Globe Gallivanting- motorbiking across the world

We rode past the nice-looking campsite and onwards- 150km in the wrong direction based on a border crossing on our map that didn’t actually exist. The towns got smaller and smaller. We stopped and asked a burly army officer how to cross into Bulgaria. He looked very surprised when he eventually understood, and sent us back exactly the way we came. We stopped at a disco garage for strong coffee to buzz us back towards the Bulgarian border. Bulgaria awaits. The border had a brilliant soviet-style ‘Republic of Bulgaria’ sign, and we passed the now-defunct ‘Disinfection Bay’ without anyone trying to hose us down with anything. Everyone was whizzing through without showing anything, so we got stopped and asked for our passports. some communist-looking flats in the rain. The crossing was great though, and the bit of Bulgaria we arrived into was excellent, with very shabby little villages, and Lada cars everywhere, and dodgy-looking huddles of young men at roadside bars. We changed some mon...

We headed off towards the main roads, with our new desire to visit Halkidiki driving us forward. We rode down the first prong of Halkidiki and immediately ran out of petrol. Just made it on reserve to the petrol station though- our luck was really in that day what with bears and all. We spotted our first snake, about a meter long, but with its head squashed as though someone had run it over on purpose. The prong was fairly pretty, but possibly not quite as beautiful as expected. We rode through a strange deserted tourist resort with a few rich Greeks eating over-priced fish in a beach-side restaurant- one place had a fish dish for 65 Euro. We got sneered at for only ordering coffee, and the coffee itself was undrinkable, with the grains lurking in the bottom. It was possible a very refined way to drink coffee, but I am of the Nescafe school, and I took a gulp and had to discreetly spit. It transpired we weren’t going to be able to afford restaurant food in Greece either, and we fou...

snow-topped mountains in Greece? We arrived into Igoumenitsa at 6am. It was freezing and an icy mist gathered about our ears. We were a bit fed up, but the scenery was at least impressively Greek from the outset. There was no-one else on the roads and we felt like Adventurers, and stopped to make coffee by the road-side. A French woman pulled up in a Renault (what else?), and gesticulated bizarrely at Adam. We rode on. The mountains were stunning, with the mist still swirling, and lots of pine trees and craggy rocks. We stopped to make lunch in one of the prettiest logging sites I have ever seen, and fell asleep on a convenient log and got covered in tree sap. It was a good snooze though and we needed it after the bloody ferry experience. lunch and a snooze... There were lakes with salt-flats and marshland and we resolved to wild-camp. see, quite nice isn't it? We looked around for ages for a good spot, following little dirt tracks to nowhere and having to heave the bike back ...

We rode across from Sorrento to Bari the next day, via Matera. The plan was to catch the Bari to Igoumenitsa (Italy to Greece) ferry overnight. It was a 17-hour car-ferry with cabins for the posher passengers, and for us smegs a few scattered seats. There was trepidation, oh yes. We set off on the fast and boring motorway. Adam picked up a German in a service station doing a big group tour on a boring-looking bus, and he chatted for while. I think he thought we were a bit mad when he discovered what we were up to though, and he left fairly promptly, though his bus did keep passing us and honking, so possibly he’d informed the driver. We stopped for lunch at a non-descript garage where there was nothing at all non-meat on offer except one sorry-looking, slightly congealed apricot tart. I ate it. Obviously. The barwoman was out-Italianing the Italians with her loudness and banging about of cutlery, and one old guy got so worried he actually left without getting anything at all. We ran aw...

We were zooming through Italy because it was all so expensive, and we couldn’t even afford the campsites without breaking our budget… The next day saw us head towards Rome, via a half-hour stop at the Leaning Tower of Pisa, where we managed to illegally zoom straight up to the Tower and get a photo of the bike in front of it, before being hurried away by an irate stall keeper (admittedly we were parked in front of his stall, but he only sold tat anyway!) Pisa was full of tourists wanting the one shot and jostling for space to get it. There were touts who didn’t seem to try very hard, and restaurants with over-priced grub, and rotund Americans wearing daft T-shirts, but we just waltzed in there, wandered round and left. The roads were stunning off the main roads, and we kept off them from then on, riding down perfect tarmac with great motorbike bends, and reaching Rome and the campsite by 4pm- record time!!! We wandered the campsite area in the evening before realizing we probably...

Our next day took us through some very good villages where people waved lots and tractor drivers beeped at us. I think it was friendly. We went through Avignon with lots of cypress trees, and Chateau-Neuf-du-Pape where we watched farmers doing whatever it is they do to their vines. We ended up stopping for a real French cafe experience and accidentally stumbled into a historic walled village of some sort where harrassed-looking teachers showed city kids round, and it all looked very old and pretty, except for the enormous metal grilles on the front doors. It all started getting very southern-looking, with a bright blue sky, and slightly scrubbeir vegetation, and we decided to head for Arles. Our route took us through miles and miles of marshland, sort of wilderness-looking, and a couple of strange skeggy towns with mechanics sat around outside cafes looking mean. We came into Arles, on the coast, expecting great things, and it was about 8pm when we arrived. It was getting dark, and...

After getting more and more excited and nervous and a bit unreal, we finally left our caravan, with a two week stint to say goodbye to everyone in Wirral and Oxford. In Wirral Steve attached our mascot to the front of the bike, and he has become a fixture we are fond of (the mascot, not Steve, though we are also fond of him...). We left Sue and Steve and were a bit upset, but will be seeing them in Thailand. We then had a horrendous ride down south with sidewinds and our very first attempt with all the luggage and panniers on, which left us both wondering if really this was such a good plan. Especially when we accidentally rode up on the kerb on the way out the drive. Some might say we should probably have had a trial run with the luggage... the bike fully loaded. possibly excessively... Anyway, we said our goodbyes to all my lot in Abingdon and had a good send-off, with a 'Bon Voyage' cake in the shape of our motorbike! Everyone waved us off and that was that, we set ...