Turkey!

“Welcome back Riaan” was how the Turkish immigration officer greeted me when I arrived. True Turkish hospitality even from their border agents.

It’s so good to be back!

I broke the trip here up in several key destinations I had to stop anyway: Budaptest (to see my dentist), Belgrade (to visit a friend) and Plovdiv (to do some paperwork and other admin).

So it did not feel like too long a journey, and it helped that the roads were so quiet! The quietest I’ve ever seen them, including the various major border crossings.

All in, it’s just over 4 000 km.

The plan is to hang around the south coast of Turkey for most of the winter - I’ll do some posts about some of the stops - and ideally after being inspired by Tread the Globe and Overland Sophia, go an explore the East of Turkey once it’s a bit warmer.

Woodbridge to Budapest

The first phase of our journey was to get to Budapest, where I have some dental work to get done, and friends to visit…it’s a city I know well - I’ve been coming to Hungary for many years now - and a great “phase 1” type route to make.

I did this in three days with my usual Harwich to Hook of Holland overnight crossing, a quick stop in Gouda (one of my favourite cities) and then using Park4Night stopping at overnight camper stops well away from the highway in Germany for some proper R&R.

It all worked quite well on this route - no hassles with Dutch customs (I was expecting quite a detailed search seeing that we’re now coming from outside the EU, but they were as friendly as ever) - and the roads were very quiet.

We’re in Hungary this week, and I hope to set off again over the weekend for phase 2, which is Budapest to Plovdiv in Bulgaria, via Serbia.

Prepping for UK to Turkey

Winter has arrived in the UK and it’s time to leave! I usually spend a short amount of time after the summer in the UK to focus on some work related items, but I do try and leave before it gets too cold.

I would have left sooner but I’ve been waiting for a replacement MacBook, which is now confirmed for 12 Nov….so Olli and I are booked on the Harwich to Hook of Holland ferry on the eve of 13 November.

It’s almost exactly a year ago I did the same route, and it worked well so we’ll just repeat it…UK via Holland, Germany, Austria to Hungary, where I’ll spend a week (dentistry related), then on to Bulgaria via Serbia, and then we cross into Turkey.

A slight difference this year is we’ll probably via Istantbul and Bursa down to Manavgat instead of the route we took last year, which was to turn immediately south after the Bulgaria border crossing.

The first MOT (annual vehicle check) is coming up for the motorhome next year May, but I’m going to bring that forward and do it now, so we’ll have the flexibility of not having to be back in the UK for a year - it makes things much easier that way.

Olli is all set up in his new buggy - this is actually a combination of a brilliant cargo trailer by Burley in the US, and a cheap collapsable dog cage. I’ve covered it with plastic whilst we’re here in the UK but I have to say that works so well I might get a proper cover made like that in Turkey.