the bus.  I wasn’t too keen on that as the travel agency was in the centre of the old city.  The old city is pedestrian only and covered in cobble stones.  My pull along bag doesn’t like uneven surfaces so it was looking like an ordeal.  Soon after leaving the travel agency I walked past a leather shop and walked out with a new bag which takes cobble stones with ease. It solved the problem of inadequate luggage space and cobble stones, but has created new ones for when I have to lift or carry it.

I arrived at the travel agency early and waited.  I was then escorted to the edge of the city to meet the bus which had already arrived.  Words and pictures in the travel agency showed smart looking German buses.  What I travelled in was a Daewoo which was so old that the non slip steel plate on the steps had worn through. It had about 6 rows of double-decker steel bunks along each side with 5 rows in the centre.  The back seemed to consist of a row of adjoining beds. The beds were narrow but adequate and the mattress was reasonably thick.  The doona could have done with a wash long ago. I had asked for a bottom bunk and was allocated the one closest to the door. The bunk opposite me was for the drivers.

 

Part of the interior of the bus

The bus did not leave for over half an hour as it waited for late passengers.  Passengers and friends got on and off the bus and it was a bit of a circus.  More passengers arrived. Eventually we set off with 2 drivers and a conductor. We stopped at the new town of Dali known as Xiaguan where we collected a few more passengers and exchanged a driver.  Fortunately he took his incense with him.

We dropped the conductor off somewhere in Xiaguan and set off again.  The resting driver sat on a stool and chatted to driver while they both smoked.  Later he retired to bed.  Initially we travelled on 2 lane toll roads (China is littered with toll roads) with a bit of a delay while all of the covered trucks, the bulk of the traffic, were filtered off by police for some sort of checking.  Later we and every other bus and truck, of which there were countless numbers, turned off the highway onto a 2 lane mostly unpaved, potholed mountain road.  We passed endless collections of small settlements and accommodations made from “stripy bag material.” (The same synthetic material that very large blue, red and white stripy bags found in shops in Australia are made from.)  Fortunately there was almost no traffic going the opposite direction.  The buses age did not prevent it from overtaking everything it encountered.  After some hours we stopped at a petrol station.  The drivers swapped over and we set off on a 4-6 lane highway for the remainder of the trip.  I’d been told I would arrive in Kunming around 6.30am, but the driver’s speedy work on the mountain roads meant we arrived before 5am.    A bossy woman bundled me into a minivan, after we’d agreed on price, and I was driven to my hostel.

It is summer time and tourist spots in China are popular and it has become difficult to get various bookings.  Hence I was unable to have a private room for the first night.  The only bed available was in a 10 bed mixed dorm.  The room was large and the beds were wide with the bottom bunks, which I had, having good storage.  However, like most Chinese dorm beds the mattress was fairly thin and as it was on a wooden base I found it hard.  Combined with the heat it was not a particularly satisfactory sleep.  Most of the others kept very late hours and while they were fairly quiet it was still not conducive to good sleep. I have my own room for 2 nights and then have to move to a 4 person dorm for one night. 

Beds in the dorm.   It even had steps instead of ladders. The steps opened for storage.  An electronically locked cupboard was under the bottom bunk and available with each bed.