![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Hel_Neptune__museum_2022.jpg\")
Hel, Poland \u00a9 CC BY-SA 4.0 | Adrian Tync on Wikimedia Commons<\/p>\nAn iconic but controversial bus journey to a sandy peninsula in Poland is on the road again, thanks to marketing moves by coach operator Flixbus. Travellers will once more be able to take the \u201chighway to Hel\u201d trip on a bus listed under the number of the devil, 666, from summer 2026.<\/p>\n
Hel is popular, thanks to its sandy Baltic shorelines, lighthouse, fishers\u2019 cottages, and World War II fortifications. The bus trip there also gained momentum in its own right thanks to the play on words between the bus number \u201c666\u201d and the name of the terminus \u201cHel,\u201d making it the \u201cHighway to Hel\u201d \u2013 a 1979 song by Australian rock group AC\/DC.<\/p>\n
Hel, Poland \u00a9 CC BY-SA 4.0 | Adrian Tync on Wikimedia Commons<\/p>\n
But after years of operation between the seaside village of D\u0119bki and Hel, bus firm PKS Gdynia dropped the route number 666 in 2023, due to concern in the heavily Roman Catholic country over its satanic connotations. As Travel Tomorrow reported at the time<\/a>, a PKS Gdynia representative told press that the complaints were not huge in volume but were ongoing over a long period: \u201cThe management board buckled under the weight of letters and requests that were sent to us, maybe not in large numbers, but periodically for many years with a request to change the line number,\u201d they said. Complying with those demands, the route was renumbered as the 669.<\/p>\n But now, in rock and roll form, Flixbus is flicking the bird at puritanical critics and bringing back the number 666, intentionally playing into the devilish associations of the town\u2019s name and bus route.<\/p>\n FlixBus spokesperson Aleksander Kalenik told Poland\u2019s TVN24: \u201cThe number 666 was deliberately chosen as a marketing communication element, intended to increase the visibility of the connection on the popular holiday route to Hel.\u201d<\/p>\n @flashback_raf<\/a> Welcome to Hel\ud83d\ude08\u2600\ufe0f\ud83c\udf0a #dronevideo<\/a> #dronephotography<\/a> #cha\u0142upy<\/a> #polwysephelski<\/a> #summer<\/a> #summernails<\/a> #views<\/a> #explore<\/a> #poland<\/a> #polska<\/a> #gdansk<\/a> #trojmiasto<\/a> \u266c original sound \u2013 Ian Asher<\/a> <\/p>\n Micha\u0142 Leman, managing director of FlixBus in Eastern Europe told a press conference the decision had practical reasons too: \u201cIt\u2019s better when a route explains by itself where it\u2019s going. In this case, there\u2019s really nothing more to say. Everyone will understand,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The full route will have also have an \u201cunlucky-for-some\u201d 13-hour duration, taking passengers from Krak\u00f3w to Hel, with various stops, including the Polish capital Warsaw but hopefully will not become a journey from hell. The timetable has also been purposely devised to avoid the build-up of traffic congestion during the high season along the Hel peninsula. It is set to depart Krak\u00f3w at 6:00 am, arriving in Warsaw at around 10:30 am and finally reaching Hel just before 8:00 pm.<\/p>\n