Directions from pedestrians

I'm constantly amazed by the directions I get from pedestrians when I'm on
a bike. My "lost" period started out well -- a gentleman gave me very
colorful but accurate turn-by-turns (for _one_ street - it needed it) with
advice on what the idiot drivers would do, and where, and how to react.
But then I started heading home. I had been exploring the wilds of New
Jersey and my plan was to catch the PATH train home. Yahoo, of course, had
screwed something up and had the PATH station in Hoboken right on top of
something called the Bergen light rail. Incidentally, I'm pleased that
this light rail station, 9th & Congress, has become an essential part of a
gravity loop. It's a vertical rise of about 200 feet, with a large
elevator taking non-train passengers, including cyclists, up and down. So
anyway, that's where I was directed when I asked where the PATH stop was.
So when I got there, I asked someone at the actual light rail station how
to get to the PATH, and he said to take the light rail two stops. Then I
said, but where is it? And he said, oh, it's all the way on the other side
of Hoboken. He clearly didn't think the distance was bikable, and I didn't
tell him how far I'd already come. The temperature had dropped about 20
degrees (I found out later) rapidly and I wasn't thinking clearly, and I
was almost going to buy a ticket and wait on the freezing platform when I
realized that Hoboken is only _one_ square mile. No two points in the city
could be more than 1.4 miles apart. I'm now going to write 1,000 times
"have a good map at all times."

--ag