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Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

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Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#91

Post by [deleted] »

School-Cotton wrote: post #42
thriftwy wrote: post #21

In Russia it was at some point possible to go from St. Petersburg (Atlantic coast) to Vladivostok (Pacific coast) using only regional trains ('electrichkas'). With some skill, paying for the ride could be avoided entirely, but it would take ~28 days. Whereas a proper sleeper train does that in "just" 7 days.

That’s impressive. AFAIK in the US, the only two major cities you can get between on regional trains (i.e., without using the national train operator Amtrak) is New York and Philadelphia (New Jersey Transit from NY to Trenton, then SEPTA from Trenton to Philly). NYC and Philly are so close that they could almost be considered the same metropolitan area, so it’s not very impressive! Edit: also Baltimore and Washington…

[deleted]

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#92

Post by Marazan »

dan-robertson wrote: post #90
Marazan wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was done with local buses, not intercity buses. You could get much, much further using coach routes.

Not really. They are buses with multiple stops rather than direct city-to-city coach connections but the X buses (eg X6, X7 from the route in the OP) are intercity routes.

The distinction is buses that a Bus Pass would or would not be valid on.

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#93

Post by signal11 »

satysin wrote: post #25
00deadbeef wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s generally the terminology we use in the UK. Bus = something you just walk on Coach = longer distance and prebooked

Yup. While not an official definition the following site has a decent definition of the differences https://www.wyattcoaches.co.uk/news/what-is-the-difference-b...

That’s actually a pretty good explanation. My Concise Oxford dictionary app has this:

coach(1) /kəʊtʃ /

▸ n.

1 Brit. a comfortably equipped single-decker bus used for longer journeys.

2 a railway carriage.

3 (also coach class) N. Amer. economy-class seating in an aircraft or train.

4 a closed horse-drawn carriage.

▸ v. travel or convey by coach.

– DERIVATIVES coachload n.

– ORIGIN C16: from Fr. coche, from Hungarian kocsi (szekér) ‘(wagon) from Kocs’, a town in Hungary.

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#94

Post by jccalhoun »

Really interesting. As someone from the USA, I didn't realize that this was only local buses not cross-country and was surprised he only got 339km in 24 hours. Reading the comments here it now makes sense. I don't know if you could replicate the journey in the USA with those rules

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#95

Post by ivan_gammel »

shusaku wrote: post #31

“How far can I go on just local trains” is a fun game to play here in Japan. I’m not sure my body could handle the bus version here, unless the roads of England are very straight and smooth!

It was pretty easy to travel from Moscow to St.Petersburg only using local trains („elektrichka“), but I also heard stories about traveling entire Transsiberian route this way in 1990s. As of 2017 this seemed already impossible, but still quite close with only few gaps, as can be seen in this story where it took author only 24 days and just 400€: https://www.yaplakal.com/forum2/topic2130672.html

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#96

Post by mmphosis »

version_five wrote: post #47

There is something very romantic about this - obviously there are other ways to make the trips, but somehow is feels more free and a bit furtive, like if you had to sneak out of town for some reason it's a good thing to know. I'm in Canada and I can't think of any meaningful distance you could cover in this way. Maybe Toronto-Barrie. Our cities are all so far apart, they are mostly isolated hubs and spokes. Curious i…

I've taken the Go bus from Toronto to Barrie, I think the transfer stop was in Bradford.

From the Barrie bus stop you need to get on Ontario Northland to go further, but that is a regional bus and is significantly costlier. I paid over $90 each for the regional bus to Toronto - compared to some of the pre-pandemic flight deals: Abbostford BC to Hamilton ON for $17! Greyhound is no longer in Canada - you used to be able to cross the country using Greyhound. The Bolt Bus and others can be good options, I've gone overnight from Toronto to New York. I've also taken these buses in Europe, and yes you do transfer in Lille.

Our hack was to take the CasinoRama bus from Toronto to Rama for $5, or on the first trip it was free and they gave us play money to spend at the casino.

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#97

Post by [deleted] »

version_five wrote: post #47

There is something very romantic about this - obviously there are other ways to make the trips, but somehow is feels more free and a bit furtive, like if you had to sneak out of town for some reason it's a good thing to know. I'm in Canada and I can't think of any meaningful distance you could cover in this way. Maybe Toronto-Barrie. Our cities are all so far apart, they are mostly isolated hubs and spokes. Curious i…

[deleted]

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#98

Post by poulsbohemian »

mmphosis wrote: post #96
version_five wrote: post #47

There is something very romantic about this - obviously there are other ways to make the trips, but somehow is feels more free and a bit furtive, like if you had to sneak out of town for some reason it's a good thing to know. I'm in Canada and I can't think of any meaningful distance you could cover in this way. Maybe Toronto-Barrie. Our cities are all so far apart, they are mostly isolated hubs and spokes. Curious i…

I've taken the Go bus from Toronto to Barrie, I think the transfer stop was in Bradford. From the Barrie bus stop you need to get on Ontario Northland to go further, but that is a regional bus and is significantly costlier. I paid over $90 each for the regional bus to Toronto - compared to some of the pre-pandemic flight deals: Abbostford BC to Hamilton ON for $17! Greyhound is no longer in Canada - you used to be ab…

Say that’s interesting as there (pre-pandemic) was a Bolt bus from Seattle to Vancouver- so I’m hearing you could theoretically get from Seattle to NYC via Canada… seems logical now that I type it, but guess I’d never really thought about it. Would be more that 24 hours I assume, but maybe not

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#99

Post by Epenthesis »

louthy wrote: post #48

I felt ‘seen’ as I went through the tweets… - Starts is London, where I lived for 18 years. - Goes through Kibworth Beauchamp which is about a mile from where I live now (Beauchamp is pronounced like ‘Beecham’ btw) - Then to Derby, where I was born and grew up - Then through Belper, where my first job was Felt slightly surreal!

Is Derby pronounced with the first syllable rhyming with "car" or "her" (/dɑ:bi/ or /dɜ:bi/)?

Re: Just how far can you travel by bus from London in 24 hours?

#100

Post by poulsbohemian »

yann2 wrote: post #88
version_five wrote: post #47

There is something very romantic about this - obviously there are other ways to make the trips, but somehow is feels more free and a bit furtive, like if you had to sneak out of town for some reason it's a good thing to know. I'm in Canada and I can't think of any meaningful distance you could cover in this way. Maybe Toronto-Barrie. Our cities are all so far apart, they are mostly isolated hubs and spokes. Curious i…

Depends on the company. The US has no dearth of characters. And most of them seem to travel by bus. One time I ended up next to a dude who would excitedly point out every prision along the highway he had been a guest at. Another time a "paranormal investigator" with a 2 inch thick binder of haunted houses and she wanted me to go through every page.

When people at the state prison, which is in my town of residence, are released they are given a set of clothes and a bus ticket back to the major city. Some of them are nice to talk to - polite, and very happy to be outside again. I can only think of once while riding the bus that there was a guy I was concerned about. The “normal” clientele tend to be far worse behaved than the folks just getting out of the system
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