Well, these days you can catch a Flixbus from London to Sofia for a mere 150 Europounds, and 48 hours of your time. And from there, Calcutta can't be that far, right?
(But, seriously, you can probably do it in another 48 hours...)
A very different scale, but this reminded of the Green Tortoise which was an American, mostly West Coast affair that once ranged from Alaska to Belize.
50 days one way? Some research shows it was £85 vs. £200-£400 for a one-way plane ticket. What is the use case for this?
I guess:
- very motivated to go
- plan to stay for a very long time
- absolutely CANNOT afford a plane ticket
- or, afraid of flying
Reminds me of a lot of Amtrack routes in the US. I looked at trips from NYC to Chicago. I thought it would be fun and I needed to get to Chicago. But it was more expensive than flying and like 25 hours. There is just absolutely no reason to travel that way.
A sidenote about this cross-continental trip. Dervla Murphy's book Full Tilt is really good. It talks about her crazy bicycle journey in the middle of winter from Ireland to India. Rest of her books are great as well, but this one is my favorite.
If this fascinates you. Im sure you will also be fascinated by maharaja express [1] which is orient express equivalent in India. Fairly expensive and targeted towards foreign tourists but i do find it fascinating.
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[ 5.3 ms ] story [ 53.2 ms ] thread[1] https://xcancel.com/Indianmemory/status/1277521026813882368#...
(But, seriously, you can probably do it in another 48 hours...)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40649091
Can see it having been a unique experience, bonding with people over such a long period of time.
Looks like photos from inside the bus are also not available sadly.
Oof that really puts inflation into perspective doesn’t it?
The past really is a foreign country sometimes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Tortoise
edit: oh wow. It still runs!
http://www.greentortoise.com/
I guess:
- very motivated to go
- plan to stay for a very long time
- absolutely CANNOT afford a plane ticket
- or, afraid of flying
Reminds me of a lot of Amtrack routes in the US. I looked at trips from NYC to Chicago. I thought it would be fun and I needed to get to Chicago. But it was more expensive than flying and like 25 hours. There is just absolutely no reason to travel that way.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/163921.Full_Tilt
[1] https://www.maharajasexpress.com
Related, the Damascus <-> Baghdad bus from the 1930s:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlmpfHuLo14
It's a Calum documentary. He does these in-depth studies of historical curiosities like snow trains and WW2 rescue buoys. One of my favorite channels.
Someone found some photos on Shutterstock:
https://www.shutterstock.com/editorial/search/london-to-calc...
Some historian say this might have actually caused the 1st world war since these German activities provoked the British empire.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin%E2%80%93Baghdad_railway
https://www.reddit.com/r/Damnthatsinteresting/comments/1q841...
Was the Reddit article the impetus for your post?