Krakow to Budapest: Great Bus Trip!

This is great news - I will seriously consider this as an option (unless flying through Warsaw is cheaper or faster). Can I ask roughly when and how far apart were the two bus stops? Did you feel comfortable leaving things on the bus while exiting? I assume luggage was stowed away in the bus trunk area?

And lastly, how much was this trip and did it arrive more or less on time?

We left Krakow at 6:30am and the first stop was about 8:00 and the second stop was around 11:00. The luggage was stored underneath in the bus trunk so we just had our two small backpacks and we carried them with us when we got off. There is a bathroom on the bus too. The bus was a little over half full and it looked like a mix of tourist and locals. We arrived very close to on time. It costs 5900 HUF which is about $20. Websites- www.eurolines.hu or info@volanbusz.hu
I hope this helps.

Great information!! Thanks for so much for sharing.

Thanks so much for posting this! I really want to connect these two cities on my next trip and I had gotten discouraged based on tons of bad Orangeways reviews and tons of bad overnight train reviews. I was actually considering getting rid of either Krakow or Budapest for the trip. I will look into Eurolines and keep the itinerary intact.

Hi Julie,

I'm also wondering if you considered flying as well (through Warsaw, most likely) and why did you decide to take the bus vs. flying?

We never really considered flying since we were interested in seeing the countries. Slovakia is definitely worth seeing. For most of the trip it is just a two lane road with not much traffic.

Hi,

Thanks very much for this information, another feasible option in addition to the night train connection between Budapest and Krakow. I know both cities are accessible by bus from Berlin but to go from one to the other by bus is another added advantage. My experiences with buses in Europe inter city are positive. It's not Greyhound, if I can put up with 10 hours on Greyhound San Francisco to LA, then going by bus Krakow to Budapest will be easy, plus being way more interesting.

Julie,

Thanks for the great information. This might be a good option for us as we would like to go up through Slovokia from Budapest to Krakow.

Since Julie posted this, I've been looking into it for a trip next May. Eurolines has 1 bus a day, leaving alternately at 6.30 am, 3 pm, 10 pm and 11.30 pm. Orangeways has buses 3 times a week leaving at 2.30 pm. Luv Express has daily buses at 4.15 and 11.15 am. The first 2 take 7 hours, the last 6.5 hours, according to their schedules. I wonder if that means the Luv Express doesn't make the pit stops?

There is no "convenient" mid-point stop to break up the journey. The buses do not stop along the way (except for pit stops). Any places south of Krakow that I found involve changing buses (or trains) and take as long or longer to get to than Budapest itself.

I didn't find any non-stop flights between Krakow and Budapest. Because of the layover and the time to get to/from the airports, flying would probably take longer than the bus. It would certainly be more expensive - just getting to/from the airports might cost as much as the bus ticket.

Chani--I hit the same wall re a direct flight from Budapest to Krakow, discovered you can fly direct to Warsaw, though.

Another option: http://transferbudapesthungary.com/special-offer.html