Bulgaria to Turkey

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Bulgaria. All the advice we had been given was to get through Bulgaria in one hit, with as few stops as possible so as to avoid any nastiness of any sort. We crossed the river into the country where the border procedures were swiftly completed. It amounted to a stamp in our passports and the purchase of an auto route sticker for the windscreen - a sort of congestion charge by another name, ie a road tax. I don’t understand why foreigners are exempt this charge when they drive in the UK. The roads were good, relatively free of traffic and we made speedy progress - until, that is, Jeremy who was leading the pack was pulled in by the police. We were all doing 90 kph in a 60 kph area! But they were only interested in Jeremy for some reason. We all watched from the layby as Jeremy pulled out all his charm and, after about 15 minutes of “chat” they let us go on with a mere, but very serious, warning. We kept our speed down thereafter. The countryside was beautiful with rolling hills well covered with broadleaf woodlands. We wound our way up a huge mountain range to over 5000 ft amsl, into the clouds in fact, and the only problem we had was that Ian’s gearbox oil warning light came on. After following the book instructions and topping up the fluid we were able to proceed. The other side of the mountain range it was relatively flat all the way to the Turkish border. We had lost our way a bit on the edge of one of the towns and a man guessed our predicament, jumped out of his car, and told us how to go on. In fact we found nothing but kindness and smiles, - even the police let us off - in our entire 7 hour crossing of the country. We wound our way from the border to Edirne where we found a nice little hotel very near the centre of town. Once established we explored the charming city centre, visited the mosque which was very attractive and ended up with a good meal at a small restaurant. We had a good night’s sleep other than for the drummer who patrolled the street at about 4 am loudly waking all good Muslims to have their meal before the dawn. This we were to experience throughout Turkey - not conducive to a long restful sleep!
(244 miles today)

Progress Report

Day 1 432 miles days run 432 miles Shipton/Warwick to Dover/Calais and on to Germany
Aarchan free camping site 1

Day 2 748 miles days run 316 miles Campsite 2 Nurnburg/Regensburg Germany

Day 3 1,087 miles days run 339 miles Campsite 3 just north Aust/Hung border (Austria)

Day 4 1,205 miles days run 118 miles Campsite 4 Budapest (Hungary)

Day 5 1,406 miles days run 201 miles Campsite 5 (free camping) Hungary (storms!)

Day 6 1,636 miles days run 230 miles To hostal in Pitesti (Romania) to dry out.

Day 7 1,752 miles days run 116 miles To hotel Cosmo (Romania) near Bulgaria border

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