That’s my first thought, and I giggled to myself at the ridiculousness of the situation. It’s 3:30am, I have just arrived in Jasper, I have nowhere booked to stay, and the bus company has just lost my bag. I’ve been on a bus for 32hrs and I am in severe need of a shower and a change of clothes. That’s not going to happen – the bus driver tells me that it must be on the bus to Edmonton, and it won’t be back through Jasper until Saturday. I had all of the gadgetry of the modern-day flashpacker in my camera bag that I carried onto the bus, but only the increasingly pongy clothes on my back to wear.

My mind flashes back to the connection at Prince George bus depot; I had the presence of snoozymind^® to walk over to the last bus and check that there was nothing left on it, but was shooed away by a bag zombie who said that no customers could be near the coach during loading. At the time I wasn’t that bothered, and quite keen to get on the next bus and resume my snooze, but now I was now kicking myself for not pressing the matter and keeping eyes on my bag.

I sat on a bench and got my Mac onto the WiFi at the closed train station. I had received an email from Mike at the WTF hostel, which I’d booked for the following night, saying that I could just grab a bed in the dorm when I get in as there are beds free. Top bloke. I headed there and got a few hours kip in.

First thing in the morning I headed over to the Greyhound office at the train station, tooled up with indignant rage, ready to kick some metaphorical arse. I arrived to a see a little smiling old lady, who said

“Ah, Matthew? We’ve found your bag dear.”

Ah, bugger. That’s not what I was expecting. I was sort of looking forward to a ruck.

“Oh, uh, thanks!”

How, or where was a mystery to her, as it was left inside the door of the office when she got in in the morning. Regardless of how the bag fairy did her magic that night, the problem was solved. It was however a valuable experience, as I had to (for the second time this trip) go through a worst-case scenario checklist in my head.

Here are some tips for if you ever get into such a situation, and what to do upfront in order to mitigate the pain should it ever happen to you.

1. Know your cover

Are you covered by travel insurance? For total loss, just delays or both? The time that you need to know this is when you panic, that’s when you need to know if you can book into a hotel and relax until you’re thinking straight, or if you need to find a 24hr coffee place to sit in whilst you deal with the situation. Most importantly you need to check what your delayed baggage allowance is, so you know how much you can spend whilst delayed without being out of pocket in the long run.

2. Take photos of all of your stuff, including new things you buy on your travels

I was a bit anal about this and laid out all of my kit on a table before I left so that I could document what I was taking with me. But I didn’t always do this once I’d started to acquire things along the way, so if you treat yourself whilst away (to a new backpack for example) make sure that you take a photo and show off to your mates – it’ll actually come in handy if it ever goes missing and you need to prove that you owned it.

3. ALWAYS keep your passport with you when in transit. ANY form of transit.

This seems like a “duh” point, butI had been a bit lax in the previous few weeks. When I first arrived in Vancouver my passport was in a zipped pocket all the time, always on my person; I was in UK city mode. After that I had moved it to my documents folder which is too big for my camera bag so lives in my rucksack – I wasn’t crossing any national boundaries so it seemed overkill for a bus trip.

I had decided when I was in Whitehorse to rearrange my rucksack, as I had way too much crap that I didn’t need in there. In doing so I transferred my passport to my camera bag, as when I get to an airport eventually I’ll have to dig it out of my rucksack anyway and it’d save me some time in the future, as I tend to be that guy whose name gets the last call over the PA system. This turned out to be an excellent move.

It meant that when I was stranded in Alberta with nothing but gadgets, I had the “fly the **** home” option in my back pocket. That’s a nice thing to have.

4. Don’t panic

People are cool, and you can blog about it later. 😉

 (as ever, the majority of these photos have nothing to do with the post, but they were taken in Jasper!)