Fourteen fabulousOpen-top bus ridesaround the UK
Feel the salty sea wind or lakeside breeze in your hair, the sun on your face and the world at your feet with these open-top bus rides. Passing famous cityscapes, ruined abbeys and aqueducts, these open-top bus routes also take you through woods and valleys, up cliffs, and along the varied British coast.
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Peak Sightseers, Derbyshire
The Peak Sightseers are two stunning seasonal open-topped rides through the iconic landscapes of the Peak District National Park. Passing yellow fields of buttercups, grazing sheep, steep green dales, and miles of dry-stone wall, these are routes that are worth it for the top-deck views as well the destinations.
- Where do they go? The Red Route rolls from Chatsworth to Ashford-in-the-Water via Haddon Hall and Bakewell. The Blue Route is an epic linear journey to Castleton and beyond through some of the UK’s most famous hiking areas with incredible views along the Hope Valley. The Longshaw Estate is perfect for a relatively gentle walk past twisted mossy trees and purple rhododendrons. There are green-walled lanes through foxgloves and forget-me-nots and rocky steps by waterfalls in fern-filled Padley Gorge. Both routes converge at Chatsworth House, where arriving car-free gets you a glossy complementary guidebook to the painted hall and richly-panelled oak room, tapestried bedchamber and hundred-acre gardens.
- What will I see? Approaching Ashford, look out for the medieval Sheepwash Bridge with the Wye rippling through its three low stone arches. There are views of the parkland around Chatsworth, whether or not you stop off there, the sight of hilltop Peveril Castle as you come into Castleton, and lots, lots more. It’s worth the ticket price for the views from Winnat’s Pass alone at the western end of the route.
- More ideas in our car-free guide to the Peak District and Derbyshire.
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Purbeck Breezers, Dorset
The Purbeck Breezers are several great year-round routes. Breezer 50 recently came third in a UK poll of scenic bus routes (beaten only by routes through the North York Moors and Scottish Highlands). The 50’s USP is crossing over from Sandbanks to sandy Studland Bay on the chain ferry.
- Where do they go? From Swanage to Poole in Dorset via Corfe Castle (Breezer 40) or from Bournemouth to Swanage via the beaches near Studland (Breezer 50) and from Rockley Park to Sandbanks, via Poole, Lilliput and Canford Cliffs (Breezer 60). There are some seasonal routes too that start in late May and run through the summer. Find out more here.
- What will I see? Poole Harbour, Brownsea Island, the time-warp town of Wareham, the dramatic ruins of Corfe Castle, Swanage waterfront and plenty of other great views.
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599 Bowness to Grasmere, Cumbria
A spectacular all-year bus route through the heart of the Lake District.
- Where does it go? From busy Bowness to fell-ringed Grasmere, with its gingerbread and art galleries, the 599 runs frequently (more in Summer) past views of woods and water. You can buy combined bus and boat tickets too.
- What will I see? It runs along the shores of island-dotted Windermere, Rydal Water and Grasmere and stops near both William Wordsworth’s houses. It passes the foot of the hill below Rydal Mount, where the poet spent his last four decades, and stops almost outside little whitewashed Dove Cottage, which recently reopened as part of a fabulous new complex for visitors, Wordsworth Grasmere.
- Find out more from Stagecoach and discover more car-free adventures in our guide to Windermere.
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Oxford City Sightseeing, Oxfordshire
Come face to face with the gargoyles on the colleges or the bearded heads that circle the Sheldonian Theatre when you ride through Oxford’s streets on this cheerful red City Sightseeing bus. The commentary comes in a choice of languages or a kids’ version and includes a free walking tour so you can stroll through the courtyards of the Bodleian Library or past the Radcliffe Camera. Hop on and off the buses at stops outside iconic Oxford sights like Christ Church College, where several scenes in the Harry Potter films were shot or the dim-lit Pitt Rivers museum, housing everything from Roman shoes to Siberian reindeer-skin knickers!
- Where do they go? From the railway station, past all the major sights, to Magdalen Bridge and then North up the Banbury Road and back past Jericho and along St Giles.
- What will I see? All kinds of interesting things, from the neoclassical Ashmolean museum to the original workshop where William Morris, founder of Morris Motors, first started selling and repairing cars.
- Find out more here. Follow Good Journey’s directions. And explore the Oxford area with our car-free guide.
- You can also take City Sightseeing open-top bus tours in London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Cambridge, Bath, Chester, Stratford, York, Brighton, Norwich, Cardiff and other UK cities.
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Beachcombers, Yorkshire
Ride the Bridlington Beachcomber along the Yorkshire coast to the chalk cliffs at Flamborough, with their lighthouses and huge seabird colonies. Or hop on the Scarborough Beachcomber along the town’s iconic seafront.
- Where do they go? From Bridlington to Flamborough Head or between Scarborough’s huge castle-topped North and South bays.
- What will I see? Bridlington’s sweet factory and animal park (discounts with your bus ticket), the beaches and headlands, with dramatic shifts of scene. The Beachcomber also stops outside Sewerby Hall, a Georgian mansion with a zoo and fifty flowery acres of garden.
- Find out more here and explore the area with our car-free guide to Scarborough.
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Atlantic Coaster, Cornwall
Miles of craggy Cornish coastline are the backdrop for the Atlantic Coaster. Cornwall has several great open-topped buses now, including a trip to Land’s End with views of The Lizard. Check the bus is running this year before you depart.
- Where does it go? The Atlantic Coaster runs from Padstow to Newquay along the rugged North Cornish cliffs, including wild Bedruthan Steps.
- What will I see? Padstow’s popular harbour and cafes, breathtaking coastline, grassy headlands, hedges of honeysuckle and banks topped with frondy tamarisk, sandy coves and whitewashed villages. While cars wind blindly through the sunken Cornish lanes, the Atlantic Coaster’s open-top vistas take in views that stretch for miles, making it much more than just a means of getting from A to B. Don’t expect to arrive in a hurry, but be ready for great scenery.
- Find out more here and discover the area with our car-free guides to Newquay, Cornish towns and around Cornwall.
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Isle of Wight Breezers, Hampshire
Beaches and green headlands with the Downs Breezer or a vertigo-inducing climb up the road from Alum Bay to the National Trust’s Battery on the Needles Breezer? There are some show-stopping sights on these open-topped Isle of Wight buses.
- Where do they go? The Downs Breezer runs in a circuit from Ryde Bus station via Dinosaur Isle and Whitecliff Bay, while the Needles Breezer takes a circular route from maritime Yarmouth.
- What will I see? All kinds of classic island landmarks, including thatched St Agnes church and the Dimbola gallery, a museum in the house where Victorian photographer Julia Cameron used to live. Get off near the Needles to take a closer look at these three unmistakable chalk stacks, with a lighthouse on the end; the closest views are accessed via a tunnel through the downs.
- Find out more here.
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Skegness Seasiders, Lincolnshire
Eleven candy-coloured, characterful open-top buses ply the seafront at Skeggy each summer. There’s music onboard, linked discounts to local attractions, and the buses are painted to match their names (Rocky is striped like a stick of rock, Sandy sports sandcastles…)
- Where do they go? Their 20-minute route passes Fantasy Island theme park, with its screaming rollercoasters, and the first ever Butlin’s resort, still going strong after more than 80 years.
- Find out more here.
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Whitby Town Tour, North Yorkshire
An hour-long sightseeing tour around Whitby. BBC North West’s John Mundy voices the weekday commentary, with live guides at weekends, to tell visitors about the Bram Stoker and Lewis Carroll connections and other local stories.
- Where does it go and what will I see? The bus starts near the arch of replica whalebone and the bronze statue of Captain Cook, overlooking the harbour, and heads west along the clifftop North Terrace before turning inland towards Whitby’s evocative museum and art gallery in sloping Pannett Park. Then over the River Esk and up onto the Yorkshire cliffs to visit the ruined abbey, with its new visitor centre.
- Find out more here and explore the area with our car-free guide.
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Thanet open-top route 69, Kent
Ramsgate boasts elegant gardens and restaurants by the harbour and this open-top bus runs along the coast to Dickensian Broadstairs. Bus 69 is regular at weekends and is great for sightseers or walkers who want to hike back along the coast.
- Where does it go and what will I see? Starting from Ramsgate’s boating pool near gothic St Augustine’s Church. Nineteenth-century architect Augustus Pugin built it, lived next door and was buried there. The bus goes on past a maritime museum in a quayside Clock Tower, a big network of wartime tunnels, and the house that Charles Dickens based Betsey Trotwood’s cottage on in David Copperfield.
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Somerset's Coaster
A twenty-minute bargain jaunt along the Somerset coast in a half-open-topper, bus 1 runs from the centre of Weston-super-Mare to Sand Bay.
- Where does it go and what will I see? It starts on Weston’s Royal Parade, looking over the sands towards the rebuilt pier. It trundles along the seafront past the new stone arch and, soon after, there are top-deck views across the Bristol Channel towards Glamorgan. From the last stop, stroll on beside the bay to Sand Point, a grassy promontory with salt-swept summer flowers and rising skylarks.
- Find out more here
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New Forest Tour, Hampshire
Ride through ancient heathland and shady woods past grazing ponies and miles of heather on these seasonal open-toppers. One day ticket entitles you to ride on three different routes around the New Forest National Park.
- Where do they go and what will I see? The Red Route runs through the wilder northern woods, over blooming heath and through pretty villages like Burley. The Green Route takes in popular attractions like Beaulieu Abbey and Exbury Gardens and the Blue Route heads to the coast.
- Find out more here.
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Clacton Breeze, Essex
A seasonal open-top trip along the coast in Clacton-on-Sea, bus 134 runs every half an hour, Monday to Saturday.
- Where does it go and what will I see? From Clacton Pier, past some of the seaside gardens, the bus heads for Holland on Sea and then back to the pier, via Clacton railway station.
- Find out more here. And explore the area with our car-free guide to Colchester.
