This rainy day concluded my 8 weeks, 11500 km motorcycle trip through south-east Europe. I was very satisfied with my Kymco Hypster, it always did its job without complaining, and I never had any problems with it. It was a good and faithful companion and it only consumed a modest 2.8l/100km over the whole trip. It was exhausting at times riding for so many hours a day, sometimes in temperatures above 40 degrees, but I enjoyed the freedom you get when traveling this way. You can go wherever you want to and stop whenever you like; which is not possible when traveling by bus. I don’t think this was my last motorcycle trip.

The whole night there was thunder, lightning and rain. In the morning when I got up it didn’t rain so I hurried to pack my things together before it started again. And it did start again when I headed into the Alps. For the first time in 8 weeks I took out my rain jacket and pants. Before I reached the Gotthard I still saw occasional lightning and I thought about if it was a good idea to go over the mountain pass in these weather conditions. Just when I reached the mountain I saw it clearing up a little and I decided that it would hold long enough to go over the mountain. I didn’t regret the decision. It was a special atmosphere riding up the mountain, with the clouds hanging in the valley and the fresh green slopes with rests of snow on the other side. I grew up in a beautiful country I thought; too bad I haven’t seen a lot of it yet. Certainly one of the next trips has to be in Switzerland itself to finally get to know my own country as well.
The weather changed for the worse on the other side of the mountain. Clouds were hanging deep and soon it started raining and it didn’t stop until I reached home. My shoes were not made for this kind of weather and they were soaking wet the whole ride and my toes started to feel pretty cold.

It was still quite a distance to the Swiss border, too much for driving on country roads. So I headed for the autobahn. Thanks to riding a motorcycle I was able to pass two traffic jams fairly quickly. They must have been using gold to build the road, the trip from Rimini to the Swiss border, about 300 km cost me about 20 Euros in toll, more then what I spent on gasoline.
It was symptomatic, up to Milano the sky was blue and no sign of bad weather but then the closer I came to the Swiss border the more clouds showed up and when I crossed the border I even felt a few rain drops.
When I left the autobahn in Lugano I ran into a police control. That wasn’t good because I didn’t have an “Autobahnvignette”. I think they were looking for someone because they didn’t ask for it.
I spent the night on the camping La Piodella near Lugano.

I continued my way north-west. It was the weekend and where ever I passed a beach there were endless lines of cars along the road. It seemed as if every Italian went to the beach on the weekend. I passed many caravans as well. I always thought that the Germans are the biggest caravan people but the Italians are pretty numerous also. The only difference I think is that Italians stay mostly in their own country.
I drove to Torre Pedrera north of Rimini as my last destination before returning to Switzerland. I was looking for a camping to spend the night but they were so expensive that I thought I might as well stay in a hotel. In fact at the end after some negotiations, the night in Hotel Croce del Sud including breakfast cost me less then I would have paid on the camping where no negotiations were possible. They actually wanted me to pay for 1 tent and 2 persons because high season had started. While the beach in the afternoon was still crowded, in the evening it was pretty quiet. It seemed that most people were there just for a day or the weekend.

From the Gargano peninsula up to Pescara I passed a lot of long stretched beaches. Then the long beaches got replaced by long towns. It was as if the towns were built along the road and finally grew together. That was not a lot of fun to drive and I was able to advance only slowly. In Porto Sant Elpidio I put up my tent on a camping. After I was done with the work my neighbors, a mother with her 2 children, her nephew and her father invited me to eat dinner with them. Again they were German and it was quite entertaining eating spaghetti with them. It was nice getting invited. I think the reason because I never got invited before was that in preseason there were almost exclusively pensioners on the camping’s. Now almost in main season this changed and there were a lot of younger people as well who seemed to be a little bit more open.

Early in the morning the ferry arrived in Brindisi. Immigration and Customs went all smooth. Although a little tired I was eager to ride again. On the way north an old “hippie” VW bus drove by on the fast lane. I noticed the license plate, they were Swiss and I felt I was getting closer to home. Obviously they felt the same way because the person in the passenger seat looked back and waved heavily at me. I drove a nice road north-west along the coast to the Gargano peninsula where I looked for a camping. I chose to stay in the nice Camping Centre Turistico San Nicola. I had two really nice German couples as neighbors. When they saw me they invited me to eat with them, it was the first time this happened to me on my trip. They made a fine salad and sausages on the grill and of course there was wine as well. It turned out to be a really nice and entertaining evening.
There was another premiere on this camping; for the first time on my trip I went swimming! Although I had visited countless beaches during my trip, I never really got around to taking a swim. Now I was almost home again so it was about time to dig out my bathing shorts. I used the next day to relax on the beach. In the evening the group from last night went to eat pizza together. This time the evening ended earlier after a grappa back by the tents because it started to rain a little bit.

It took the ferry 30 hours to get to Brindisi. I only booked a Pullman seat which was pretty uncomfortable for 2 nights but fortunately the ferry was basically empty and you almost had to ship to yourself. The route was interesting because for the most part there was land somewhere to be seen. Actually the route brought me back to two places I already knew; only this time I drove under them instead of over them, the canal of Corinth and the bridge of Patra. It felt funny seeing these places again from a different perspective and gave me a sense of how far I had traveled with my motorcycle.

Finally I drove to my last destination in Turkey, to Izmir and Cesme. There I reached a point where I was a little sorry that I didn’t look for more information about Pamukkale upfront. I heard from several people that Pamukkale is near Izmir. I didn’t bather to ask where this place was exactly because I thought that once I got to Izmir I would ask for the necessary information. And so I did, but had to hear that it was not as near to Izmir as I thought it was. I wanted to take a ferry directly to Brindisi, Italy, but this ferry only left once a week. I had a decision to make either visit the place and then wait for the ferry for almost a week or let it go and take the ferry that was leaving shortly. I kind of was ready to get home again so I decided to skip it. A little hurtful it was though, because had I known the location just a day before, I could have adjusted my route to visit the place and taken the early ferry as well.
This way I had enough time to take a look at Cesme and surrounding. It was pretty windy and I found some nice spots to look out onto the deep blue colored sea. It also has a nice large beach, although it was a bit crowded on the weekend. At 10 o’clock at night I drove to the harbor where the ferry was waiting.

A trip along a nice road brought me to another crowded place, Marmaris where I ended up at the end of the next day. Once again the panorama was nice but too many people for the narrow beach. It seemed to be popular among Russian people.
Just before reaching Marmaris I stopped on a viewpoint to take a look at the city form above when another motorcycle pulled up beside me. It was a Swiss couple on their way back to Switzerland, coming all the way from India.
I had a really annoying experience in the hotel I stayed in. Actually a pretty nice hotel with a good breakfast and evening buffet they wouldn’t let me bring any water to my room. After a hot day on the motorcycle I usually drank about 2 litters of water in the evening which I tried to explain to them. They were very insisting so that I had to take my water bottle for a walk outside the hotel and leave the water which I bought for the next day in the reception. That was too much and I was happy I didn’t have to stay an entire week in that hotel.

The next day the road continued to be difficult until getting closer to Alanya. This seemed to be a very touristic place consisting almost entirely out of hotels and vacation apartment buildings. Then there started to appear countless holiday resorts along the way to Antalya. I continued to Kemer where I planned to spend the night. The hills to the south west end of Antalya and around Kemer had a small resemblance with the “morros” of Rio de Janeiro, that’s what came to my mind when I saw them. I didn’t really understand why Kemer was so touristic. Ok the panorama is certainly nice but the beach was overcrowded and consisted of large pebbles instead of sand.

Relaxed I drove on the next day heading south. There were two parts that were especially nice. The first one was the road from Ürgup towards Develi. Half way on this road I turned south and shortly thereafter reached the second part from Nigde to Mersin. The temperature was incredible, later I learned that I was driving in a heat wave with temperatures above 40 degrees. The heat over the street was even worse and at times it felt like driving over an oven. That didn’t change much when I reached the Mediterranean Sea again either. This was the furthest point of my trip close to Syria and I headed back west. In contrast to the area west and around Antalya, this part of the south is not much developed. There are few towns and the streets are similar to the one along the Black Sea coast, up and down and turning all the time. I advanced very slowly and when I reached one of the bigger towns on the map, it was already late; I stopped and asked for a hotel. There wasn’t anything there. I was tired but I had to go on. Advancing very slowly, just before reaching the next bigger town I saw a hotel in one village. I went to ask and I was lucky. The hotel just went into business again and I was one of the first guests. It was Motel Sydney in Bozyazi.

The second day I drove to one of several underground cities in Cappadocia. That was very impressive. They built the entire villages completely under ground, digging out tunnels and caves to live in. I wouldn’t have wanted to live down there but it was amazing never the less.
In the evening I found a very nice spot on top of a rock, with no people around it was fascinating to see the sunset in this scenery.

The walks were certainly the best part of it and one time in a valley I reached one of these carved out houses where a local was selling cold drinks and other stuff to people walking by. He told me that nobody comes by these days and business is going bad. He convinced me to drink an Ice Tea. We talked for a while about motorcycles and once I was ready to leave I got up and reached for my money. It wasn’t there. I realized that I didn’t take it out of the jacket when I left it with the motorcycle. I had to explain it to him; I thought he wouldn’t take it very well because business was going so bad. But surprisingly he staid very calm and said that these thing can happen, that I didn’t do it on purpose and therefore he invites me and that I shouldn’t worry about it. I felt pretty bad because every day he had to carry all the drinks and food from town to this place, about 45 minutes on foot, so I insisted that he give me the name of someone where I could leave the money that I owed him.

I spent 2 days in Göreme mostly walking the countless valleys. I liked it a lot in Cappadocia, that’s what the region around Goreme is called, famous for its stone formations and for the fact that people carved their houses into these rocks. You can even get rooms in these rocks but I stayed in Hotel Ottomanhouse which was of good value and had an immense breakfast buffet for me alone.

I didn’t know until arriving in town that there was something to see in this place, so first thing in the morning I packed my motorcycle and drove to Hattusha which is right next to town. It’s the ruins of an ancient Hittites town. One can get a good impression of the dimension of this city when standing on top of the hill to the south with the pyramid like city wall.
After I spent a couple of hours in the ruins I left and drove towards Cappadocia. It was a very rural area, dryer and hotter then in the north. Driving along huge corn fields I was the only tourist on the way. I saw many farmers with a couple of cows taking a rest in the shadow of a tree in the hot afternoon sun. Then I arrived in Göreme.

In the morning I continued on south to Ilgaz. Just as the day before, the landscape was very nice, green with lots of flowers. From Ilgaz I drove towards Corum. Without warning the end of a traffic jam came into view. I stopped and looked around but I couldn’t see where it started. On the opposite lane there was not a single car coming so I decided to continue on driving there. It wasn’t a very busy road, but cars and trucks were standing all over the place, people picnicking in the shadow of trees. They must have been waiting for many hours already. After kilometers I reached the front. There was an accident blocking almost the entire road and I stopped. When a police man saw me on my motorcycle he indicated to me that I could pass slowly. On the other side it was the same story, people on the street, cars and trucks spread out everywhere on both lanes, not able to go forth nor back, blocking everything. Once again I was very happy that I was traveling with a motorcycle, I was able to slip by and save myself many hours of frustrated waiting in the hot sun.
Driving along rice fields I saw a waterfall marking on my map just a little outside Corum. I decided to go take a look. What a disappointment when I got there, it was just a restaurant with a little stream. It was far off the main street and I don’t think many foreign tourists have set foot there, so I figured from the reaction of the waiters. It was lunch time anyway so I ordered something. It wasn’t easy communicating because no one spoke English. With signs I managed to let him know that I wanted something small. He understood me and brought me a basket of bread with a bowl of a very tasty mix of tomato’s and other things to put on it.
After my break I drove back to the main road and continued to a small town called Bogozkale. After returning from Yazilikaya ruins I changed the spark plug of the motorcycle, ate and went to bed. I stayed in a Hotel Baykal.

Just as pretty was the ride from Inebolu to Kastamonu, over a mountain range with lots of forest onto a plateau of green plains with colorful flowers. The road was also much better again. I was driving till the sun stood very low which gave the landscape an extra nice flavor I enjoyed it a lot driving in the sunset and it was very calming and satisfying.
It would have been nice to camp there but I didn’t see any camping grounds, so I drove into Kastamonu when it was dark already. I asked in several hotels but they were all booked out. I thought I had to drive into another town but while leaving I saw one more hotel. I went to check and fortunately they had a room for me.

Just outside Zounguldak I drove buy a parking space with an entrance into the mountain. First I thought it was a mosque built into the rock but when I turned around and went to look I saw that it was a cave. I didn’t expect too much but paid the small entrance fee and went in. First it didn’t look like much but the cave just kept on going into the rock for 850m. Passing underground streams and towards the end very nice drip stone I was happy I didn’t just drive by when I saw it.
I continued along the Black Sea coast to a small town called Amasra. It’s a cozy little city; touristically developed just enough to provide everything you need but not as much as to attract the masses. I ate lunch in one of the restaurants and drove on. I continued along the coast to Inebolu where I turned land inward. The trip along the Black Sea coast was very nice. The street wasn’t so good, narrow, curving and going up and down all the time. It was very tiring to drive but also very rewarding because the scenery was amazing and there was almost no civilization.

The Swiss couple I met in Kavala warned me of the expensive gas in Turkey. Good thing that my Motorcycle runs with 3 Liters per 100 km.
I went on the autobahn to get onto one of the big bridges crossing the Bosporus. On the other side I ran into a toll station. I looked for booth where I could pay with cash but didn’t see one. So I just took one in hopes to find some machine that would accept coins. It only accepted cards and cars were coming behind me so I wasn’t able to turn back. The idiot in the next car in line lost his temper, got out of the car and instead of helping me he started to make a scene and scream around as if the world was about to end. I let him scream while I waited and hoped that someone would come for help. Nobody came so I squeezed me through the small gap the barrier left. Was it just that hysteric idiot or are Turkish people only friendly when they get some money out of it?
Well fortunately just a few hours later in Zonguldak I learn that there were other people as well. An older man who lived some years in Germany helped me find a good Hotel. He went to ask in several places until we found one in the town of Kilimli that I was able to afford. We drank a tea together and then he went his way. I was hungry so I looked for a place to eat. The first restaurant was empty and they told me that they were preparing for a birthday party so I went on. In the second place I saw many people and I entered. I was a little confused because I didn’t know if it was self service or if I could just sit down and wait for someone to take my order. After looking around for a while I realized that I had entered a private wedding party and that I was probably not invited. A little embarrassed I left. In the town itself I finally found a small place, they only served one menu but that was ok with me. In the night I had a very good sleep because it was a very quiet town.

People seemed more hospitable here; I got free tea in the hotel, a map and an introduction on what to see in the city, which made it a lot easier. Turkey is quite a change when coming from Europe. It takes a while until you get used to the regular chants from the minarets. It’s quite entertaining at first because for someone who doesn’t understand the language, singers from different mosques seem to “compete” with each other.
In the morning I went to see several mosques where you have to take off your shoes to enter and women are given long skirts to wear. The great bazaar was entertaining although they sell almost exclusively to tourists as it seemed; it’s probably far off from a “real” bazaar. After walking for hours around the city, late in the afternoon I went to visit the old palace. It was interesting to see but I think I missed the best part because it was late and they had already closed the living quarters for the day. I left the palace just as it was about to close and walked through the park between the two big mosques back to the hotel. Going out to eat was something new as well. Every waiter in a restaurant wanted to strike up a conversation with you an “overtalk” you into eating in his restaurant. They had quite impressive language skills, speaking with almost everybody in their native language. I even got to hear some Swiss German.

After a couple of hours I reached the border crossing to turkey. The military presence on the bridge made it clear that these two countries had their share of differences in the past. On the Turkish side I found a model border crossing with tourist information where you could get free road maps and other useful info, duty free stores, restaurants and a bank to get money in the local currency. Only downside was that I had to buy an extra insurance for my motorcycle again, because I didn’t have the right papers with me.
Arriving in Istanbul I had the same old problem of finding my way in a big city. After some curving around I found a small hotel very close to the center.

In Kavala I stayed one day on the Camping Akti Kavala Batis. Although right by the city you won’t notice because the complex is located in a small bay that hides it’s proximity to the city. The camping and the beach are pretty nice. In the morning I went for a walk in the city and in the afternoon I took a sun chair on the beach to relax for a while.
There was a Swiss couple on the camping as well. They were on their way back to Switzerland after crossing all of Africa in their Land Rower. In the evening we talked for a while about our adventures and they gave me some tips on what to see in Turkey where I headed the next morning.

I wasn’t sure whether to stay a day in a camping on one of the peninsulas or whether to head straight for Kavala. I decided to drive a full circle on Sithonia peninsula and if I found something nice I would stay. Actually there were pretty nice places and beaches but all the camping’s were packed full with Greek tourists (I didn’t experience Greek people as very friendly or open, though I met some helpful ones as well) that I decided to drive to Kavala.

Having seen a lot of Meteora, the next day I drove towards Deskati. It was a stretch away from most civilization. There wasn’t much live on the road; at least not human live. I saw 4 turtles, 2 lizards and 2 snakes right on the road. One of these snakes was very unlucky because being almost out of danger it noticed me and in the last moment it turned back and got right under my wheels. I saw many stains on the road and wondered how many turtles, snakes and other creatures had lost their lives on that road.
Somewhat later I reached the sea again. I drove north and stopped in Paralia. It had a halfway decent beach but packed with people, maybe because it was the weekend. I continued north but only after a few minutes the weather turned bad. A thunderstorm came up and since I didn’t feel like driving in the rain or with lightning, I made a stop in a restaurant to eat something. Just in time when I finished eating it stopped raining and I was able to go on. I had lots of hours riding behind me when I finally reached a camping near N.Moudonia at 7 o’clock in the evening.

At last I couldn’t resist taking my motorcycle for a ride in these mountains and go visit some of the monasteries. On the way I met a Bulgarian pensioner who was traveling by bike with little money and sleeping in a hammock in the wild. It was interesting to hear his stories and we talked quite a while.Meteora is really an amazing place and sitting on one of these rocks and look at the panorama can’t be described in words.

Meteora is a small mountainous region with characteristic rock formations. Some time ago monks decided to build their monasteries on top of these rocks which makes the place truly unique and worth visiting. I went out into the rocks again but this time I wasn’t going to take any risks. On my way I almost stepped on a medium sized land turtle. First I thought it escaped from someone in town but later I found out that they live here. While coming down another path suddenly something rustled in the brushwood. I just saw a long black body shaped like a garden hose dive down the hill with amazing quickness. I was happy the snake was as scared of me as I was of it.

I stayed a few nights on the camping Vrachos Kastraki because Meteora is a great place to stay a couple of days and go hiking and because the camping was pretty good as well.
I had a lot of dirty laundry so the first thing I had to do was to wash some of my cloths. Then I took the map they gave me in the camping and walked toward the rocks. First it went very well, the path was good. But after I reached the highest point of the path, things started to get messy. The path slowly faded into pure wilderness. I walked through spider webs and through thorn bushes. According to the map there was still supposed to be a path like the one before, but there was nothing at all. I am sure I went the right way because from the top I could see where I was going. But worse to come, I had to climb down some pretty steep and slippery rocks and suddenly I realized that there was no way back up again, the only way was to continue on down the slope. So I went on and reached a point where the only way down was a pure vertical drop of about 1.5m. It wouldn’t have been such a problem if there were a good base to land but there wasn’t much, it just continued down. I sat down for a while to think what to do. I really didn’t think I could climb up there again and the houses I was heading for seemed already so close. I decided to take my chances and jumped. As I had feared I wasn’t able to keep myself in place after I landed and with too much momentum I stumbled down the slope, grasping for anything to hold on to. Fortunately I got hold of something and was able stop. I scratched my hand and arms while doing so but it could have ended much worse then this, I didn’t complain. I wasn’t down quite yet but the most difficult part was behind me. I followed a dried out stream downwards and while it leveled out the bushes started to get pretty thick. With some patience I finally managed to get out and reach the small town. I was relived I made it out without breaking or twisting an ankle or a leg. I had enough adventure for one day and returned to the camping.

Half a day in Athens was enough for me. I wanted to get out of the city as fast as possible but that wasn’t so easy. I lost my way again and ended up at the Olympic sports facilities. There I asked for directions and went on an autobahn to get out of the city as soon as possible. I stayed on it till Lamia. I was lucky and could drive in the wind shadow of a truck most of the time which helped me keep the consumption low and the speed acceptable. In Lamia I headed land inward to the town of Kastraki near Meteora.

Taking a break to look at the Canal of Corinth I left Peloponnese and drove into Athens. It’s an immense city and it didn’t take a long time until I had no idea where I was whatsoever. I managed to find the Acropolis but I didn’t see any hotels there. I had to drive further so I went on till I finally reached the sea. I knew that hotels here were probably more expensive but it was the only way that I could find the place again after visiting the Acropolis. After I checked into a hotel, it was already well into the afternoon, I drove back to the Acropolis. There was a lot of traffic and once again I was happy to travel by motorcycle because you can slip through to the front on a red light. There were tons of scooters and they were driving like crazy, using every gap to sneak through. It was not a lot less crowded on top of the Acropolis. Unfortunately at the time they were restoring the temple and the support structures spoiled the view. After taking a look at everything I went to a restaurant with a big appetite because I hadn’t eaten anything all day. Fortunately I found the way back to the hotel without any problems.

From Tolo where I spent the night I went to visit Ancient Epidaurus. I didn’t take the main road to get there and got a little lost in the wild but finally I found the place anyway. I sat a while in the top row of the ancient theater, took a walk around the other ruins and the small museum before heading back to Tolo. Again I choose a small road which turned out to be interesting as well. The camping I chose wasn’t that good; you had to share the toilets with all kind of insects.

I drove to Kalamata and then the very nice mountain road to Mystras, an impressive fortified city sitting on a mountain. Its location kind of reminded me of the Incas’ preferred spots for building cities. After hiking all the way to the top and bottom I sat on my motorcycle and continued to Sparti, Tripoli and Argos. The road from Tripoli to Argos was very nice again and the mountains had a resemblance with the Andes in Chile.

In the morning I packed my stuff and after a short ride I reached Ancient Olympia. I got rid of all my motorcycle cloth and put them in my bag and left it fully packed on top of the motorcycle. I was a little bit worried about leaving it there like this but I didn’t want to walk around in the heat with that much cloth on.
It’s certainly fascinating to imagine how it once must have been in that place, but after a while I had enough of all the scattered stones on the ground. I made a quick visit to the museum where at least some very well preserved statues and other items can be seen.
Finding everything still in its place I got on my motorcycle and continued on south to Finikounta where I spent the night on the Camping Finikes, a nice little Camping, very quiet and no mosquito’s at all.

The next day I drove back to the mainland and then south. The road along the coast on the mainland was very nice to drive with the motorcycle; a very good and interesting road, few cars and almost no settlements.
Then it got crowded again when I crossed the big bridge by Patra to the peninsula Peloponnese and went on to spend a night on a camping near Kastro.

With my motorcycle running on new oil I drove south to the Levkas peninsula. In pouring rain I got to Lefkada. All the hotels were pretty expensive for me but it was raining so heavily that I didn’t want to go drive around to find something else. I stayed the night and then drove south on the island. The weather was still very clouded and sometimes it rained a little as well. On the way I passed the very impressive beach of Porto Katsiki. Seen on many postcards from Greece this beach is located away from anything. I don’t know if it’s because of its remote location or because it was not the best weather, but there were almost no people there which makes this beach even more outstanding. After a little pick nick on the beach I drove to Vassiliki, a place full of windsurfers, where I mounted my tent for the night.

Leaving Albania I first drove towards Ioannina then to Igoumentisa. There I boarded a ferry to Kerkyra (Corfu Island). I drove quite a while on the island until I found a place to stay in Sidari. The place was full of British people. At first I was very disappointed of the island because I saw all these small crowded and not so nice beaches around Kerkyra. I stayed 2 days because I was tired of all the riding through Albania. One day I drove around for a while and fortunately got to know some nice places as well. In the evening I managed to make an oil change in a gas station. During the night I didn’t sleep well. First of all there was very loud music till deep into the night and second because I had to go hunt down mosquito’s all the time because they always flew into my face.

With exception of one small part, the roads in Albania so far were in excellent condition. I chose to continue on the same road along the coast. It was marked on my map the same way as the other roads I had used the day before. I expected it to continue this way, wide straight roads in good condition. But a little south of Durres, after the road went up and down a mountain with a spectacular view, things changed to the opposite. For a 100 km the road was narrow, nothing but turns and in terrible condition, bumpy as off-road. Average speed was maybe about 30 km/h. For the first time I was a little worried about my motorcycle, but it held. Most of the way there was nothing but pure nature. After a couple of hours I reached a small place, I think it was Vlore, with a little beach. There I saw a small group of people; they all had these big expensive Paris-Dakar Enduros, dirty as hell. They must have thought I was crazy when they saw me with my shiny 125ccm chrome cruiser traveling this road. Although the road was very difficult to ride, I was compensated with stunning sceneries and a feeling like being in true nature. Driving along this road I noticed something thin and long on the street. I didn’t see it as a threat; I thought it was some marking on the street so I continued on without reducing speed. Just in the last moment I realized that it was a big poison green snake. Unfortunately then it was too late for a maneuver, so all I could do was lift up my legs as high as possible and then I rolled over it. I was really surprised; I certainly didn’t expect to see snakes on my trip, even less snakes of this size and color and in the middle of the road. That was not the last incident. A little later I had to stop because a herd of sheep crossed the road. Another time I almost got into an accident with a pig that decided to run into the street behind a blind curve.
This was certainly one of the most adventurous roads I had chosen so far. After 7 hours on the motorcycle for a stretch of 200 km on the map I finally reached Saranda. I asked for a crossing to Greece but they told me that from Saranda there was no crossing, that I had to take the ferry to Corfu or to go land inward first and then to Ioannina. I was tired and my but hurt pretty badly after this bumpy road so I decided I would spend the night here in Saranda.

The next day I headed a little land inward because I was curious about to Skadarsko Jezero, the largest lake in the Balkans. When I reached it I decided not to drive around it but instead head back to the coast and then cross into Albania. When I was getting close to the border I was stopped by a group of policemen. They were friendly, only asked for my papers, were astonished about my motorcycle and told me that there was no border crossing where I was heading. They explained me the way as good as possible, again I didn’t have a detailed map of the country. After asking someone else later, this time an elderly man that was sitting on the side of the road I managed to get to the border. It was clearly not one of the main border crossings; it was only a small country road. After paying for another insurance I was able to move on.
Instantly I noticed the change in people. There were obviously few tourists passing trough here. Hundreds of children were just returning from school and when they saw me they started cheering and waving at me, it felt as if I was a king riding through the streets. That was certainly a very warm welcome to Albania.
It was a very poor and rural area, many people driving wagons pulled by donkeys. That changed considerably when I came closer to Durres, a domestic tourist destination, where I spent the night. The donkey wagons were replaces by cars, Mercedes to be exact. I think about 7 out of 10 cars were Mercedes, from the oldest model to the latest and greatest, everything was present, that was something I didn’t expect to see. In the hotels almost nobody spoke English or German but somehow I managed to get a room. There are tons of hotels and the beach is big, but for this time around, it was almost empty. In the night I switched on the television more out of curiosity. I was really surprised when I saw an Argentine TV novel being broadcasted with Albanian subtitles. I never saw anything from Latin America on Swiss TV, so it felt really wired to see it here in this country.

From Dubrovnik it’s not far to the border of Monte Negro. I had a little problem at the border because I didn’t have an international insurance form with me. I was able to buy a local insurance for 10 Euros and then I was permitted to pass. Shortly after the border I encountered something that looked like a Fjord to me, the Bay of Kotor. First I didn’t like it much because I had to drive all around it. But then I realized that it was actually a pretty nice place. I kind of understood the name Monte Negro a little better after the ride around this bay. On the way I stopped for a while in a place that seemed pretty popular with tourist. I don’t remember the name but there was a castle way up in the mountains that one could visit. It looked as if it was about to start raining any minute so I didn’t hike up there. I just ate two slices of pizza and then I moved on. On the way I found it interesting that there were so many police checking for speeding. Fortunately I was always within the speed limit. Passing Sveti Stepfan, a small typical fisher village I reached Bar where I spent the night.

As I was driving through the city there were people holding up papers letting me know they had rooms for rent. After a couple of failed negotiations I came to an agreement with someone. I put my stuff into the room, took a shower and then I walked down to the city where I bought a ticket to walk the big walls around the city. When I first saw these walls, I thought I was looking at the walls of a heavily fortified castle. Only later I realized that these walls go around the whole city. After finishing my circle I climbed down and took a stroll through the city itself. Unlike Venice, I found this a truly nice and impressive city that deserves its fame. Suddenly it started raining heavily so I just sat down in the next restaurant and ordered my dinner. The weather only gave me a short break to return dry to my room, and then it continued raining all night long.

The next day I drove to the western end of the island. I arrived exactly in time to take the next ferry to the mainland. This time it was a small ferry but now I remembered to place my motorcycle on its main stand. On the mainland I continued south-west along the coast. There was one especially nice point, up on a hill it seemed as looking down onto lakes, but as I heard from other people, it was saltwater. I decided to eat my lunch there, but exactly that moment it started raining pretty heavily. The other people disappeared in their campers and cars. I covered my bag with an extra cover, put on my jacket and helmet so I wouldn’t get wet and waited. Fortunately it stopped again in a few minutes and I was able to finish my lunch and take some pictures. Crossing the border to Bosnia and Herzegovina and then back again to Croatia went very smooth. In the late afternoon I arrived in Dubrovnik.

Arriving on the island I continued to the town Hvar where I rented a small room. It was raining all night and even in the morning. But then it cleared up and I was able to walk up to the castle towering above the small city. The town itself is very touristy, exclusive hotels, shops, cafes and restaurants, but very typical as well. I also took a little tour on my motorcycle which was very nice.
When I started traveling a couple of weeks ago I was a little bit worried because I didn’t speak any of the local languages of the countries I was about to visit. But so far it was really no problem at all. Most of the people spoke either German or English, even in the bakery or at the gas station.

After eating some of the tasty local bread for breakfast, I continued south to Split. Arriving in the port I was happy I was traveling with a motorcycle and not with a car. It was easy to leave it on the side of the road while gathering information about a ferry. With a car it would have been much more difficult. I hat to wait 2 hours for the ferry to Hvar. That gave me a little time to take a look around. The historic parts of Croatian towns remind me somehow of medieval towns, stone houses with very narrow streets, without cars.
This was the first time on a ferry with my motorcycle and I didn’t think about the movement of the sea when I left it there. I didn’t place it on its main stand. The wind was strong and the movement of the boat was clearly noticeable. When I went down again I saw that my motorcycle was in a different place and strapped to the wall as well. I don’t know if it already fell down or if the crew members strapped it as a precaution. I couldn’t see any damage so I guess it was the later one.

The next morning I drove back to the coast and then south, passing many of these small bays which Croatia is famous for. I stopped and stayed the night in Primosten, a typical small Croatian town with old stone buildings and a little harbor.

In the morning I started driving toward the national park Plitvicka Jezera. I don’t travel with a guide book, so this place was recommended to me by people I met on the last camping. I decided to use the autobahn again. Unfortunately I missed the exit and was then imprisoned for the next 50km. Still I reached the park around midday. Having had such a pleasant experience with my last apartment I decided to try it again. There where countless offerings of rooms. Croatia is really a motorcyclist dream, not only for the nice roads along the coast but also because there are so many people offering rooms in their homes, targeting especially car, motorcycle and bike tourist. They are usually pretty nice with private bathroom and cost only little more then a camping. So I stayed in the house Marija Bicanica a few kilometers away from the park. It was 2 o’clock in the afternoon and I had to decide if I go on to visit the park today or if it was better to wait for tomorrow when I could use the entire day. I wanted to have an entire day but on the other hand I didn’t know what to do with this afternoon so I decided to go anyway.
The park is beautiful, many lakes and waterfalls, all with very nice colors. It kind of reminded me of Iguazu in South America. Here you don’t have this sheer amount of water but you have these idyllic scenes. Fortunately the park is open till late in the evening, so I was able to spend a good 4 hours walking the park. Better would have been a whole day, but it was just enough time to get an idea of every part of the park. Towards the end there was another thunderstorm coming up but luckily it went another way. I was one of the last people to leave the park at 7 o’clock in the evening.

The next day I drove to Rijeka and then to Selce. After one week of camping I felt like I needed to sleep in a bed again, also to recharge the batteries of my cell phone and camera. After inspecting some I found myself in a very nice apartment with an economic price.

After packing my stuff together I drove east towards Slovenia and Croatia. I didn’t have a map with a fine enough scale so it was difficult to find my way and I had to stop and ask several times. After some riding in Slovenia I reached Croatia where I put up my tent in Camping Park Umag. I went for a walk inside the camping when it got really dark and soon thereafter a thunderstorm went through the area. I didn’t really want to be in my tent during lightning so I went to eat a pizza in the camping restaurant. It was one of this monster camping, the size of a small town. At least I was able to get money in the local currency from the camping’s own ATM machine and a smaller scale map of Croatia.

A little worried about the distance to Venecia I decided to make an exception and take the Autostrada today. Of course I was pretty much the slowest one; I don’t know if I was even allowed to use it with just 125ccm. But fortunately my Kymco looks like a bigger one and so nobody would notice, except maybe for the fact that I was going only 90 km/h.
I drove to the Camping Village dei Fiori, which in preseason is really an excellent deal. There were still few campers around and it was very quiet. The sites are of the best, with shady trees. There is a huge whirlpool which is exactly the right thing after a day on the motorcycle. They even have a small gym and tennis courts if you feel like it. In the little store I was able to buy an inflatable pillow. It slept a whole lot better thereafter. I was very happy there and it’s also a good home base for trips to Venecia where I went the next day. In the reception I was able to buy a combo ticket for bus and ferry to Venice.
Affected by the fame of that city my expectations where pretty high. The bigger was my disappointment when I got there. I didn’t find it an extraordinary city that deserves that much fame. Ok, you have waterways where other cities have streets; that’s certainly unique. A plus is that there are no cars and therefore no noise and pollution, but instead you have this immense mass of tourists which is about equally annoying. Sometimes it was hard to walk because there were so many tourist groups blocking the way. If you wanted to visit a church or museum you had to stand in line for hours. That was nothing for me and I was happy when I was back in the camping. In fact I liked it so much that I decided to stay another day relaxing.

The next day I put down my tent, packed everything and headed towards Lago di Garda in Italy. I lost some time in Lugano because I didn’t find my way but at least I was able to enjoy the beautiful scenery of this city. I crossed the border and instantly noticed a change in driving behavior on the road. Nobody seemed to bother about the speed limits. So I adjusted to cover more ground. My route was Menaggio, Sondrio, Breno, Bagolino, Salo. In Bagolino I didn’t find the small road to Bagolino. I stopped and asked someone, they didn’t seem to know either, but just as I turned on the motor another Italian on his sport motorcycle stopped. He offered me to show me the way. That was very nice of him, but with my 9kw motor up the steep mountain road I almost felt sorry for him because he had to be very patient. When we reached an intersection he showed me the way and then headed down the other road. I continued up, and up and up, more then I thought was possible here and ended up on top of a full grown mountain pass. After a little break I drove down. I reached Lago di Garda late in the afternoon. It was a long way, but a very scenic one. I was very tired, I put up my tent in one camping, I don’t even know where that was.
The following day I still felt the many hours from the last day so I decided to make this segment a short one. I just drove around Lake Garda and looked for a comfortable camping to put up my tent.

I spent 2 nights on the Camping Tamaro. It was the middle of May but in the night it was still pretty fresh and it felt a little chilly in my summer sleeping bag.
I walked to Locarno in the morning and towards the evening I sat on my motorcycle to drive up a nice little valley near Locarno.

After working a good 4 months in Switzerland I headed out to get to know a little bit of Eastern Europe. At the end of my 2 year bittrail in South America I got a little bit tired of traveling in public busses, that’s why I decided to try something different this time. I went for a motorcycle. I bought a Kymco Hypster, a 125ccm Cruiser that seemed comfortable enough for a larger tour and provided enough space on the back for my travel bag. I had to do some carpenter work to get a good base to hold my bag, but then I was ready.
I started riding toward the Alps in beautiful weather, though a bit cold. I took a break at midday to eat my sandwiches. As I tried to put everything back into my bag it happened. On the first day after only 2 hours my motorcycle fell. The path where I placed it was a little inclined and as I packed, it started to roll and then fell. I couldn’t believe it; I thought I had to turn back before it even started. I was happy I didn’t buy a heavier motorcycle, after taking off my bag I was able to lift it upright again. Fortunately the only damage was a badly bent clutch lever. I decided to live with the bent clutch lever and packed my things on again. After 8 hours (I didn’t use the Autobahn) I arrived in Tenero.

On the 23rd in the evening I landed in Zurich. I was picked up by my sister because I had kept my visit a secret to surprise my parents on Christmas; and a surprise it was.
That concludes the Bittrail in South America for now and I’ll be heading for new territories in a while.

The trip back to Switzerland brought me first to Bogota with a 3 hours stay, then to Madrid with a 6 hours stay. Even in Madrid the temperatures were already freezing cold, how would it be in Switzerland?
I had problems in the transit because of some new EU security regulations that doesn’t allow you to take liquids on board, not even water. I had to argue a good while with the security person there to make him understand that I had to wait six hours in the terminal and I had no intention of throwing away my water. I insisted on keeping my water and after he asked his supervisor finally I was allowed to go.

I liked Playa Blanca so much that I spent my last day there again, relaxing and swimming with the fish.
If you ever get to Cartagena or Colombia look for one of the Juan Valdez coffee shops. I am not a big coffee drinker but what I’ve tasted there was certainly one of its kind, try the “Tinto campesino”.

My flight was from Cartagena in one week so I took another night bus (did I mention I hate night busses) to reach the place where almost 2 years ago I started this “vuelta”. I rented an apartment for the time. With a daytrip I catched up with two things I hadn’t seen the first time I was in Cartagena; Islas Rosario and Playa Blanca. It was a tour in a boat and in a lot of hurry. In the morning we went to a marine resort on one of the islands to see different animals and a show of dolphins. Although the reefs around the islands looked nice, I was a little bit disappointed of the islands itself, no dream beaches anywhere to be seen. Unhappy because there was no time for snorkeling on the islands we reached Playa Blanca. Fortunately there I was compensated, the beach is a real dream beach and there is even a small reef for snorkeling. Unfortunately many people step on the corals so I’m pretty sure it won’t last much longer. But I was still able to see many interesting fish. After a couple of hours we had to go back on the boat and head back to Cartagena.
On my way back I suddenly realized: Two years ago I started here leaving in one direction and after two year I found back from another. It was an amazing thought. Long ago I realized how big the world is and can’t really agree with people when they fly over the Atlantic in a few hours and because of that think that the world is small.