Just in case someone is interested - this is how it went.

(A somewhat abbreviated version for the Parish magazine as so many people asked me but I had limited space)

It is difficult to condense 4617 miles into around 700 words but I’ll give it a go. The far north of France and the middle of Belgium really are very boring to drive through but then came Germany. I just loved the chance to do 100mph on the autobahns in the free speed sections though, to be honest, I was more comfortable at 90mph. I glanced up occasionally to see beautiful Bavaria or swapped driving with Richard! Next Austria – wonderful as ever and it has the most impressive tunnels. Potter along at 80mph then down to 50mph and switch the headlights on as you plunge into yet another one. Sometimes the road goes into a narrowing gorge accompanied by a rail track but eventually the mountain wins and it is another tunnel.

            The first experience of Slovenia was a most inviting open-air thermal pool just yards from the tent – perfect after 2½ days driving. Heading for the coast we stopped off to go through a World Heritage set of caves. Due to a lack of an internal sat-nav, we ended doing somewhat more than the 600 steps advertised.

            Out of Slovenia and into Croatia and the amazing Adriatic coast with its mountains, steep valleys, forests, inlets, islands and the blue, blue sea. We worked our way south along the coast, although Croatia is incredibly bossy dictating our speed at every turn. Near Sibenik we were travelling over what seemed like a flat plain with dry scrubby vegetation when suddenly there was a great gash in the landscape where a river had carved a deep gorge – the Krka National Park. It was great swimming in the waterfalls at the bottom. The end of Croatia means Dubrovnik with its complete set of city walls. These have enough steps to provide a thorough physiotherapy session for anyone recovering from heart surgery - or anything else for that matter. The fascinating city definitely needs more than one day!

            It took less than that to cross Montenegro, but then we couldn’t find Albania! Approaching the border crossing with some trepidation we handed our passports up to the official at the window of the Border Hut to get out of Montenegro. He passed them to the man at the next window who returned them to us with a smile and we set off to look for Albania. After about 6 miles and passing through a couple of villages we realised that we had found it, and that the second window had been the dreaded Albanian border post. We camped by the beautiful Lake Shkodra and after a day’s rest drove the length of the country. This was perhaps not the best bit of planning on the trip.

            As we drove along on scruffy, untidy roads and small sections of modern motorway we saw an odd mixture of an old, undeveloped world and one that was rapidly trying to make it into the 21^st century. Teddy bears were tied to the reinforcement rods of unfinished buildings to keep out the evil spirits. At the end of the day, which we had found fascinating but exhausting, there was a final sting in the tail or more to the point a bite in the Rottweiler. He was standing with his owner looking at the famous Blue Eye Spring as I walked by. After wiping the blood away and the four tots worth of alcohol that had been splashed over my hand as antiseptic, at the nearest bar, we headed for Greece! Here our border luck continued - potential rabies and tetanus not withstanding.

            Northern Greece was straight out of all the extolling travel brochures except that they don’t mention the lack of service stations and their amenities on the first 200 miles of newly completed motorway. The second half of the day was a little easier in that regard.

            Finally into Turkey – some advice for anyone following in our footsteps. The first part of European Turkey is gentle hills and a lake or two and this lulls you into a false sense of security. Do not, under any circumstances, arrive on the outskirts of sprawling Istanbul at rush hour, especially if you have to find somewhere near one of the bridges over the Bosphorus; also if you have a sat.nav. that takes more than two seconds to ‘recalculate’ when you have gone wrong, yet again! We nearly went to Asia instead of our son’s apartment but turned off just in time. Istanbul itself is a whole new story – we had two weeks there.

            After a cub camp with the grandchildren on our final weekend we spent a night on the Black Sea coast to recover – beautiful - then we set our sights on home. We must be charmed concerning borders. Passing a 5-mile queue of lorries we wondered what awaited us but 15 minutes and we were through to Bulgaria. A night in rapidly developing Sophia and we were on the road again right across Serbia (with almost no motorways), through some attractive hills and just into Hungary. Most of Hungary is very flat - at least the part we saw. This might be due to the Danube, which we kept bumping into or rather, driving over. Lake Balaton had a very eerie feel as the sky was grey and overcast and a mist swirled over the surface.  A ferry took us to the northern shore and we were soon at Héviz and its extraordinary thermal lake. Serious looking Russians and Germans peopled the 19^th century spa, some areas of which felt as if things hadn’t moved on since then. However, the warm lake water set us up nicely for the final leg back into Austria and then home.

(Slightly more than 700 words but even so, just a taste of our adventure!)

Nov 2013