Well, after Detroit I think a landfill would have held more joy and delight for me. However I never dreamed that Indianapolis would be as nice as it was. At the bus station there were no people hanging around outside and as I walked into downtown there were loads of people around and the streets were lined with restaurants, bars and shops. It was like culture shock after the desolation of Detroit.

There is a hostel four miles out of downtown so I caught a local bus up to it. All the way up College Ave I was looking out at the beautiful, colourful houses. There was the occasional house that was tatty or boarded up but it didn't spoil the overall effect that this was a nice place.

The hostel itself was lovely. It is a converted house and the people running it are a lovely couple. There was only one other guest so it hasn't quite got into high season yet.

The weather was beautiful the whole time I was there. I had one full day to explore town. I started the day off with in Monument Circle (see the photo) sitting on the steps eating lunch. It was the day before the Democratic nomination vote in Indiana so there were people out campaigning for Clinton and Obama, and a guy with a placard saying "Iraq needs an American style Electoral College". I felt like going over and suggesting that what they needed more urgently was stability and an end to the civil war, but I didn't. I found a canal walk on the edge of downtown as well that was very popular with joggers and walkers like me.

I loved Indianapolis, it's the nicest place I've been to so far. The only bad thing to happen to me was some guy trying to sell me a necklace at a bus stop. Otherwise I didn't do anything particularly exciting... which leaves me plenty of time to tell you about the crazy people I encountered.

The bus journey from Detroit involved a transfer in Dayton, Ohio. After getting some lunch in a place simply called Cheeseburgers And Cold Beer I waited in the bus station quietly reading my book until a crazy lady came through the doors from the buses shouting "Security! Security!" The woman behind the ticket counter asked what the problem was. The lady said there were two guys on her bus calling her Cyclops (because she only had one eye) and she wanted them removed. She was shouting a lot and saying "no one calls me Cyclops and gets away with it".

After a few seconds an enormous woman who represented security at the station appeared and the three of them went out to the bus where the crazy lady again loudly expressed her concerns, which included getting on the bus and shouting at the alleged miscreants. She was getting more aggressive and I think at this point they told her she wasn't getting back on the bus and they all came back in as the bus departed. Over at the ticket counter some further discussion happened that further enraged the already annoyed lady. She came over right near me to the telephones (at which point I stared intently at my book to avoid eye contact) and she shouted "two can play at that game" and I saw her dial 911.

She explained, suddenly in a more controlled voice, to the operator that she had been called names on a bus and now the staff were refusing to sell her another ticket from this station. She shouted some more and then waited out front. If I was to describe her I would say that apart from having one eye she also had a mullet haircut, a baggy grubby white T-shirt that her stomach hung out the bottom of and a gruff voice. Your typical decent citizen then. The police arrived and defused the situation somehow and we never saw her again.

There was also a very expressive woman talking loudly on the payphone to someone, presumably her boyfriend, behind me. I gathered from what I couldn't help overhearing that there was some friction between the two of them and the possibility of another guy who was competing for her affection. She quieted down the concerned guy by telling him "I'm tryin' to be wit' yo motherf*****' ass". I'm sure that gave him solace. I'd like to see that touching line used in the next Julia Roberts romantic comedy.

From Indianapolis I'm heading state-by-state back east to the coast now. Next stop: Cincinnati, Ohio!