The Bus to New London

It was supposed to be a simple trip—just a straightforward bus ride from Sofia to Belgrade. Five hours, maybe six if traffic was bad. I had my backpack stuffed with snacks, a downloaded playlist of podcasts, and a firm belief in Google Maps. As the bus pulled into the station, fifteen minutes late, I thought nothing of it. Balkan punctuality, I figured.

The bus itself was a typical long-distance coach: slightly frayed seats, the faint scent of mystery upholstery, and a driver whose bushy mustache exuded authority. I settled in by the window and listened as an elderly woman behind me launched into a monologue about yogurt to the poor tourist seated next to her. “Bulgarians don’t age; we just ferment,” she declared, as if she were revealing a state secret. The tourist nodded politely, clearly regretting every life choice that had brought him here.

The first hour was uneventful. We crawled through Sofia’s traffic, passed the usual suburban sprawl, and hit the highway. But just as I was getting comfortable, something strange happened. The bus pulled into a gas station. It looked oddly familiar. Too familiar. I glanced at my phone, and my stomach sank. We were back at the Sofia bus station.

The driver didn’t seem concerned. “Forgot something,” he muttered over his shoulder as we turned around and headed back out of the city. Nobody else seemed alarmed, so I told myself it must have been some minor hiccup. But as the kilometers rolled by, things only got stranger.

We made our first scheduled stop at a place called Tomato Junction. It wasn’t on any map I could find, and I consider myself a bit of a Google Maps connoisseur. The tiny village was spotless, the air smelled faintly of ketchup, and the centerpiece was a fountain shaped like a giant tomato squirting water. A family got off the bus with suitcases. “We’ve been trying to move closer to fresh produce,” the father explained as he waved cheerfully at the rest of us. The bus pulled away, and I tried not to overthink it.

The next few hours were a blur of increasingly bizarre scenery. We crossed a bridge that zigzagged like it had been designed by someone who thought straight lines were a conspiracy. We crossed it again twenty minutes later. And again, an hour after that. The driver said nothing, his mustache twitching faintly as he hummed along to the radio. I glanced around at the other passengers, but nobody seemed concerned. One guy was knitting an impossibly long scarf, and an older woman was peeling boiled eggs like she was preparing for a picnic.

By the time the sun started setting—again—I realized we had been traveling for over twelve hours. My phone had given up trying to track our location. The little blue dot spun helplessly, as if to say, “You’re on your own.”

At some point, we stopped at a retro diner for a break. The waitress wore a pastel uniform straight out of a 1950s movie and poured coffee with unsettling precision. When we stopped at the same diner three hours later, I decided to confront her.

“Do you have a twin?” I asked, trying to sound casual.

“No,” she replied with a blank stare. “But you do.”

I decided it was better not to ask any more questions.

Time started losing all meaning. The sun rose and set whenever it felt like it. Days blurred into nights, which blurred into something else entirely. At one point, I found myself having a heated debate with the yogurt lady about whether the moon was slightly bigger than usual. I could’ve sworn we were driving in circles, but every stop looked different: villages with houses painted entirely in stripes, a gas station that sold only clocks, and a small town where every single resident waved at the bus in eerie synchronization.

Finally, after what felt like weeks, we arrived at a city. It wasn’t Belgrade. The driver pulled into a massive, bustling station and announced cheerfully, “Welcome to New London, capital of Europe!”

I stared out the window. The skyline looked like London had collided with a surrealist painting. Skyscrapers twisted and leaned at impossible angles, and neon signs flickered in languages I didn’t recognize. A bus with three decks—yes, three—rumbled past us, its topmost passengers waving nonchalantly as if this was just another Tuesday.

“What is this place?” I asked the scarf-knitting man as we filed off the bus.

“New London,” he said, as if that clarified everything. Seeing my blank stare, he added, “You must’ve gotten on the wrong bus. Happens all the time. The 173C isn’t just intercity; it’s interdimensional.”

“Interdimensional?” I repeated, feeling like the ground had just shifted beneath me.

“Yeah, no big deal,” he said, rolling up his impossibly long scarf. “You’ll love it here. Great for tourists. Stay at the Clocktower Inn—it’s affordable and doesn’t move locations during your stay. Visit the Museum of Slightly Impossible Things, and definitely try the local jellyfish pie. If you want to get back, just take the midnight bus from the Terminal of Unlikely Destinations. Make sure it says ‘Sofia’ on the front, though. Last week, someone ended up in Atlantis.”

I stood there, overwhelmed, as the passengers scattered into the city. New London stretched out before me, a kaleidoscope of colors, sounds, and smells that made my head spin. My plans for Belgrade were long forgotten. After all, it’s not every day you accidentally visit the capital of Europe in another dimension.