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34 | Setra Family News Setra Family News | 35
Setra coach and bus stories:
Real-life Setra stories
To commemorate the 60 th anniversary of the Setra brand, we collected stories about Setra coaches
and buses from all around the world – at times touching, at times funny, and always entertaining. In
this issue of the SetraFamily, we are delighted to present two more of these very unique anecdotes.
Through the desert in a Setra
A café on wheels
I
f
Heinz Dysli hadn’t chosen to be a bus
driver, he might have gone into the
food-service business. He could easily
imagine being the friendly owner and host
of a small corner café – where people
would come in and immediately feel at
home with friends. It would suit his relaxed
personality quite well. But he is now a bus
driver – and has never regretted his decision.
And you know what? There are times
when you can actually combine both professions,
as he experienced one day in
2008 on the autobahn between Salzburg
and Vienna. That winter had hit really hard,
with snow, storms and ice rain. The autobahn
was like a parking lot, nothing was
moving – for well over four hours!
As is so often the case in situations like
these, people get closer – and this time
quite literally – since his coach with its
35 passengers was spontaneously transformed
into a café for freezing car drivers.
Some headed straight for the lavatory,
others drank a hot coffee, enjoying a bit of
warmth and a good chat. In spite of the
difficult circumstances, it was really very
pleasant and a lot of fun in the coach.
About a month later, he received several
letters and postcards from his “guests”.
They thanked him for his hospitality and
asked when his “café on wheels” would be
passing through again.
Submitted by Heinz Dysli, Bern/Switzerland
A
s
a Setra sales representative and
later on as a distributor, Peter
Strobl has been around a lot. He
used to travel regularly in Africa and the
Middle East. And yes, he’s slept in crowded
hotel lobbies more often than he’d like to
remember. In 1982, he embarked on one
of the most daring adventures in modern
times: riding on a coach in Sudan.
The group of tourists was travelling in an
old Setra through fascinating landscapes
and on roads that didn’t even deserve the
name – and nothing at all could upset the
local driver’s sunny mood. Every few minutes,
he would turn around, give a ‘thumbs
up’ and pronounce with a brilliant smile:
“Setra, very good!” The fact that the fuel
pump filter was plugged didn’t seem to
bother him at all. The resourceful man just
kept going until the coach couldn’t source
any more fuel, at which point he had a very
practical solution in mind. As the bus slowly
advanced, a 13-year-old boy would jump
off the coach, run alongside it, open the
engine flap and activate the fuel pump
manually. As soon as the engine would start
running again, the boy would rush to jump
back onto the coach. The group finally
reached its destination in Kosti on the
White Nile, where Peter Strobl spent the
night under the stars with one of his business
partners. But that, as you may suspect,
is a whole other story.
Submitted by Peter Strobl, Dessau/Germany