Why I chose Busabout

As a solo traveller heading to Europe I found the thought of doing Inter-rail and organising everything on my own completely daunting. I’d never really have a chance to meet other travellers and would feel quite isolated a lot of the time. There are a lot of people that do it this way and they seem to really enjoy it as well so don’t think it’s awful or anything, just probably not what I was looking for.

But on the other side of the spectrum we’ve got the structured tours like Contiki (vomit) and Topdeck. Now I’m really sorry if you’re a Contiki fan and have travelled with them before because I’m super opinionated and am not afraid to speak the truth and the truth is I loathe Contiki haha! Topdeck is a little better but that structured way of travel is honestly the worst thing I could imagine. Topdeck do offer a few slower paced tours that are apparently quite good but I’ll explain a little more why I dislike this way of travel.

In most places I had 3 nights and two full days to explore and even this felt incredibly rushed at times. I honestly can’t comprehend how arriving in a city one night, hitting the town (hard might I add), getting up early (hungover) to do a bunch of structured tourist activities with the other tour groups then doing like a dinner/bar thing that night and leaving the next day is travelling? You’re not experiencing anything!? When do you get to immerse yourself in the culture of the place? People watch? Feel the vibe of the city? Wonder around and get lost with the locals?

Whenever I met people from Contiki or Topdeck all they could tell me was how exhausted they are and how Susie who was meant to be their best friend since like a week ago fucked Brad who has been her boyfriend since like Tuesday and now her entire holiday is ruined because of this. When you’re out at bars and stuff, if you’re not “in” with their group then they ignore you? Travelling is supposed to be an enlightening experience where you get out of your comfort zone and meet new people. They only wanted to mingle with those inside their bubble. All they would ask is “Are you with Contiki?”.. No.. “Oh why are you here then?”… Because it’s a public bar that belongs to the city of Florence for everyone to enjoy? They would push you out from the dancefloor, give you dirty looks if you attempted to talk to someone from their group etc… I hope you’re getting the drift here? I am incredibly passionate about travel and I feel that everything Contiki represents or stands for isn’t even remotely close to what travel should be.

Anyway I’m getting salty sorry hahaha! So the fact that I didn’t want to completely freestyle it but also wanted flexibility and the ability to choose when I wake up, where I go and what I eat, I needed to find a better balance and along came Busabout! I’d had a friend (only one) use Busabout years before my trip and the places she visited were different to those of your standard Europe trip that you see all over facebook. She was able to experience and visit places I’ve had on my bucket list for ages and places I’d never known existed. Since I saw her photos go up I’d put in years (yes years) of time researching busabout, contacting the reps and constructing the perfect trip using their loops and structured tours.

So basically Busabout is considered a tour company but with a far more flexible style of travel. You can start in whichever city you like (on their loops), hop on the bus that leaves from their chosen hostel, it will drop you off in the next city at their chosen hostel and you can choose to spend however long you wish there until you decide to get onto the next bus and so on. You can stay at the hostel that they drop you off at and pick you up from which is usually the far easier option, but if you find somewhere you like more they’ll help you figure out local transport to get there. As long as you’re back at that hostel at the departure time on the day you leave it’s fine.

When you’re on the bus you have a travel guide who will give you insider information and tips about the place you’re heading to. They’ll also give you access to exclusive tours and activities for a better price. The best thing though is that it creates a safe community for you to be a part of on your adventure. You spend the entire day with the same group of people which gives you a chance to make some friends who might be interested in doing similar things while you’re in that city. The little activities that they offer as extra’s are also sometimes exclusively for busabout and even if they’re not, a few people from the bus end up signing up so you can still sort of stay with the group if you like.

But then the other great thing about it is that you have the freedom to quite literally do whatever the fuck you want. Some places I spent two days, others four. I met people who missed the bus (those pub crawls can be brutal lol) and ended up staying longer or who decided they wanted to stay there for a week at the last minute! People even decided they wanted to stay in the optional drop off city that we stop in during the day sometimes to pick up people and drop them off. We get a small break for toilet and food and people just decided then and there that they wanted to stay! But when you’re in each place you can visit the attractions that you like. Not everyone wants to visit museums and that’s cool, you’ll go do that and meet up with these people later for dinner because it’s that simple. If you need to sleep in because you went too hard last night (happens a lot) then you’re able to. You won’t miss any scheduled activities etc. You can wake up when you want, eat where you want, go where you want, when you want, change your mind if you want, meet other new exciting people during the day and hang out with them if you want. So this was honestly the ideal option for me! The combination of free-style flexible travel with the perks of being apart of a community.