London to Calcutta by Bus (2022)

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London to Calcutta by Bus (2022)

CGMthrowaway

Comments (31)

lmm
Needs (2022), in particular for this part:> Now more than forty years later, an India-based travel operator Adventures Overland announced a bus service from New Delhi to London and back, covering 20,000 km and travelling through 18 countries in 70 days. The service was supposed to start in 2021, but got delayed, probably due to the Covid pandemic. The first bus is expected to leave in April next year.I wondered what route they were planning, because Iran is still pretty unwelcoming to Brits (funny how overthrowing their government will do that to you), and turns out the plan was to head East through Burma and then Northwest through China and eventually Russia. Obviously there are a couple of problems with that now.
merelysounds
This bus route has its own Wikipedia page, well deserved too:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London%E2%80%93Calcutta_bus_se...
rsynnott
> One even went as far as Sydney. The last leg of the journey from India to Sydney was made on ship.Did this... really have to be pointed out? :)
6Az4Mj4D
Thank you for sharing. It seems bus is enjoying fully.Really good tires, battery and passenger butts to endure such a long journey in the bus :)
drumhead
The world seems to have become smaller since then. Many places on that route are at war, unstable, unfriendly. Where there would have been curiosity and friendliness there's hostility now.
testing22321
There is still more than one company that runs a bus from London to Nairobi via Cape Town.
Markoff
this is more up-to-date experience - overland from Portugal through Turkey, Iran, Pakistan to India and to Chinahttps://www.thelongestwayhome.com/resources/overland/my-over...I wanted to do central europe to India overland ~20 years ago, even got Iranian visa, but Pakistani embassy was doing me problems, so in the end just flew from Turkey to Indiagetting from Prague/Bratislava to Istanbul is like 1 transfer in Sofia (still works in 2026, there is Flixbus from Bratislava to Sofia for like 50EUR for 17 hours ride)similar with trans-siberian railway, back in the days you hopped on train from Budapest to Moscow, switched for trans-siberian/manchuarian railway and you could be with 1 transfer from Budapest in Vladivostok/Beijing
tobi_bsf
Back then, people taking those buses enjoyed life more than most do today.
kleiba2
Pure adventure!> The journey took fifty days......so not for the working folks.
voidUpdate
How did the bus drive from England to mainland Europe? I'm not sure I'd class the journey as "by bus" if it also includes ferries