Crowds are flooding Washington, D.C, in preparation for tomorrow’s inauguration celebration. That includes hundreds of Chicago area residents riding a caravan of buses organized by Congressman Danny Davis. WBEZ’s Ben Calhoun is tagging along on one of the buses. Already about 6 hours behind schedule, Calhoun says the bus driver pulled over after an engine warning light came on.

CALHOUN: Right now I’m on the side of the highway, waiting for the other buses to come back and pick us up. I don’t know what that’s going to mean, because all the other buses are full, so where we’re going to put people I have no idea, but apparently they’re on their way back to get us right now. Everybody on the bus is very optimistic, people on the bus are praying and they’re hoping that we’re going to get there still.

Update: Later in the afternoon, Calhoun and the other passengers were taken to a service station in rural Pennsylvania.

CALHOUN: Once it was clear that the bus wasn’t going to start again or be fixed relatively quickly, people started singing songs, making up words to songs like, ‘Please fix my bus, won’t my bus be fixed?’ I think everybody’s going to grab a hot dog or a Cinnabon and hang out for who knows how long.