Kolkata-London Bus service?

yossie23

Camelgirl: Awesome stuff! Mahmud's question seemed an interesting albeit unbelievable one and I didn't expect someone one IM to have first-hand experience with that. Do you have some sort of a travelogue or diary on that trip? Or pictures (am I stretching it?)?
My 'behind' couldn't deal with a 33hour bus-ride from Madras to Bombay and I swore that day that I'll never do something similar again. And here you are with your 36 day trip across the world!
I'm beginning to love this site more each day!

crvlvr

so it wasn't really a bus?

camelgirl

I do have a few slides but they are packed away since we moved in Dec. Eventually I want to get a scanner to get them on my computer. I only took a couple of rolls of film in the 3 months I was away. I was on a very limited budget, as was everyone on our bus and film and developing photos were a bit of a luxury.

And CRVLVR I don't think it's possible to take a train much past Europe. Buses were the main transport on the "overland route".

Yossie, I didn't imagine I could spend that long on a bus but a very strange thing happened after a few days, you just got used to it and it became your temporary home. Very relaxing. And this was a really crap old bus! The seats did NOT recline. No toilet. You just got used to stopping by the side of the road and heading for bushes (girls one side, boys the other) and in Eastern Iran and all of Afghanistan there were no bushes, just a bit of a ditch by the side of the road. It all worked out without any fuss. These were mostly empty roads!

After I got to Delhi I went overland by public train and bus to Kathmandu which took 3 days. It was all great but I'm not sure I could do it anymore! That is definitely still possible though I don't recommend Nepal right now!

yossie23

You must have been an adventurous woman! Post the slides if you get a chance to scan them someday. I'm a sucker for pictures from the past, esp the black and white ones.
Cheers to you!

70s-80s overlander

In August 1978 I did a good share of the reverse route –Karachi – Lahore - Peshawar – Kabul – Herat – Mashed – Tehran – Tabriz – Ankara – Istanbul – just by taking the ordinary people’s buses. It wasn’t that big of a deal. It did get slightly scary in Iran when, after the revolt started beginning, tanks rolled into then sat in every major city, fighter planes began flying low overhead, and the overland buses would only go through cities at night (the bus would park outside a city until nightfall, then resume the trip). “Bus station” food was generally “something” [frequently a large splat of butter] with rice – or “water biscuits”. I lost weight but felt OK. This was August, and the route was hot and dusty, so several times along the way it happened that the bus would stop at a “hotel” at the edge of a town and some of us would take quick showers. Sometimes the buses would carry sheep, chickens, etc. It always amazed me how a bus would let someone off in what seemed like “the middle of nowhere,” with no sign of civilization in sight. Sometimes it would be a recognizable “highway” that we were on; other times a bus would stop at the top of a hill for several minutes until the driver figured out what looked to him like the best path ahead. The main thing to emphasize is that this wasn’t that difficult overall. One just kept repeating the name of the city one wanted to get to, and someone would point in which direction to walk to find the bus. In those days, there was a very cheaply-made paperback that outlined the path. The main thing about it was that it was encouraging. I figured, if somebody else did it, then I could do it. The main path was definitely London to Kathmandu via Istanbul, and I was the rare one, except for someone local, who was traveling only in the middle.

Colin

I was 'repatriated' from Bombay to Karachi by the Australian trade commissioner who was acting consul for Australia, he solved our problem of not enough cash by repatriating us on the ship carrying refugees to Karachi providing we paid our fares before we left, in Rupees, which allowed us to change our last couple of GBP on the black in Bombay. We arrived in Karachi with one pound between two of us. From there we made it to Kabul, up to Herat and by bus to Teheran.
We hitchhiked to the Turkish border ('Dogbiscuit'), hitched thru Turkey and made it to a lovely Greek Island where we stayed for about a month recovering and eating the 21st birthday cake my sister had sent from Melbourne to Kavala before braving the road again through Europe to Dover. The Poms took some convincing to let me in without a visa and no money but a lot of fast talking and some pleading and we walked straight through customs onto the train up to London.
I stayed in Leeds for about three months working in 'Hunslet Baths' (Leeds 11) before doing it all again backwards, this time by air!!

somnath

Wow, that’s fascinating !!!!! Thank you Mahmud, this is a whole new thing to me. Initially I took it lightly and ……..
But finally, camelgirl and others thanks for sharing.

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sadhuji

yes mahmud - there are so many things we still do not know. and thanks for the members of indiamike who seem to have an answer for everything.

wonderful work indiamike.

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dooms

I have been scratching my head since this thread began. I knew there was some info already on Indiamike regarding this, I.E. for people who still want to do it. Finally, was able to dig it out.

Tim Makins has a post regarding this bus service @
Travelling by boat - from India to Europe

Dragoman Overland has a UK-India bus service. Check out
http://www.dragoman.com/destinations...ls.php?cat=NUK

camelgirl

It does sound so adventerous now but it didn't seem like such a big deal back then as it was a common thing for Europeans and Australians to do, though not Americans--everyone thought I'd lost my mind. Sitting on a bus didn't require much effort! Not like mountain climbing

We did pick up a few travelers along the way, mainly in Afghanistan, who were doing the public bus thing like Overlander talks about. They just were exhausted and wanted to get to India.

Yossie, my slides are in color and I do hope I can find them because you got me thinking about them. I have some excellent pics of the bus, inside and out and of some places we stayed, inside & out. I think IMers would find them interesting. Unfortunately, I have no idea where they are as they are currently in storage

The thing that's hardest for most people to understand now is how totally out of touch you were. No email or cells or even any telephones or mail along the way. Once you hit the road you didn't get any mail until you got to New Delhi. I loved being completely out of contact because you are not distracted by what you've left behind and you can be totally submerged into what you are doing. You could write aerograms and post them as you went but only if you stayed a couple of days.

I sound like people who went from the horse and buggy to automobiles a hundred years ago!

By the way, I was the oldest person on the bus at 32 y.o. the average ages were 18 to 25. No they didn't call me grannie--I looked the same as them !

yossie23

I dont' have a homephone, but carry a cellphone provided by the company. I seldom receive calls and that is such a relief. Unhindered time is bliss. But I don't know if I can live without email or messengers It's indeed ironic that most of our communications and relationships are online. Receiving a smile from a stranger is so rare that it surprises me!

You get the slides, I will buy you coffee

camelgirl

Thanks Yossie! I'll have to wait a few months for that coffee but when I do find the pics IM will be the first to know!

seventies'hippy

Yes lots of busses plied the route through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan Khyber pass, Pakisthan & into India,,,,,,
You could catch them from London, Amsterdam, Paris or I guess any major european city. Some companys are still running except the route is via southern Iran into pakisthan instead of Afghanisthan, they sometimes have to replace this section by a flight.
People also drove themselves there, There was quite a convoy in places when they all bunched up together, like at border crossings. It was also usual to have 12 or more western vehicles, buses, volkswagon campers, converted ambulances or normal cars parked on the headland at Anjuna or above the Vagator cliffs, Some people drove upto Manali or Nepal.
I never got a bus all the way, prefaring to go A to B to C by local transport or hitchhike, though I did catch 'The Rocking Horse' from Kathmandu to Delhi once. If it was today there would be flyers in Internet Cafes wherever westerners where advertising a bus going say from Delhi to Goa next week ask driver for details,
A good way to meet fellow travellers & exchange stories,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

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mahmud

Thank you all. Actully, I have been also cherishing a dream of a overland route as :

Singapore-Malaysia-Thailand-Myanmar-India-Pakistan-Afganistan-Iran & so on. Now, I can say that it is possible to make my dream true.

canadagood

I took the "Budget Bus" overland from Mashad Iran to northern Greece in July 1975. A lot of people got off in India and so they had a lot of empty seats on the way back. My seat mates included a guy from Colombia who had brought his Dalmatian dog from home!
We stayed at very cheap hotels or slept on or beside the bus when out in the country.
I have a few travel photos at my personal web page at http://www.notsorry.com/travel-mashad.asp I would love to see photos and comments from others.
-- Gregory