Bulgaria to Budapest

My wake up in Bulgaria would rate among one of my worst in memory. I was perhaps 2 hours into a relatively deep sleep after a problematic night, when I was woken up and told to get off the bus - we were in Plovdiv. It was about 4am, I was as close to being asleep as you can be whilst appearing to be awake, I was in a new country in which I couldn't decipher any of their Cyrillic script, nor did I have any of their currency, but to top it all off, I really needed to visit the mens room - bad.

Whadayaknow, I pulled through it ok though. First stop, a 24hr gaming room to use their toilet. Then a hotel to leave my bag at. Then some money, a 24hr fast food joint for a breakfast burger and some basic language tutelage, and things were looking up! The old town of Plovdiv, on top of one of their 'seven hills' was really beautiful, with some nice period homes, and an old roman amphitheater to boot. I also found amusing what appeared to be an old amphitheater sunk into the middle of the main pedestrian way in the 'new' centre. Apparently they'd dug it up by accident during a construction project. By the time business had started for the day, I felt I'd just about seen enough of the town. I was starting to realise at this point that I couldn't justify staying in every town and city with history I passed through. Quite frankly, I was getting a bit sick of the same thing (history!), and felt that the sooner I got to some mountains for a bit of nature, the better. And so by around midday I found myself on a bus to Sofia.

My only sightseeing in Sofia was wandering past the government buildings and their big orthodox church. I'm not sure whether the likeness of the orthodox churches I saw to mosques came from the prominence of domes, or from them once being the other and then converted by a conquering empire. Anyway, it was big and beautiful, but just another church. Travelling through these regions that have seen so much conflict and shifts in power, I can't help but question whether religion has had more negative consequences than positive. The bus driver in Croatia pointed out that a church four times as large as that which had been destructed had been built, while people still lived in substandard housing. All around here the churches are big and beautiful, even ones that are still being constructed have so much marble and other materials going into them I can't even fathom how much it would be worth. Meanwhile, there is still a lot of poverty around. In Australia I think you'd have to really stretch your imagination to think of a large conflict on the basis of religion, but over here I don't think it's too far fetched an idea - even still, after all the 'lessons' learnt. Of course many may deny it having anything to do with religion, but it all depends on how you define ethnicity and peoples beliefs.

In the evening, rather than go out alone (it was a very quiet - but lovely and peaceful - hostel that I was staying in), I joined Julia, whose first day it was working at the hostel, and her friend in going to the movies. Don't laugh - we saw that Twilight movie. Rest assured, our intent from the beginning was merely to have a laugh, both at the movie and the teenage girls enamoured with whatever stupid facet of the it. The people responsible for making such crap (I can only speak for the movie - I've never read the books) should have to answer to a committee on what is a tasteful way to raise the youth.

I searched out a brewpub afterwards to sample their brew - it was refreshing to have an ale after so many lagers, but it wasn't fantastic. The chicken and mushroom pizza I got on the way home (to complement my dinner thus far of ice cream, pop corn and ale), made by two chatty (read: distracted) fat ladies, I was expecting to be an overcooked abomination, but it was absolutely fantastic. For lunch the next day I again searched out a recommended establishment. The 'Nun's salad' I had (a mix of all the good stuff really - cheese stuffed peppers, purée eggplant, etc) was excellent. I now had an inkling as to why Kalina, back in Aus, is known to make the most superb salads - it's in her blood!

I got a night train from Sofia to Belgrade, Serbia, then the following night another sleeper from Belgrade to Budapest, Hungary. In such heat, it was an immense pleasure to stick my head out the window as the train started moving, an immediate shift from feeling like I was about to shut down, to feeling that everything will actually be splendid. I slept pretty well each night - it was a much better way of travelling than by bus.

It was hot in Belgrade. Everywhere had been stinking hot. People were quick to point out that as an Australian, I should be more than used to it, but I couldn't stand it. Honestly, to add to my list of things that make me less Australian (such as a complete disregard for footy), I can add that I'm a cold weather person. I was getting more sick of the heat than I can convey here - to me, it was debilitating. Anyway, my day in Belgrade was really about drinking the coldest thing possible, over as long as time as possible, and ALWAYS walking on the side of the street that was in the shade. I at least had some company in another traveller performing the same train journies as myself. Belgrade wasn't overly interesting to me. You'd have to tell me I was in the old town for me to know it. The nicest part was the old fort, inside of which is a largely green area, a free public space overlooking the Danube.

Budapest seemed like a much more happening place than Belgrade, and it is certainly a more beautiful place. Not nearly as cheap though. I stayed at a hippy hostel (sorry, here's another wide ranging slur, but sometimes I feel like full on hippies are as misguided as staunch capatalists that believe we humans are not having an ill effect on the Earth) which I couldn't get into until later in the morning. It felt like the kind of place where getting up before midday is frowned upon. They were a good bunch of people thouh, owners and guests. I got to lie down for some further shut eye after my two night trains, then by midday I was up and at 'em. Wandering along the banks of the Danube a few hours later, I was as surprised as they come to see Adam and Dezarae walking along the bank towards me. We'd planned on meeting up in Budapest, but neither of us had been in touch since arriving so it was by complete chance that we crossed paths.

We pulled up a couple of chairs on the footpath of a quiet street and enjoyed a refreshing beer. Whilst there, a motorcade rider stopped at the intersection with the main road nearby. Expecting some foreign dignitry to come through, we were greeted by a procession of skaters. I thought it was great to see policeman blocking the road for skaters: for some (ridiculous) reason there's always been a stigma between cops and skaters. After some further wandering we had a nice dinner sampling some Hungarian fare - no 'goulash' though (what we call goulash they call porkolt - proper 'gulyas' is actually more like a soup). I think the highlight of a huge share plate of roast pork was actually the crispy roast potatoes underneath, drenched in pork fat as they were. After getting back to the hostel, I went out to a pretty sweet garden bar with a few fellow guests, but I was not in the mood, partly in anticipation of an early rise the following day so as to see a bit more of Budapest before leaving wih A&D in Norm, so I left after one mojito.

Sorry, but I must make a mention of my guts

I left Istanbul on a bus, and went to Çanakkale, on the eastern peninsula of the Dardanelles, oposite the Gallipoli Peninsula. The few buses I did go on in Turkey were of excellent quality. Always an attendant (or two) as well as the driver, serving basic drinks and sometimes some snacks. They even have wifi! They had screens in the backs of seats as well, but I didn't watch any movies as they were dubbed not subtitled.

I headed back across the Dardanelles the next morning, to Eceabat, where I decided to scrap the guided tour of the battlefields and cemeteries and go it myself. I got a 'dolmus' (a kind of shared taxi which leaves when full - I love that the name basically means 'stuffed' - think dolma / dolmades) to the museum, which was a complete waste of money, then proceeded to walk into the park, where there's no public transport. It was a hot day, and I covered a lot of k's, but I felt I was taking a lot more in than the people passing by in cars and buses. I visited a few of the cemeteries, ANZAC and Turkish, a few of the landmarks where some of the fiercest battles took place, then walked down to the coastline and along to ANZAC Cove.

Here I went for a swim. Apart from being refreshing on such a hot day, it also happened to be in the same spot that the ANZACs made their first landing all those years ago. The sea was lapping up against the beach, and foremost in my mind was how the sea had being doing thus for such a long time, irrespective of human indifferences. Ninety five years previous those gently breaking waves would have been washing bodies up on the beach and the swell and currents would have been slowly dispersing the blood.

I find it hard to connect with the events that occured on Gallipoli during that time. I have no family members that were involved. People talk about a visit being a pilgrimage of sorts for Australians and Kiwis. It is the most remarkable military event in our history so far, and I think there's something in that to do with using it to give our young nation a bit stronger sense of identity. There are no signs of the terrible things that happened at Gallipoli other than the cemeteries and memorials; the dense, tough scrub could be found in many places like it (it reminded me a bit of the 'maquis' on Corsica). So it's all in the head, really, going there and remembering. 'Lest we forget' - forget what? Countless people have died in atrocities the world round - it's terrible, but I think it's most important to remember how purposless the loss was, and ensure it never happens again.

Now to change the topic completely. Around the time I got a Çanakkale my downloads, shall I say, started to become less solid. The morning after my visit to Gallipoli (and the watching of the World Cup final following that) I was lucky to have a half day lazing around the quiet hostel I was staying at before I got on my next bus. The reason I bring this is up, isn't to raise pity for my situation, but to point out something I found very ironic. In Turkey, you see, the food is so great, but in Australia we'd probably classify it as 'junk' food. Ugh, I hate using that term, but it is - all fast, fairly greasy - but honestly, it's all such great quality. The thing is, there was little else I could eat, even if I wanted to, that may have been easier on my guts.

Either way, I wasn't going to let anything get in the way of trying as many different foods as I could. The evening I got to Edirne, I went straight to a recommended 'ciğerci'. Edirne is famous for their ciğer, which are livers (typically calf I believe) battered and deep fried in sunlower oil. In a ciğerci, the only you choose is what to drink, and whether you will have soup as a starter. Otherwise, without fail you will be brought bread, a plate with sliced tomato and dry roasted yellow peppers (awesome!) on it, and a plate of ciğer. It was so good, I had it the two evenings I spent in Edirne. I also had a cheese burek for breakfast, and a doner kebap for lunch. See - good food for an upset stomach!

I also visited the Selimiya Mosque in Edirne. Also designed by the revered Turkish architect Sinan, he himself proclaimed it to be his masterpiece. I went inside, in between prayer times as it is a functioning mosque (as opposed to Aya Sofia). It was an incredible structure - I think what struck me most about the place was the symmetry; how every nook and cranny seemed to be exactly as desired. I didn't do too much else in Edirne, but it was a pleasant city to wander in.

I left Edirne to get a night bus over the border to Plovdiv, Bulgaria. It ended up being one of those chains of events where everything seems to go wrong. I think I got ripped off by the taxi when I was told there was no more dolmuses going to the place where I was to meet the bus (which did not stop right in Edirne, being an exress from Instanbul). Apparently. Then the bus didn't even stop at the hotel/sercive station complex where I was waiting! Someone saw me slightly distressed (when I watched a Metro bus drive right pass) and bundled me onto another bus, so that I could meet that very Metro bus as the border and jump on. Lucky. Unfortunately though, it had me leaving Turkey in bad spirits.

Istanbul

Leaving Adam and Dez in Bar, Montenegro, I jumped on an overnight bus to Ohrid, Macedonia. The beers we had whilst watching the football before the bus didn't help me sleep as planned. My eyes were closed for most of the trip though, so I didn't see anything of Albania.

Ohrid, my first taste of Macedonia, was a pretty, old town on Lake Ohrid, which connects Macedonia with Albania and Greece. There's not much one can do at 5:30am, so I just wandered around until I eventually found a little cafe that opened earlier than the rest, and accepted my euros. I needed, and indeed ordered a coffee, but the local men were sitting around drinking their tea. This was the first time I saw this kind of hanging serving platter: the owner would load it up with tea and coffee, then jump on his bike dangling the platter wih one hand to go and deliver them, presumably to other shop owners starting their day. A nice community feel.

I jumped on a bus that afternoon to Skopje, capital of Macedonia, where all I did was have a good feed. The highlight was a kind of cottage cheese cooked in a dish with capsicum, tomato, 'erbs and an egg on top. I then got straight back on another bus, this one being an overnighter to Istanbul. I actually slept quite well on this journey, though if I learnt a lesson from spending two nights on buses, it's to change my underwear in between journeys; or at least wear something more comfortable than jocks.

Would I have done anything else on my first day in Turkey other than get a kebap? Of course not! Just a basic one, for 2TL, chicken on a roll with tomato, lettuce and seasoning. I'm sure there's entire websites dedicated to the kebap, so while I like the idea of speaking all day about the kebap, I'm not going to spend the time researching it. I can at least tell you about the ones I had though. A great, chilli chicken kebap in pide, another chicken in pide, and an 'iskender' (aka Bursa) kebap, which is a doner kebap on a plate with tomato sauce and yoghurt on top - this one was a bit dissapointing actually, but the venue I chose was the reason. Holy cow! Only 4 kebaps! Well, I'm obviously going to have to sample a couple more doner kebaps before I leave Turkey. I should perhaps make a quick comparison of the kebaps I had to their Australian counterparts. In Australia the 'kebab' is always enormous - I can only justify eating them when I'm sloshed - where as those I've had here are a more sensible size. Also, the meat I've had, and especially seen here, seems to me a much better quality than the uniform density doner meat in Aus - here you can always see the layers of actual meat.

Ok, so where to start with Istanbul? Again, you can do your own research, but it's a city of close to 20 million. It straddles the continents of Europe and Asia. It's been around for aaiiiges, was once the capital of the Byzantine empire until the Ottomans took it and made it the capital of theirs. How can anyone possibly absorb all that history?

Istanbul is expensive, at least compared to the Western Balkans I had been travelling through. I spent a fortune in one day seeing three of the main sites. That's a poor way to talk about such amazing places though - first of all was Topkapı Palace, home to the Ottoman Sultans for centuries. The interior was beautiful, with a lot of tiles, in particular delft tiles, indicating a progression towards Western influences. The 'Summer Pavilion' was also the place where the Crown Princes were circumcised - I loved the contrast! The court of the concubines was less interesting to look at than to think about the goings on. I believe one Sultan fathered more than 100 children! One highlight for me was seeing the Imperial Council, where the Ottoman Viziers held heir meetings, and the metal grill up on the wall behind which the Sultan sat and observed. I'd heard about this grill, this place, where so many shaping events in the Ottomans history had taken place. It was amazing to think about how all those things happened, right there, just a few hundred years ago!

The Basilica cistern, built by emperor Justinian in the 6th century, was a nice cool place to visit in the heat of the day. Amazing that something built so long ago, had been used to store the cities water for so long, and is still in such good condition today. Also built by Justinian was the Aya Sofya, originally as a church, then converted into a mosque, it was then converted into a museum by Ataturk. I've never been inside anything like it. The enormity of the main dome and the whole inner space just takes your breath away. On another day, I headed out to the Chora church museum, which had some pretty gnarly Byzantine mosaics - which had been covered up by plaster for hundreds of years when it was converted into a mosque.

While out at Chora, I treated myself to a fancy lunch at a restaurant called Asitane. They claim to have carried out extensive studies of traditional Ottoman cuisine, and go about recreating them. Some stuffed vine leaves (with sour cherries - is that what made them Ottoman?) were average - not worth their price. But the main, a melon half stuffed with mince, rice, almonds, pine nuts and currants, was fantastic, especially the cooked bits of melon sitting beside. Other meals of note included a couple of fish sandwiches down by the water, on the 'Golden Horn' - apparently an Istanbul institution. Fresh fish, grilled, chucked on a roll with some onion and lettuce - excellent. There are plenty of veges around, which I found great, but the problem for vegetarians is they are always served with meat!

I never got to a 'meyhane', where mezes and raki are the order of the day, but I did drink enough raki to determine it's just a Turkish version of ouzo, pastis, or any other aniseed liquor out there. One raki fuelled night started with some expats I met in a brew pub, in which I was ostensibly sheltering from the downpour outside. One member of the party was an expat Yank, who co-ownded a hostel in Istanbul - he'd been living there for five years on tourist visas, walking across the border to Greece and back every three months! We ended up at a bar with some great live music. It was (I guess) somewhat traditional, but they were all young musicians, obviously passionate, and had a great energy about them. At one stage they sung in that wavering way in which the call to prayer is made five times a day. It really captured me, as did hearing the call to prayer, though I'm sure it would wear thin after awhile.

One morning I jumped on a ferry, and for little more than a dollar crossed the Bosphorous from Europe to Asia. Cool! I searched out a recommended coffee shop, where I had a mastic turkish coffee (interesting) and also a regular turkish, also good. The Turks don't actually drink much turkish coffee - they appear to prefer their black tea, çay. It is always served in little tulip shaped, stemless glasses. My guts decided they weren't overly happy with me in Asia, so after walking through the neighbourhoods north to another terminal, I got a ferry back to Europe and chilled out awhile. In the evening I visited the çemberlitaş hammam, which was designed by Sinan, a famous Turkish architect who also designed the Süleymaniye Mosque among many other things. I received a vigorous scrub down by a Turkish man, followed by a wash (with a lot of bone cracking, the good sort) then a massage. I'd never felt cleaner! It was a fabulous way to wind down after a couple of busy days.

On the road with Norm

Norm has a chequered past. He originates from the UK; I'm not sure of his precise lineage but he is of the Ford family. His recent history is quite tumultuous, in particular the replacement of his engine in Port Grimaud, France.

I was pleased to make the acquaintance of Norm in Zadar. He provided plenty of comfort with 3 of us on board. He wasn't a huge fan of the hills though. The Bastow-pioneered way of travelling up inclines was to 'just tractor'. It was actually a real pleasure to pop him into 2nd gear and just mosey on up the hills.

Norm sure saw some great scenery in the last coupla weeks we were travelling together. The Adriatic coast was breathtaking; one could not decide whether to gaze out to sea or look up into the precipitous mountains.

The back road from Sarajevo to Dubrovnik was a real gem. It started with a AU$0.60 espresso (for serious). It continued through a series of luscious green valleys, speckled with limestone cliffs and outcrops, then opened up into some 'proper' mountains, some with snow atop. Norm was happy uphill as long as he was just tractoring. I was astounded by the scenery. I had no expectations - all I knew about Bosnia was the little I knew about its conflicts - so I was taken away with the beauty of the countryside. At a roadside lunch stop I looked at all the ridgelines above me, and I though how great it would be to go hiking here. No crowds, and much cheaper than Western Europe. The daydreams were somewhat quelled by the ongoing existence (so we had been told) of land mines in Bosnia.

Down out of the mountains, a policeman in the form of a Bosnian Jean-Claude Van Damme pulled us over, eventually pointed to my bare feet and the front of he car, and asked for 20€. When I walked over to their car with a 50 in my hand, he pulled an enormous wad of cash out of his wallet (is that your lunch money officer?), and got 30€ change ready. I proceeded to ask for a slip of paper, hoping they'd either not bother wih the bribe whoops I mean fine at all, or at least make it legit. They deliberated for some time, wrote me a slip of paper, and instructed us to go back to the Gacko post office to pay. Which we did: 15€, the correct conversion. During this time, they also felt the need to keep all three of our passports.

Returning to the police on the road, said BJCVD was going nuts and pointing at the front of the car. We had no idea what we was banging on about, but eventually figured out that our lights had not been on when they should have been. Well, this finally explained one half of the initial fine, but now they wanted to fine us again for the same offence! I just sat by their car, acted polite as I could, and sat there moving my hands and pointing and all that, until he eventually gave back our passports and told us to keep going. All in all, a loss of and hour or two's time, but at least we injected 15€ into the Bosnian economy rather than pay for a months worth of coffees for BJCVD and co.

Down at Dubrovnik, we paid a fortune for the only camp ground around, but I would not have skipped a visit of Dubrovnik's old town for anything. Dubrovnik is an absolute jewel. As Branka had suggested, right up there with Venice. They seemed similar to me in several ways: absolutely lovely, but I couldn't spend too much time there unless I was rolling in cash, and there with a partner. Dubrovnik fended off the Ottoman Turks, and many other aggressors, for centuries, and remained its own city state for a remarkable amount of time. When you see the city walls it's easy to imagine how they managed this. I sweet talked my way into a heavily discounted student ticket, and spent a couple of hours circling the walls.

The following days were spent at a more relaxed pace, with another night in the south of Croatia, before entering Montenegro. We knew nothing about Montenegro, but all three of us thought that they seemed a mostly unhappy (outwardly, at least) people. A few of them did open and smile once we talked a bit. There is obviously a huge amount of money going into Montenegro. This is evidenced in all the buildings popping up. We drove straight through the larger town of Budva - it looked disgusting. Any charm it may have had is being eaten up by the consumers desire for more, bigger, better. By chance, we happened across a lovely little campground away from all the Paris Hilton look at me's, where we spent a couple of nights. It was holiday mode - lazing around at the rocky beach, with all the Montenegrans, Serbs and their deck chairs. We saw next to no foreigners in Montenegro; most other countries have plenty of travelling Euro's in them (e.g. Germans on the Croatian coast!)

From Montenegro it was time to say farewell to Norm, and thus Adam and Dezarae also. We'd only been together for about ten days, but on account of them being held up for four weeks to mend Norm, they'd missed out on more of central Europe than they would have liked. So while they are ferrying over to Italy, I am continuing east.

A change of mode

Falling in with Adam and Dez meant that we were now all travelling in 'Norm', which they'd driven thus far from the UK. We took it very easy on our first day together - they'd been on the move for a few days, covering a lot of ground in order to catch up with me. Adam and I went for a long stroll throuh the little village we were in, observing how just about every house was growing a combination of produce. A swim in the sea was a nice prelude to dinner, which was cooked in Norm and complimented well with some drinks I'd brought with me for the occasion.

We made three stops on our first day on the road. Zadar was a beautiful place, set on a mostly flat island, but was very touristy. Sibenik was a gem, a conglomerate of narrow laneways on a fairly steep hillside. We caught a boat that night from our camp site across to Trogir. Trogir was similar to Zadar in being an old city on a flat island, but to me had a lot more charm. The laneways were narrower and less grand. We had a nice dinner that night, ostensibly for Dezarae's birthday, the highlight of which was a black (squid ink) risotto. It's on the menu all down this Adriatic coast, but one we had more recently proved how bad they can be.

Split was next on the itinerary, the major city of the region. In the centre of town is an old palace that dates back to the roman era. It's quite well preserved, and was a pleasant place to stroll around within. I got some dried figs from the market - they use beam balances and weights to weigh everything! A nice touch, but I'm sure many a tourist gets stung.

We stayed at a camp ground right by the water, not far south of Split. It really is an incredible coastline. The sea is punctuated with islands and jutting peninsulas, then turn around and limestone mountains rise up hundreds of metres, often in striking ridge lines and sheer cliffs.

We went away from the sea after this. The morning started with another sour cherry strudel - they're everywhere, and fantastic. Then we crossed the border into Bosnia and Herzegovina. First stop was Mostar, which had a beautiful old centre - though a lot of it is rebuilt. Shrapnel wounds on the buildings are a very common site. It was quite touristy actually, and my thoughts were that seeing something first hand is always different to the opinion you form of somewhere from the media.

In Sarajevo the next day, seeing men cut the grass with a sickle was to me an image and indication of a country still 'catching up'. The tram ride into town was interesting, observing the people as well as the buildings outside, some intact merely covered in shrapnel wounds, others damaged so badly only a skeleton remained, and brand new German car dealerships next to it all.

The city still has a lot of beautiful old buildings, but shrapnel wounds are ubiquitous. Observing all the mosque's, churches and synagogues next to each other goes some way to explaining many of the problems that have arisen in the region. I did a tour that focused on the most recent war, but it didn't provide a great deal of insight. I, of course, went to the place where Franz Ferdinand was assassinated. I saw a couple of Sarajevo Roses, which are particularly large shrapnel wounds in the ground that were filled in with a red resin. Apparently a famous poet labelled the people of Sarajevo as roses. I felt very uncomfortable taking a photo of one of the more public ones - I'm sure a lot of locals would be offended at the tourists interest in such horrible events that were so recent. But personally, I only wish to gain some understanding of what it must have been like, which is a difficult thing, having grown up in such comfort and safety.