If you read the last blog you would have realized that our trip this year which was planned to last 6 months came to a sad ending. Despite this the 5 months that we did travel went really well and we visited many new and interesting places, meet many friendly people and experienced the local food and wine.

This trip was called the half gap year as were going for 6 months and we wanted to fill in the gaps of our past trips. As you can see in the maps below we drove through areas that we haven’t been on our past 6 trips. When I counted the countries that we drove through it came to 21 with 4 new countries to add to our tally, Moldova, Lichtenstein, Kosovo and Andorra. [I will be honest and say that one of those countries was Switzerland which our TomTom took us through for 5 kilometres on our way the Lichtenstein.] Our tally is over 40 European countries that we have visited, this is truly more than we ever imagined when we first started travelling in the “Bunyip” in 2009 and we feel privileged to have had the opportunity to do so.

Map of our 2015 Trip

Thank you to all those who have been reading our blog over the last months. Thanks for all the comments and the emails that we have received, especially the kind words of support during the last couple of weeks. Writing and putting a blog together takes time and we appreciate the feedback.
If you have read the whole blog then you would have read over 43,000 words about half the size of a small novel. We have put up many photos which we hope have been of interest. We took nearly 6000 photos and luckily for you we only put the better ones on.
This trip we travelled 16,000 kilometres and in total the “Bunyip” has done over 100,000 since we purchased it in 2009. As always it performed well as we took it on some rough roads and up many a steep mountain road, with only a few repairs and some new tyres.

Small rant. Eastern Europe “is it safe”

I don’t like to rant about issues in the blog but this time I will make a small exception, after all it is the last blog of our trip. As we travel we get asked constantly asked if it is safe to go to Romania or Albania or Bulgaria or Kosovo and many other places mostly Eastern Europe. They must think that the people there are evil and want to rob you or do you harm. This is not helped by the media and the way Eastern Europe is portrayed in movies. If fact we feel safer there than in Western Europe, an example is, a Dutch lady running a campsite in Romania has been broken into 3 times not there but in Holland.In Romania she leaves her keys in the car and does not lock her house. We have had no trouble in at all in the East but in France our motorhome was broken into [no gas used, no ipad stolen or 2000 euros, motorhome forum – in joke] and luckily only 20 euros taken, but we were left with a sick feeling and beefed up our security since. We have met people who ride their bike through all of these countries and felt safe doing so. We wildcamp more in Eastern Europe as campsite and aires are not common and everywhere we have stayed has not been an issue with either the locals or the police. In fact we were stopped by a policeman in Moldova only to satisfy his curiosity and to wish us well while we travelled in his country.
Friendliness. We have been overwhelmed by the way people have treated us, especially the young people.

For example in Moldova we were parked outside of the fortress in Sorocco where we stayed for the night, in the evening it was a place for the locals to stroll near the river. A group of eight 16 year old lads on scooters were parked up behind us, they were curious and finally one get up enough courage to say hello. I went and talked to them for a while, between them there was a smattering of English. When they left every lad in the group shook my hand and went past Jenny to say goodbye, very polite and respectful. In Serbia a man on a bike knew we were foreign and chatted to us wishing us a pleasant stay in his country.

In Kosovo a group of young people invited me to have drinks with them and when I left they gave me a plate of food. In Romania another group of young people at a picnic spot invited us for drinks and later insisted that we stay for dinner which they cooked over the fire. I could continue on but you get the drift.
On a blog I read they felt conspicuous driving a motorhome there as people could not afford such luxuries. We don’t feel that bad as our motorhome is nearly 20 years old, but the people we had met are glad to see people coming to their country. Firstly they bring in money and also people are genuinely pleased that we are interest in visiting, most people our proud of their country and want to show it off.

The places to see in Eastern Europe are fascinating and the other benefit is that you can see them without the crowds and the selfie taking, loud talking obnoxious tourists.
Finally, “yes I have gone on for a while”, it’s so inexpensive to travel there. I get a shock when I get back into Western Europe, things are very much more expensive. We certainly eat out more in Eastern Europe and the food is delicious.
Enough of my rant, I could go on further but I think you get my point. I think I will throttle the next person who asks “is it safe”. We found it safe, fascinating and friendly.

The sights we saw we will never forget but the thing that will stand out on this trip is the people we met on the way. We have been overwhelmed by the friendliness and hospitality people have shown us. So instead of pictures of the sights and places we visited I want to finish this blog with some of the people who made our trip a memorable one. There were many more that we didn’t take photos of but they will always have a fond place in our hearts.

We’re not sure what next year will bring but we are still hoping to return and continue to explore new places and meet more interesting people.

For the motorhomers who read the blog and glean information from it I will update and put additional information on when I have time back in Australia. For now its farewell to Europe for another year. Safe travels, Ewout and Jenny