Lux Express in the Baltics

When my wife, Paula, and I visit Europe, we typically travel by train. But while arranging intercity transportation for our visit to the Baltic States in September 2014, our research indicated that buses were a better transit option in those countries.

A few minutes of Internet searching revealed that several bus companies served the region. Lux Express (www.luxexpress.eu), with its English (one of six languages available) website providing comprehensive information, quickly became my favorite.

While you can purchase tickets online, at a bus station or from the driver, ours were purchased by Helen Allikmäe of HansaTravel (Randvere tee 15-22, Haabneeme 74001, Estonia; phone +372 600 9933, fax +372 608 0947, www.hansatravel.ee) in Tallinn, Estonia. She expertly made all of our trip arrangements, with the exception of our flights, which were booked by our local agent.

We learned of HansaTravel from the informative article “Touring the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania” by Charles and Nita Swartz (June ’09, pg. 6). For our four tickets, Helen got us a great sale price of €5.40 (about $7) each, about a third of the usual price.

Lux Express operates several classes of buses. We rode a Lux Express Lounge bus almost 4½ hours from Tallinn to Rı¯ga, Latvia. A few days later we took the 4-hour ride from Rı¯ga to Vilnius, Lithuania, on an older Lux Express bus. Both buses offered a WC, air-conditioning, reclining seats with seat belts, free Wi-Fi, 220V outlets and free hot drinks.

Our Lux Express Lounge bus added individual touchscreen media systems with music, movies, games, Internet and GPS plus headphones at no cost. There was even an onboard magazine (in English and Russian) that was more interesting than most airline magazines.

The buses were clean, quiet and comfortable. No smoking or alcohol consumption was allowed on board. 

Our bags were tagged before being loaded into the bus, and the tags were checked before we collected our luggage upon arrival. You don’t need to carry your ticket; just present your passport to board. Overall, the experience was considerably more relaxed and pleasant than US domestic flights in coach class.

In addition to the Baltic capitals, Lux Express serves Helsinki, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Berlin, Warsaw and Wrocław, along with a number of smaller cities in Northeastern Europe, including Kaliningrad and others in Ukraine and Belarus. There are few stops along the routes, but in larger cities there may be a stop, often near a major hotel, in addition to the city’s bus station.

In Vilnius we exited our bus at the city-center Panorama stop, which is much more conveniently located to the northern part of the city than Vilnius’ bus station. If you use this stop, be advised that, while it has no services, it’s adjacent to a large, modern shopping mall with clean and free WCs, an ATM, an information desk and a nearby taxi stand. 

Overall, we were very pleased with our Lux Express experience. The buses were on time, the Wi-Fi was fast and we experienced no problems. It would have been nice if more drivers spoke English (announcements were in a language we didn’t recognize), but that wasn’t an issue.

The other passengers appeared to be an equal mix of locals and tourists. Lux Express seems to be a well-organized, reliable and professional organization that we can readily recommend.