20/04 The Road To Nowhere
After the nice beer in Split we all slept a little bit, and then went to some bars along the seaside, we had a little to much drinks there, but it was a fun evening. As I told you before everything is always full in Croatia, it’s really incredible!
Around 9 o’clock in the morning we left for Dubrovnik, roughly about 150 km’s further. What I didn’t see was that a small piece of the coast side is still owned by Bosnia! So we entered Bosnia, ate a good pizza there and continued to Dubrovnik. Once arrived we found a place to park quite quickly and entered a really magnificent city! It’s quite difficult to describe it, but just take a look at the pictures. Anyway, Zagreb, Zadar & Split were really worth the visit, but Dubrovnik is a must see! So if anyone is considering a city trip… Dubrovnik!
After walking around in Dubrovnik for about 4 hours (which is too short), we continued the coast road to find a camping. One sign informed us that there was a camping called "Monica" 30 km’s further in a very small place called Moulinet. We had to go up and down trough the mountains, and as further we got the more the fear grew that it was going to be another Auto Camp. Auto camps are place you find everywhere in Croatia, it’s a legal place where you can park your car/ camper and spent the night, as it is forbidden to do it anywhere else. But! We arrived and it was a normal camping! A beautiful bay, the sun was shining and we had everything there we needed! Finally we could install ourselves and relax a little. At the camping spot there where only three other campers, since the season in Croatia normally just starts around half of May. After we made installed everything, prepared a nice meal, we just… relaxed. It was something everyone of us needed, because the amount of cities we saw in just those 6 days was made us all a bit cranky. The next morning the sun hid itself behind some clouds, but the temperature was still nice. Around nine Peter went a little up in to go to a car that passes there every morning to bye some bread. After that we went for a swim in the still very cold Mediterranean, (here it’s the Adriatic see). Around 12 we sat together and discussed the plans for the next days. We actually wanted to stay another day at that place, but I was afraid of Albania and if something would happen to the car there, we could be stuck for another day or two, so we decided to go and try to pass Montenegro and Albania in one long ride.
21/04 "Monica" Was just a few kilometers from the border with Montenegro, passing it was not a problem, they first didn’t want to let the van pass, because they said it’s not a car, but…. Something else, it was obvious that one guy just wanted us to pay him money, but I just waited and 15 minutes later we were driving. There we did something stupid, we drove in a half circle, back into Croatia, so we had to turn again, and had 6 border controls in just 30 minutes. The views in Montenegro are wonderful, they are building resorts and nice houses along the coast side everywhere. The roads are in good condition (not compared to Croatia and so, but doable). The only thing is that it goes so slowly because of all the work in progress. The last 40 km’s you can see that you get closer to Albania, and then… suddenly a roaring noise from under the car… the exhaustion pipe close to the engine broke in two, shit! With a empty Jupiler beer can we connected the two pieces together again and… it seemed to work! For about another 10 km’s. Same thing again, there we were, not along the coast side anymore. There were some people sitting together in what they call a bar and we went to ask them for help. 10m further there was a ‘service station’ ( you would never notice it if you didn’t know). They guy drove the car inside (the car just fitted in that building I think no more than 5 cm’s above and on the sides left). He looked at what happened, and without communication he starts working on it ( the language they use here is one that looks a bit like Russian, so we where able to just get bye). 10 minutes later he starts the engine and… problem solved! Price card: 10€! We were good again! Quite lucky it happened in Montenegro, and not in Albania.
Then passing the border to Albania… no road… a long time before they checked everything. Other people we passed during this trip all advised us not to go trough Albania, not because of the people, but because of the bad Roads, but what could we do, a Ferry ticket from Dubrovnik… to Italy, and then from there to Corfu was to expensive so we just had to do it. After jut having entered Albania it was like entering a ghetto, but the road was ok. Then suddenly we had to pass a bridge… which was made in wood! After that the road was good! Very good, we couldn’t understand what they were talking about because this wasn’t difficult driving! But then the motorway just… ends! No more motorway, humps, turns, bricks and so on. I was really scared that something would happen with the car again. The country really looks very poor, I think we saw one new car, al the rest are old machines and especially old Mercedes, because they have very good suspensions I think. Nothing looks attractive here (we didn’t see the capital, maybe it’s better there). We drove until 2 o’clock in the night, and were still very far from the border, so we just parked the car and decided to sleep. When we stopped somewhere in the night it was like being in a thriller movie, empty streets and dogs howling everywhere. In whole Albania we saw dead cats and dogs on the street everywhere!
22/04 After a short sleep we continued in the broad daylight! But what we didn’t know was that we only just had to start with the worst part of all. You have to know that we took the coast road, and we think that the road land inwards is probably in a much better condition. For another 120 km’s we drove over four hours, and that was good! Me the whole time in Albania I kept thinking something will happen, we will not get to Greece, it’s not possible (I’m a bit of a pussy sometimes) but the at last, a short good road to the Greek border! It was sunny, but and raining at the same time, it’s like the rain represented my tears of happiness! GREECE! A wide open road, nature smiling at us, it feels good to be happy!
From the border it was another hour and a half driving to get to the place ‘Igoumenitsa’ where there was a ferry. The plan we had was to find another camping and go take the ferry the next day. But that city was just a small harbor city, nothing special, and no camping’s, so we just took the ferry and went to Kerkira a.k.a. Corfu! In Corfu we found a camping which was already open, parked ourselves and actually took a holiday.
23/04 The next day we went to the hotel where we start the 25th, there we already got our room keys, and could already stay there if we wanted. But until then we just stay at the camping enjoying the Greek sun, Greek food, Greece!
I just wanted to say something about Albania, although we didn’t visit anything, the country was beautiful, it’s just strange to see that one country differs so much from the other just by passing one border!
Discovering the Island will be next on this blog, so stay tuned!
I also got some news from Yana, apparently Greece doesn’t give any visa to girls anymore for a period of 6 months, they are afraid she will stay here illegal. So now she is trying to get an Italian multi visa which costs a lot! And she should be here in 2 weeks!
