Goodbye EU...

I think that we managed to soak up some of the Transylvanian atmosphere in Romania. It rained most of the time so the hills were very misty and eerie. We visited the alleged birth place of Dracula, Sigisoara, and the beautiful city of Sibiu. Sibiu is sharing the role of European City of Culture with Luxembourg this year and the Romanians have gone to great lengths to present it in its full glory- it is spotless, unlike the rest of Romania. On our way to the Bulgarian border we drove over a mountain road through the Fagaras Mountains and for once we were treated to a view from the top. However the rubbish was disgusting. I understand the area to be a National Park, it was so disappointing. On our way down we did see some workers clearing some of the rubbish but they were just making little bonfires out of it- there was too much to transport away.

Band on the street in Sibiu, Romania

Romania is a beautiful colourful country with something to interest everybody in every corner; however, I did become weary of having to clean up the area every time we stopped.

Mountain pass, looking down the hanging valley

The final stretch to the border was via a rather rickety and isolated road made much worse by the rain. It followed a railway line and we passed numerous what looked to be derelict large Collective Farms.

Again in Bulgaria the roads were washed out but the police were very efficient in diverting everyone. We headed for the Black Sea Resort of Varna and then a little further south to camp is a Special Reserve area of forest right on the beach. Again we are not sure what the Special Reserve was for. Not wanting to moan but again the litter was pretty foul. Luckily the part we chose to camp on had just been the subject of some flash flooding so I think all the litter had been washed into someone else’s patch. After it started to rain again, our neighbours, Dianne and Mark, played host to us in their “White Box” until the wee hours of the morning with the help of some fine Bulgarian wine.

Breafast stop, first morning in Bulgaria

We found a better beach further down the road at Sozopol. The town, despite being extremely touristy was delightful and after regular dips in the Black Sea to cool down we made a move to find a secluded shady spot where Gavin could do some maintenance on the car. I will let him explain about this in more detail, but needless to say it did not go to plan and those pesky flies were attracted to every orifice on ones head. Finally, with Gavin’s patience holding out the task was a “good ‘un” and we were on our way again.

The road to Turkey was through a hilly green and lush Natural Park, home to many types of oak and periwinkle and fly- tipping.

Now we are finally out of the European Union and I had to pay for my first visa, Gavin’s was for free. So far Turkey has been delightful and the Turkish people have been so courteous. Initially the road down through the hills from the border to the first big town, Kirkareli, was full of villages and babbling streams. Kirkareli was stuffed full of different grocery shops and little eateries. The whole place was simply bursting with life.

We are now cooling off at a beach campsite right on the Sea of Marmara before heading into Istanbul.

Recovered Photos...

Have finally managed to recover photos of Croatia from the memory card, and have added a few here. A bit more interesting than photos of stork nests and Land Rovers... The first photo shows the wind on the water north of the Dalmatian Coast. The last three were taken at Plitvice Lakes.

Happy Birthday Mum!

Last year from Russia, this year from Bulgaria.
All the best.
Love from Gavin and Catkin

Croatia, Hungary and Romania

Roof tents are great – when it’s not too windy! After our last post we headed south-east to the northern Dalmatian coast (and we even saw a Dalmatian dog!). Quite early on in the day, however, the winds picked up to gale force, whipping up a frenzy on the sea. People were sent scattering from the beaches, trying to maintain control of their inflatable dinghies, and the road was closed to motorbikes and caravans. Not Land Rovers though, so we carried on past the barrier arms. Man, was it windy. It looks like it might be like that quite often, too, as there was hardly any vegetation above four feet tall. As the day wore on our thoughts turned to our camping situation. At an altitude of six feet above ground level, the roof tent tends to cop the wind a bit. "Maybe we should use the dome tent on the ground?" Catkin suggested. "Just wait until the sun goes down, and I’m sure the wind will drop," I tell her. "We’ll be fine." When the wind actually picked up after sunset, the dome tent was looking promising, although I’m not sure if that would have withstood the gusts either. Finally at around midnight the wind did drop to satisfactory roof tent levels, albeit with the fly tied down, and even then it was still a pretty noisy night. On top of all that, I don’t think we really ventured far enough south to get the best of the coast.

We had a more important mission. With our newly acquired insurance green card, mentioned in a previous post, we had a small window to get through Romania, so back north and further east for us. Stopping at the Plitvice Lakes (on another tip from Marcus), we spent an afternoon wandering around the boardwalks marvelling at the turquoise water. Took heaps of photos, but so far the memory card has refused to release them for public exhibition… Instead you get to see a picture of a stork nest on top of a power pole. The nests are massive, and are quite a common sight.

Crossing into Hungary we made for Pecs for a few essential purchases and a night in a great little family-run campground, and then onto Szeged. Over the last few days our focus has changed slightly, in that we have been covering a lot more ground and seeing a lot less touristy sights. Consequently we’re taking fewer photos, but have included a night shot of the Camel in front of the Tisza river in Szeged, Hungary.

Since then we have made it into Romania and the roads have got worse (and the driving). We spent the first night at another family-run campsite, Route Roemanie, were the owner was very helpful in giving us advice on routes and things to see in Romania. I think he was a little disappointed that we were driving through so quickly, but understood when we explained that we had to get to New Zealand.

Last night we chanced our arm on the shore of a fishing lake in Transylvania. We got a few odd looks from the locals, and I think we may be camping at one of their best fishing spots.

We've currently in Sighisoara, where Dracula was allegedly born, and have just had a delicious lunch at a small cafe, although what was delivered to the table bore no resemblance to what was ordered!

Happy Birthday Kathryn!

Catkin’s last post saw us back in Austria. Our main reason for going to Vienna was to collect our all important Insurance Green Card for Romania, which luckily had duly arrived via Post Restante (thanks to Bob and Sue). We also used the opportunity to stock up on guidebooks for Eastern Europe and the Middle East, and buy a map of Northern Africa, so hopefully we are now fully prepared for the months ahead. We spent a great evening in the city eating and drinking (as you do in European cities), ending up on the Danube in a cheap student bar where you had to pay a deposit for a glass (I felt old, especially when I noticed everyone there was just drinking straight from the bottle…why didn't I think of that?). We even managed to find our way back to the campsite on the U-Bahn.

Catkin with a precious glass

The following day we headed south-west for Slovenia, crossing the border via the Seeberg Sattel pass on Friday evening. Descending into the Slovenian countryside, our main aim was to find a campsite, and after at one point mistakenly ending up in a farmer’s driveway, we finally found ourselves in the largest camping ground in the country, near Bled. Bled is situated on a lake and the scenery is amazing. We hired a row-boat for an hour and went over to the church on the small island in the lake, as well as going for a quick swim , as it was HOT! The lake was just like a huge swimming pool. Later in the day we spent a couple of hours in Ljubljiana, and were treated to an impromptu performance by a German/Scottish pipes and drums band in the main square.

Bled Castle in the background

Further south-west we visited Skocjan Caves, a UNESCO World Heritage Site (thanks for the tip Marcus). This is a massive series of underground caverns formed by the river Reka, and the network of stairs and bridges made it feel like being in the Mines of Moria in a scene from The Lord of the Rings. The caves and the town museums were excellent.

Entrance to Skocjan Caves

Slovenia has been a big surprise for us. It’s small, but is clean, friendly and absolutely stunning.

Now we’re in Croatia, and I’m sitting in a pleasant campsite looking out at the full moon shining over the warm and salty Adriatic Sea. We have just finished a delicious dinner of corn-on-the-cob followed by stuffed peppers, lovingly prepared in Catkin’s camp kitchen, and polished off a very nice bottle of white wine from Austria. It’s just gone 11pm and it’s still 26ºC up in the tent!

And finally, Big Happy Birthday wishes from both of us today to Kathryn (my sister)!

Back to the Wenzlick’s homeland

The Czech Republic has to be amongst our favourite haunts so far. We stayed at a delightful campsite by a lake, in Bohemia. We spent the evening swimming and drinking beer. We also visited a really cool castle, in the village where the composer Janacek was born and then and got a bit lost on a walk. Cycling seems to be taking off in The Czech Republic. On Saturday almost every other car had bikes on the roof. There are also loads of cycle routes marked on the roads. As our first foray out of Western Europe during this trip, the sudden drop in prices for everything came as a very welcome surprise.

Lakeside campsite in Bohemia

Gavin and I decided a while ago that we wanted to visit Auschwitz in Poland, so hence a bit of a detour from our “east bound and down” direction of travel. We spent ages looking for a campsite, driving all around the area. Then just opposite Auschwitz we saw a sign “Auto camp” so we approached to investigate. Immediately a young chap jumped into the middle of the road motioning us towards the gate of what looked to be a car park- not an “Autocamp”. Given that it was almost 7pm it was quite clear that we were looking for somewhere to camp. He said “yes, yes camping” and I made the sign of a tent, again “yes, yes”, also there was a sign saying showers. So we drove in and he gave us a ticket. We then found out that the toilets and showers were locked anyway. So off we went to explore on foot and found the “Centre of Dialogue and Prayer”. They had a lovely campsite. Back we went to our car park and after some discussion with the cashier, who I suspect now regrets admitting to speaking English, we left.

The next day dawned clear and bright and into Auschwitz we went. Despite the glorious weather and the hoards of people it is still quite a remarkable place. Quite bizarre trying to imagine that it was a death factory and the immense pain, desolation and suffering that must have been experienced by millions. Parts of the camp have been reconstructed from original materials, such as the gas chamber. This was the prototype gas chamber and once the system and technique for mass murder had been “perfected” it appears that this gas chamber was destroyed and larger and more numerous chambers were built at the huge camp, Auschwitz –Birkanau 3 kilometres away. The immense displays of personal possessions stolen from the victims were also very sobering. There was also a very good exhibition on Poland during the war. I certainly had no idea of the extremes the Nazis had gone to, to dehumanise the Polish people as well as so many other groups of populations. The exhibition was almost quite brutal to the visitor in being quite unrestrainedly frank.

Auschwitz

Birkenau

Heading south into Slovakia we realised that it is exactly a year since we were in Slovakia for the Mongol Rally, and yesterday we even saw one of the teams driving in the other direction. We did stop for a bit, when we turned off that road, hoping to see a few more go past, but we were disappointed. Now in Vienna, having travelled via Bratislava.

Admin in Munich

Since our last post we have travelled from Italy, through the Dolomites and Alps (again), into Austria and then to Munich in Germany. The mountains have been amazing, and since the weather has been absolutely great, the views have been spectacular. On Sunday we travelled over the Grossglockner High Alpine Road, which is surrounded by a National Park. It is a popular weekend destination for the locals. We went for a bit of a walk up to the end of a glacier, and ended up helping carry a man on a stretcher to a place where a helicopter could land to pick him up. He had dislocated his ankle, but the doctor on the helicopter managed to put it back in, so he’ll be fine. Pretty painful though. We ended the day at Zell am See.

Grossglockner

We next passed through Berchtesgaden and nearby Obersalzburg where Hitler and the Nazi Party members had homes (and a full compliment of SS troops for protection). At the top of the mountain is Kehlsteinhaus, dubbed the Eagle’s Nest by the Americans, which was a house gifted to Hitler for his 50th birthday. Nice present.

View from the top

From there we have spent a morning walking around Salzburg, and have since made our way to Munich for a bit of admin. We now have our Carnet de Passages for the Land Rover, from the ADAC (German AA), and have picked up a spare oil filter from a LR dealer. Today we are having a wheel alignment and balance done at a very efficient tyre shop just to make sure all is A-OK before heading to more remote parts. Luckily for me, Catkin speaks German, although she has picked up a few new technical terms.

After Munich we head north-east towards Poland. Standby for further reports.