As many of you know, Leila has had quite the jet-set lifestyle during her short time on the planet. She's already been on three plane flights, on a long drive from State College to New York, and in all forms of public transit. However, on Tuesday, I added another type of trip to the list- on a long-distance, regional bus.
Although the networking I've been doing with the American Women's Club, especially the Mothers' Network, has been great, it's more difficult than I thought to get together with people. It turns out, to my dismay, that most of the women with kids live in the suburbs. So, to get together with them, I have to trek out to the 'burbs. The transportation options here are good, but sometimes getting out to these parts of the greater Helsinki area is not as straightforward or fast as one might hope. Plus, it's difficult to lug a baby all the way across town, especially if she's due for a feeding, a nap, a diaper change or some other necessity.
I wanted to get together with my friend, Amy, who lives about an hour outside Helsinki. She's been driving to the city pretty often lately and was lamenting about the cost of gas (sorry, Americans, if you think gas is expensive THERE, you should see the prices here!!). So I offered to visit her, which meant taking a regional bus.
These buses are of the Greyhound/Trailways sort, rather than the local transit sort so this was a new experience for me and Leila. On a local bus, I can just wheel Leila on in her stroller, and she can hang out there for the whole ride. The regional buses have only seats and no room for strollers (except in the hold below). So I had to take her in the baby carrier (a la Baby Bjorn) and leave the stroller at home! (Oh, and we don't get to ride the regional buses for free- darn!)
Since the bus we were taking was nearly empty, I decided to take up the last row, where there are 5 seats across. That way, I had plenty of space for myself, the diaper bag, my own bag of stuff and Leila. This worked out well because there was even room for Leila to take a nap during the journey. I just molded my coat into a little bed for her on the seat, and she snoozed away for most of the trip (see photo)! So that went much better than I expected...
Amy picked us up at the bus station in Lohja, and we put Leila in Amy's daughter's infant car seat. After playing at Amy's all day, we did the whole trip in reverse. It went pretty well that way, too, with the exception of the crazy bus driver (who weaved in and out of the lanes and braked too abruptly).
The benefit of living outside the city, as with most suburbs vs. cities, is that you can get more space and more natural surroundings. Although it was raining off and on that day, hopefully you can appreciate the beautiful views from Amy's living room. The village she lives in is quite lovely, and there are lots of trees and a lake nearby. So it was well worth the trek to get there, and it was a really nice visit with Amy.
Who knows which mode of transportation will be next- camels?
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