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I'm about to take a depressingly long bus ride in Latin America and am wondering what the longest scheduled public bus ride in the world is.

By 'scheduled' I mean for there to be a regularly operating connection between the start and destination locations, without switching buses. Besides the fact that they no longer seem to operate, this would disqualify something like oz-bus.

By 'longest' I'm tending to favour distance over duration, though either way, circular repetitive journeys would obviously be excluded.

Edit (August 2017): I took the bus from Lima to Rio de Janeiro. Just over five days from beginning to end. A write up.

MastaBaba
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  • WHen I was in Argentina, I was told about one that takes a week, from Caracas to Buenos Aires. Not sure if hearsay or real though. – Mark Mayo Sep 21 '15 at 00:14
  • Allegedly there was a plan to have a bus from Kashmir to Birmingham taking 12 to 13 days (http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/kashmir-to-united-kingdom-bus-service-6500-kms/1/222084.html) – Mark Mayo Sep 21 '15 at 00:16
  • @MarkMayo That's Ormeno that does Caracas to BA, but you switch busses in Lima. And I saw the article you mention, but I'm not putting a lot of stock in it. – MastaBaba Sep 21 '15 at 00:20
  • Some sick part of me still wants to do the 7 day trip, just to see what it's like. Cama suite though, hopefully :) – Mark Mayo Sep 21 '15 at 00:22
  • There's a travel company that actually lists a price for the Kashmir to Birmingham trip at http://us.riya.travel/travelupdate-details/bus-service-from-united-kingdom-to-india. But, it very much seems the connection does not exist. – MastaBaba Sep 21 '15 at 00:24
  • Intrigued, I found a regularly scheduled bus departing from Manzhouli arriving Moscow (overnight at Irkutsk). It's got to be in the running. – Gayot Fow Sep 21 '15 at 03:43
  • @GayotFow that's nuts. But, overnight in Irkutsk only? That's only a quarter of the way to Moscow from Manzhouli. – MastaBaba Sep 21 '15 at 03:49
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    Yeah, Irkutsk is the first stop where the rest of the journey is in Russia's interior. Plus there's a major junction with the railroad there. Nearly everyone is plastered on vodka, few police. The buses were already outmoded in the communist era, today they are about 30 - 35 years old, poorly ventilated, some with no heating, no lighting. No chance to get food. Plus passengers are expected to help push if the bus gets caught in a snow drift. I have a friend who regularly takes the bus from Syzran to Tver and she fills me in on the 'pleasantries'. Your journey in Latin America is a waltz :) – Gayot Fow Sep 21 '15 at 04:44
  • Even if the stop in Irkutsk is a change of busses, this sounds like a contender for the longest bus ride. Care adding it as an answer? – MastaBaba Sep 21 '15 at 13:34
  • As for that oz-bus, they changed modes of transport. As far as I'm concerned the question needs qualification, though--do bus-based tours count? Back in the 70s I was aware of Kathmandu-London, one bus all the way but it was for seeing the countries you passed through, not simply to get from one end to the other. Space permitting you could negotiate a ride for part of the distance. – Loren Pechtel Sep 21 '15 at 22:57
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    @CGCampbell The fact that I'm amazed by a China to Moscow connection does not mean it also qualifies as a valid answer. The implication was, however, that Irkutsk to Moscow was direct. Anyway, it seems to me the question is clear and, as I also pointed out, this website has many similar longest/furthest questions that have been accepted as valid questions and required similar, or more, legwork to answer. Here's just one: http://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/5149/what-is-the-longest-tour-operated-by-travel-companies – MastaBaba Sep 21 '15 at 23:52
  • @LorenPechtel A bus-based tour is not a regularly operating public transport connection. So, no. It would not count. – MastaBaba Sep 21 '15 at 23:53
  • @MastaBaba Such runs are scheduled although generally seasonal. Space available most anyone (the driver(s) can reject someone they don't want) can ride although the price for less than the full trip is negotiated, not fixed. That part of it is pretty close, what I was questioning is that is the sightseeing part of it. – Loren Pechtel Sep 22 '15 at 00:07
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    @LorenPechtel Ok. I'd say that if the objective is sightseeing, and not getting from A to B, the nature of the journey is very different from what we normally associate with 'public transport', no? – MastaBaba Sep 22 '15 at 00:29
  • Do none of the buses between Perth and Melbourne or Sydney utilize the same bus throughout without switching? – hippietrail Oct 14 '15 at 00:00

7 Answers7

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I work at Busbud, where we're working to aggregate all the world's bus providers and routes. I had a look though our database. We're sure we don't know about everything yet, but we've found a lot of routes. There are several long routes in South and North America. I compared them using the driving distance calculated by Google Maps.

Looking for trips with no transfers, where it seems the same vehicle travels the whole route, here are the top contenders:

South America:

  • 6118 km: Lima, Peru to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (Ormeño) - via Sao Paulo and Rio Branco, Acre, Brazil. DW Documentary on it's launch.
  • 5582 km: Lima, Peru to Buenos Aires, Argentina (Ormeño) - via Santiago, Chile.

There are documentaries and tv reports about the long direct routes on youtube where you can see the same coach goes all the way through.

North America:

Europe:

  • 3631 km: Braunschweig, Germany to Grozny, Chechnya, Russia (KVN) - The route is currently a bit longer than normal since it's detouring around the entire eastern Ukraine through Belarus.
  • 3558 km: Burgas, Bulgaria to Liverpool, England, United Kingdom (Sofia Bus) - via Maribor, Stuttgart, Mannheim, Paris, London, Manchester.

Africa

Willeke
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Carl
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    Awesome! Your Lima to Sao Paulo is too short as it runs through Rio Branco, in Acre, making the total distance closer to 5700km. – MastaBaba Sep 22 '15 at 18:18
  • I'm not able to find that connection to Grozny on your site. And I find KVN is some Russian TV show :) – MastaBaba Sep 22 '15 at 18:19
  • Also, no luck on connections between China and Russia? – MastaBaba Sep 22 '15 at 18:19
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    http://www.kvn24.de/ – Carl Sep 22 '15 at 18:20
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    The only China-Russia connections we know are over around Vladivostock, they're much shorter (~1000km) – Carl Sep 22 '15 at 18:26
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    @Carl: I love how 1000 km counts as "short" in the context of this question. – Michael Seifert Sep 23 '15 at 13:05
  • I addded the duration info, unfortunately didn't find it for all routes. – Carl Sep 23 '15 at 14:10
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    "All passengers are required to get off the bus for cleaning in Sudbury" - the bus or the passengers? :) – The Wandering Dev Manager Sep 23 '15 at 15:21
  • @chx mentions 96 hours in another answer for the Lima to Sao Paulo trip. I personally asked for the duration of this journey earlier this year, while in Lima and 96 hours feels about right. – MastaBaba Sep 24 '15 at 04:35
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    Also, I'm getting quite different distances for the two South America trips. Lima to BA (via Santiago): 4793km. Lima to SP (via Rio Branco): 5621km. (Also, there's Santiago to Sao Paulo (via Urugaiana) (this is the bus I'm taking): 3269km. – MastaBaba Sep 24 '15 at 04:40
  • According to the Ormeno website, the Lima to Buenos Aires connection indeed runs through Santiago, but not through La Paz. – MastaBaba Sep 24 '15 at 04:41
  • I suddenly have a grave urge to hop on a particular bus in Braunschweig! Wow. – hippietrail Oct 05 '15 at 17:55
  • For the Calgary-Toronto, people are required to get off the bus in Winnipeg, MB (and at some other stop in the Prairies) as well, for cleaning. – Vince Oct 05 '15 at 18:20
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Lima to Rio de Janeiro. Six hours more than Lima to São Paulo. DW has a documentary on this trip. My personal longest is SP to Recife - 54 hours (scheduled for 48 hours)

PAUL DIXON
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    Both https://www.tripadvisor.ca/ShowTopic-g303506-i1199-k9198150-New_bus_route_Lima_Peru_to_Rio-Rio_de_Janeiro_State_of_Rio_de_Janeiro.html and http://highwaybrazil.com/brazil/rio-to-lima-peru-the-world-longest-bus-drive/ says this started at the end of Jan 2016 so no wonder Carl from Busbud's excellent answer doesn't contain it. –  Jun 03 '17 at 22:11
  • Well well well. I'm quite amazed Ormeno is still offering this: The price is steep and the ticket is not easy to book. – MastaBaba Jun 04 '17 at 13:15
  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_ODFlqURxY – hippietrail Jul 24 '18 at 01:32
  • FYI, Google Maps says it's 4800 km. – Johnnyjanko Sep 12 '23 at 07:42
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It's very hard to prove which one is the longest. There's a 96 hour ride by Expreso Ormeño from Lima to Sao Paulo. I can't find proof that Birmingham bus ever happened.

  • The Lima to Sao Paulo bus departs once a week. – MastaBaba Sep 21 '15 at 01:00
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    I know a friend of mine who came from Russia in a bus, on a 5-day long bus trip. If that's true or not, I can't exactly tell. – Ismael Miguel Sep 21 '15 at 10:19
  • 6.000km trip you can find pictures here (article in portuguese). Brazil is a large country where bus trips are common, Not hard to find 2 days trips from São Paulo to the northen states. Also check rules about stops, in Brazil there are a few laws about stops frequency, for example the bus must stop each 4 hours and dirvers must switch each 8hrs, etc – jean Sep 21 '15 at 11:11
  • that happens in the canadian example below, but its the drivers that change, no transfers (passenger does not have to get off the bus) that I think the OP cares about. – pocketfullofcheese Sep 22 '15 at 18:11
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I once took a bus from Toronto, ON (Canada) to Yellowknife, NWT. It took 80 hours. However, I seem to recall switching buses once in Calgary, AB. A search on (search at Greyhound suggests there is a transfer in Winnipeg, which I don't remember). That makes it about 2000km. Or 3400km if it was Calgary (it doesn't cut through the US).

pocketfullofcheese
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  • That might be a contender for the longest North American bus ride. :) – MastaBaba Sep 21 '15 at 13:33
  • A colleague once traveled from Toronto to Mexico City by Greyhound many many years ago. Current Greyhound website informs it takes 78h but includes 5 transfers – blackbird Sep 21 '15 at 17:51
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    While Toronto to Calgary seems to currently require a transfer in Winnipeg, Calgary to Toronto appears to be one bus without any transfers. It takes 52 hours, 20 minutes if it runs on time. – Michael Seifert Sep 22 '15 at 17:44
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    I took the Calgary to Toronto bus last week, ran like clock-work on the departing each stop on the dot. – Carl Sep 22 '15 at 18:04
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    @I've done the Calgary (well, Banff to Calgary first), to Toronto, gave up in Winnipeg and switched to train ;) – Mark Mayo Sep 23 '15 at 00:37
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Harare Zimbabwe to Dare Salaam Tanzania 2,285 km Taqwa and Falcon Buses is the lonngest in Africa 52 Hours journey.

Tommy
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In Europe, Eurolines operates relatively frequent bus drives between major cities and holiday favourites. The longest direct line I could find on their website rides from Hamburg (Germany), to Burgas (Bulgaria), takes 40 hours and covers just over 2300 km (assuming they take the shortest route). There might be longer ones, ... EDIT: From their French site, they also operate a direct line from Paris to Casablanca (Maroc). Also just over 2300 km, takes roughly 37 hours.

I remember from my visit to Argentina that they have very long bus rides with luxury buses including sleeping facility. I looked it up in the Lonely Planet (2008 issue) and found a depressing long ride from Buenos Aires to Rio Gallegos that takes 36-40 hours. The distance is about 2500 km (Google Maps). I am not sure it is a direct line, but wouldn't be surprised if it was.

pnuts
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RHA
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Why are you excluding the oz-bus?

While the London - Sydney route breaks your conditions, what about London - Kathmandu?

Regularly scheduled, one vehicle. 47 days. (Note that I have taken two such trips, both with budget operators {necessity--most of them had rules that excluded us.} On schedule?! No way!) And they're back in business.

Loren Pechtel
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    Clever, and one heck of a journey! Though their website seems to have information from 2011-2012 (that's when the last trip dates are listed), so I'm not so sure about "regularly scheduled." I suppose there's also question at some point as to what continues a public bus vs a tour. – Zach Lipton Jan 15 '18 at 06:51
  • @ZachLipton Note that at least in the past there were many companies running such trips. And if you find one and it has a seat you can negotiate with the driver for passage. That's what we did for Delhi -> Tehran (but due to breakdowns we ended up leaving them in Shiraz.) – Loren Pechtel Jan 16 '18 at 05:20