In our research, we always come across exciting bus travel offers. We would like to collect some of them here.
Ride Cabin is a night bus travel service that comes up again and again in our work. The Californians put their rolling sleeping cabins between Los Angeles and San Francisco into operation in 2017 and gained a lot of attention. After that, images of a further developed version appeared. A one-way ride on the Ride Cabin bus cost USD 115.
Fun Fact: The duvets and pillows are from the Ritz Carlton luxury hotel.
Corona apparently thwarted the travel offer. In 2021, their website was no longer accessible.
Inspiring for us is their strong, emotional appearance and the pleasant, well thought-out interior, which redefined the idea of night coach travel.
With the Dream Sleeper you can travel from Tokyo to Osaka. With eleven lockable cabins and so-called “zero gravity” seats, the Japanese promise a lot of comfort.
Fun Fact: Passengers have to hand in their shoes at the bus entrance and get slippers in return.
Rotel is a rolling hotel used for expedition trips. The company advertises with “the largest bus trips in the world” and has 4 different bus types with 20 to 36 seats. Overnight stays are in the patented Rotel cabins, which are either placed in a separate trailer or attached to the passenger compartment for combined vehicles.
The cabins remain closed during the journey. After arrival at the overnight place, the sleeping area is set up within five minutes and ready for usage. Breakfast and dinner are prepared in the board kitchen.
Fun Fact: Founder Georg Höltl was only 17 years old when he took off with the first rolling hotel in 1945. At that time, the bus was powered by wood gas.
InterCity from New Zealand operated a night coach with a unique concept on the route between Auckland and Wellington. Four seats become two beds and hammocks are hung on a level above. The price of a trip is in the range of a night in a hostel.
Fun Fact: Cookies are included and passengers must bring their own bed linen.
During our research on night bus lines from Switzerland, we came across the Czech bus company Nobless Line. It is one of the most comfortable buses we have seen in Europe – and this at the attractive price of CHF 65.- per trip. The “luxury bus” advertises with a bistro on the lower deck, where you can enjoy a light dinner from the Czech cuisine, and with a toilet where you will, according to your own statement, feel like «in the most luxurious hotel and not in a bus».
The Al Saif Sleeper Bus runs in Pakistan and is one of the best we’ve seen in coaches to date. Above all, we like the originality of their concept and the reinterpretation of bus travel.
In Asia, there are many exciting night bus concepts that inspire us. For example, the IntrCity Smart Bus in India (which can also be booked via WhatsApp) or sleeping buses in Vietnam, China and Thailand. In Latin America, too, travelling in comfort buses is almost commonplace.
Hollywood is also an inspiring (and surprisingly often reliable) source. The Big Bus from 1976 tells the story of the nuclear-powered superbus «Cyclops», which is on its maiden voyage from New York to Denver. On board the articulated double-decker there is a bowling alley, a piano bar and even a swimming pool. A bomb damages the reactor, causing the giant bus to almost fall down a cliff.
Fun Fact: A year before the release of the film, the company Neoplan actually launched an articulated double-decker bus called Jumbocruiser. A year after the film’s release, a jumbo cruiser was converted into a rolling hotel car-o-tel, whose trapezoidal windows seem like a tribute to the cinematic model.