Bosnia and back, the write-up

[Warthog]

Well as some of you might remember, Philbut, Walkabout Andy and I all went on a 2 week bike trip round eastern Europe (with 3 other mates). Here is the full write-up of our adventures, hope you find it as exciting and amusing as we did!

Distance: 3500 miles covered in total
Itinary: UK, France, Belgium, Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Croatia again, Slovenia, Italy, Switzerland, France, Luxemburg, Belgium, France, UK.
Protagonists: Me (SV650N), Philbut (ZZR600), Walkaboutandy (SV650S), PJ (GPZ900), Stu (Moto Guzzi 1100) and Matt (Ducati 600SS)

Day 1

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We left a rainy Oxford about 3 hours late after Philbut did some last minute shoring up of his ammo crate panniers and after the Oxford station cash machine had eaten Stu's card meaning that he had no money for the whole of the trip already! 500 metres down the road and I discover that the toggles on my pannier waterproofs are not strong enough to stop them blowing off. Miraculously, at 70 mph PJ who was riding behind me managed to catch one as it blew off! The other one was retrieved from the side of the road and so progress was resumed with them firmly tied on. After an uneventful but wet hour we arrived at Bill's Bike Barn where Matt's Dad bill was hosting a classic bike meet. He has a large barn crammed full of very intresting classic bikes!

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After a few real ales and a dirty burger we camped down on the floor of Bill's house for our first night of the trip.

Day 2

We finally got up and headed off to Folkstone to meet Walkaboutandy from this forum who was to join us for the trip. 30 minutes down the M4 and the heavens opened again and we got totally drenched! no matter, because this was the whole reason we were leaving England wasn't it?! So we plodded on with hope in our heart and water in my boots (supposedly waterproof :(). The sight that greeted us at the Eurostar terminal car park was hilarious, check out Andy's bodge job of carrying luggage!

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It consisted of a waterproof suitcase bolted onto a spare pillion seat! With much raised eyebrows and sideways glances we all agreed to let him join the trip on the proviso that he ride behind everybody else incase that suitcase flew off and clotheslined someone :lol:. In typical efficient Eurotunnal style we were on the train in about 30 mins (having been swabbed for explosives at customs) and travelling under the channel.

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After emerging in France we headed up the E40 to my parents house in Belgium. That is one long straight boring motorway I can tell you! We arrived safely at about 22:00 to find my parents had left us a crate of beer and pizza :cool:.

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Left to right: Walkaboutandy, Stu, Philbut, Matt, PJ in front, and and Phil W (who only did a bit of the trip).

A very tiring first leg, about 300 miles or so. All bikes performed well so far, but my wrists and **** hurt a bit.

[petevtwin650]

Hey Warthog did you drag that paddock stand with you all over Europe? :p:D

[Warthog]

Day 3

We left my parents house bright and early (11ish :-P) and headed into Germany. After the obligatory boring motorway blasts we hit some really nice roads into the hills and forests of Germany. This is just a photo snatched whilst stopped somewhere in Germany:

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We were aiming for Erschwege, where a friend of PJ's called Ulrich lived. He was an extremely friendly guy who is the town doctor and also the master hunter! His wife cooked us an excellent meal consisting of venison from a deer Ulrich had shot recently and we dined in his amazing house which was filled with Animals he had shot from on safari years ago.

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We were then taken to a local pub where we enjoyed free German beer until late into the evening when we then crashed out on the floor of his house. Some really nice roads in Germany, and really really friendly person!

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Day 4

We headed off to Prague next. On the way we stopped at the MZ factory as a pilgrimmage to the classic bikes they were making until very recently when it is about to close.

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Noone was around, so we roared back off up the hills enjoying some more nice roads and heading to Dresden. After more rain and some splitting up of our group we crossed over the border into the Czech Republic. Suddenly the roads were immaculate! I was very surprised. But it turns out that they were only immacualte because that specific one had just bee resurfaced (probably to give a good impression to German tourists). As we continued onwards, the roads turned bad, with some large sections of missing road with nothing more that a small sign and a swerving oncoming truck as warning! We got rained on and split up again and eventually made it to our hostel in Prague. Here, Stuart had a lie down whilst waiting for the rest to catch up:

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We decided to head out that night and found an amazing rock bar called Hells Bells which was througha metal door down a tiny alleyway. We then drank 60p a pint beer and made friends with various insane Czech locals (pictured here is Josef who seemed to be dateing is gf/sister as far as we could make out. Whatever the story, she was extremely embarassed to be photographed!)

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Czech beer really is great, it is so pure and cheap you can drink loads and not have a very bad hangover!

Day 5

We had booked two nights in Prague, so we actually had a full day to look around on this day. Prague is very pretty as expected, and a great place to visit. This is the Charles bridge IIRC

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Won't spend too much time going over Prague as this is a bike forum not a city-break forum, but it suffices to say we stayed with some friends of PJ's in their apartment overlooking Prague and drank Berechovka until the early hours! Lovely :)

[dizzyblonde]

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And I thought Matt had a serious problem collecting bikes...lol:smt101 He just said he wishes he had a barn........where is this miraculous place you speak about?

[Warthog]

Day 6

We arose this morning to bid farewell to Phil W who had joined us for the small first part of the trip. Just as we collect our bikes from the parking lot, we noticed that his bike (GTR1000) had a split rear disc! And the battery was flat. So after a long deliberation we decided he could ride back to blightey with the rear caliper removed and requiring bump starts all the way (we were just anxious for the rest of us to get going :-P)

I think he made it!

So we headed out after that into eastern Czech Republic. Aside from Prague, Czech looks very very flat with rolling corn fields everywhere.

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About 30 minutes outside of Prague we looked up Kutna Hora, the site of a famous ossuary. A priest at this church had been commanded to go out on a pilgrimmage to the holy lands by the pope. He collected a case of holy earth and brought it back to be sprinkled in the cemetary of his church. From then on, everyone wanted to be buried there, and with the addition of the plague, the cemetary swelled to about 30,000 bodies! this got a bit silly so they reduced the size and made this amazing ossuary out of the removed bones. Really amazing:

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We were due to get into Slovakia but we got lost again around Eastern Czech thanks to a myriad of raods being cloased for improvements. We eventually had to abandone the idea of getting into Slovakia and settled down to find a campsite around Brno. We founf one and asked for their rates. "For you bikers, it is 25 Euros each!" :shock:. Why?! Well it turned out it was the Czech motoGP on that night so there were bikers everywhere and campsites were charging 5 times the price! Damned unlucky for us, so we found a place to camp in some guys garden who just bought a barrel of beer to serve and charged us 5 Euros each. Much better!

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Day 7

Becuase we never made it to Slovakia, our next date was with Hungary, so we motored through Slovakia on the motorway instead! really sad to not have seen anything of it, so I can't really say what it was like. The weather had been much nicer by then, but sure enough, the moment we entered Hungary the heavens opened again and so we came off the motorway, and hurredly rode the bikes under the nearest shelter we could find to get our waterproofs on. Which turned out to be riding up a platform onto an old station :lol:

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Quite a step to get off the bikes! With waterproofs on, and lightning streaking accross the open sky we headed south to Lake Balaton. the weather turned extremely humid and warm suddenly, so off came the waterproofs and we were suddenly sweating like a paedophiles in a playground. The scenery in Hungary was lovely, loads of castles on hills and palaces. We needed some random Hungarian money, so we followed a sign to a supermarket where there was a cash machine. Guess what we found:

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Yep, Tescos has made it's way to Hungary as well. Oh well. We each took out a random note from the machine and headed down to Lake Balaton and finally and found ourselves a campsite. Peeling off sticky leathers it was clearly time to go for a swim!

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Lake Balaton was very nice, and we were really impressed by Hungary. In Czech we had a less friendly welcome, mainly cos it was all touristy and we were scene as walking cashpoints, but in Hungary everyone was dead friendly. It really isn't as backwards as you might think, and I thoroughly recommend a visit.

[Warthog]

Day 8

Everything had been going so well until today. We were riding in the south of HUngary, still really enjoyinh it, when PJ came off on a roundabout in the middle of nowhere. We aren't really sure what happened, but basically whilst riding totally sedately, he breifly lost grip on the front end whilst exciting a slightly oily roundabout and this caused his bike (fully laden with welded metal ammo crates and with loose head bearings) to weave about too much so he eventually lost it and slid down the road at 30 mph.

Here is where he lost it (with accompanying marks):

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Damage consisted of a broken indicator, bent clipon, scratched bar end and fairing, bashed pannier, and one broken strut.

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Bit of Hungarian white line as a memento!

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PJ himself was largely ok. Slid under his bike but the panniers held it off him, so he just had scraped jacket and scraped German paratrooper boot and a sore shoulder from impact.

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We taped the indy together, clipon was ok and pannier held, and PJ was able to ride on! This is yet more proof that wearing proper gear is vital, as if he hadn't been wearing it, he would have been ground a lot worse under the bike. It was boiling hot and we were all moaning but boy was he glad we had kept it all on. He hadn't had a crash for 5+ years, sometimes they just come out of the blue. Thankfully we could continue on to the Serbian border!

.... where we failed to gain entry to Serbia! Well, I tell a lie, we got through the border ok, but then our insurance didn't cover Serbia, so we stopped at the border to buy some (it costs £15 apparently). Does it heck! The two "Osiguranje" places there were charging 85 and 90 euros each for insurance! Seeing as we were only passing through Serbia on the way to Bosnia, we decided to turn around and leave the scary place with its guns and guards. How Serbia expects anyone to drive through it is beyond me.

Anyway, this meant a further delay and another stay in Hungary. We found another little lake to camp at which turned out to be like a club 18-30 butlins for Hungarians! Music was loud and pumping and carried on til 6am :(. We had a few Soproni's and eventually tried out our best Hungarian on some locals. This swiftly led to arm wrestling 4 farmers lads that had clearly been toting hay bales all their lives! I'm afraid we didn't fare too well!

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PJ's hurting shoulder went away after 3 days, but he says his arms still hurts from arm wrestling :D.

Day 9

To get round Serbia we decided to head to Eastern Croatia. The border crossing there was much less eventfull adn as UK insurance covers Croatia, we got in no problems. One mile down the road there was a police car. 2 miles down the road there was a police car with radar gun. then two more police. We crawled along at the speed limit as there were unmarked, camoflaged police everywhere! We eventually stopped in a small village to check the maps. All around us were old houses, still lived in, but with bullet holes and shrapnel damage all over them. Then a large man with a shaven head and goatee beard emerged from one of the houses. "You must come and have a drink with me" he said. "Park your bikes behind my house, come on, now." We looked at each other. We had to get on to Bosnia so we couldn't really delay. After assuring him that we really couldn't stop, he counter-assured us that we really REALLY should stop round his. So we parked the bikes behind his house and followed him to his chamber of extermination / nice outhouse he had built himself.

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We sat down in his out house and he gave us liquor. "Croatian liquor, you must drink!". "no no no" we assured him, we have to ride bikes, it is the middle of the day, we can't drink. He counter-assured us that it was TRADITION to have a welcoming drink and that the police don't mind. So we had a drink. Then what? "Beer! Wine?!" he said. "No no no no no please no" we said, "we really can't". So he settled for coke. We then sat around chatting about his life, and how the Serbs had invaded Croatia. They had one gun between three of them and they were captured and were prisoners of war for a few months. His brother had had his head blown off by a tank whilst sitting in the front seat of the car. They said you just can't forgive people after something like that had happened.

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As we talked, my eyes wandered to the huge Croatian flag hung over the window. On the left was a drawing of his brother. I asked who the picture on the right was of. "That is our hero, Croation military general! He is now in the Hague. Politics, you know.". I have subsequently found out it was Ante Gotovina, you can read about it here: http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/03/11/europe/hague.php

We finally said we really had to go, to Tuzla, to which he replied "no don't go there!". We were startled, "why not?". "Dangerous! Horrible! Muslims! Mudjahadeen, with big beards, don't like our way of life" he said. He then offered to ring his mate, the head of the Bosnian Special Forces who lived there. Before we could object, he had his mobile out and was speaking in Croatian to this guy, saying we were coming and could he find us and help keep us safe. He then rang two friends in Dubrovnic to say we were coming and also to find us and help us. It was all really rather scary. We finally took one final photo:

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and escaped. Upon reflection, all he did was offer us drink and shelter and friends to help but it was pretty scary for some reason! He was very aggressive in his friendliness.

Anyway, the road to Bosnia awaited and that will have to wait til later as I am getting tired typing this all out!

[falc]

Sounds awesome so far Warthog, can't wait to read/see the rest. Great to see pictures along with the right up.

Remember that bone church from LWR, looked pretty cool.

Glad your back in one piece also :thumbsup:

[MrTom]

Enjoying the story so far. I've back-packed eastern europe twice and often thought about going back for a third time on two wheels. The drivers out there seem a little on the mental side though!

[Sosha]

Top Job Nick.....

[sarah]

Great pics and story.

We want more. Now.

[dirtsk8]

Fantastic story so far.

[Jdubya]

Brilliant! Very Inspiring!

[fizzwheel]

What a cracking read :cool:

[dizzyblonde]

absolutely marvellous read so far, come on we want more;-)

[melody]

Fantastic story and great pictures!!!

I'm so jealous.

But not for long. :riding:

[Foxy]

:DWhat a great story, can't wait to read more :D. Brilliant!!

[Warthog]

Thanks for all the great comments! After a brief break I will now resume the tale :).

Day er 10

We headed south from the Croatian ultranationalist towards Bosnia. An easy crossing left us again at the Osiguranje shop. We had all previously checked whether our UK insurance covered Bosnia but typically we had all subsequently forgotten! So I did what any normal person would do; rode down the road to Hotel "Derby" and asked the pretty waitress and her friend :). Her friend's brother turned out to be a Bosnian policeman so a swift phonecall later confirmed that he at least had no problem with UK insurance in Bosnia and so we could continue! We set off into Bosnia, riding through undulating hills and fields covered in trees and mines. Yes, mines. It's has been 15 years since the war but we went through at least two fields which still sported "BEWARE OF MINES" signs! They may well have been obsolete but none of us were brave enough to find out. The thought of camping in a minefield and having to throw a succession of stones infront of you everytime you needed to go for a leak at night was not a pleasant one. So on we plodded to Tuzla, the alleged home of muslim extremists. We got as far as the powerstation where we all had a conflab to decide if we should phone the head of the Bosnian Special Forces to seek his aid/torture.

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I was ok with ringing him but a quick vote showed that we were all a bunch of chickens so we decided to head to a lake next to Tuzla to try and fend for ourselves!

As we wound our way past the hydroelectric dam, we came across what can only be described as the Bosnian riviera. There was one big pink hotel, a few "pensions", a club and pizzeria "Parot". There were a few hip bosnians and even a gixxer thou with twin yoshis buzzing about! We found a slab of land that had hopefully been cleared of mines, threw up the tents and headed to Pizzeria Parot for some nourishment. THe place had clearly had lots of money invested in building it, as it consisted of multiple tiered jungle layers made of rocks and wood and covered in plants. it was really cool. We ordered a beer (Tuzlanski Pilsner) and a large Parot pizza, their speciality!

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The translation for the menu was a little dodgy, as all pizzas came with "ketchup" rather than tomato sauce! Oh well, we ordered the pizza and it subsequently came.

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...with ketchup. And blobs of mayonnaise. And processed ham. In their haste to spend money on the building they had forgotten to employ a chef. It was actually quite sad, as it clearly was a poor war-torn region and they had made a little swirly pattern with the ketchup and everything :'(. Still it tasted fine, and brought me back to student years. I seriously reckon that in about 10 years this lake will be a hot tourist destination!

Back to the camping and we asked if we could have a fire. They said sure! (no annoying health and safety here) and said we should break wood off the big boat to stoke it!

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As we lit our fire we gazed accross the lake, with the mellow sounds of the cement and rock carrying cable car device rattling away in the background.

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[kwak zzr]

superb!! what a great journey!! excellent write up and piccys mate.

[gettin2dizzy]

Excellent write up :) Looking forward to the rest.

I can't believe Philbut has those crates as panniers! I've got two identical ones in the boot of my car about to be converted :thumbsup: - I'll be pestering for details about how he did it/if they're any good ;)

Rob.

[Warthog]

Day 11

The road to Sarajevo involved some nice hilly areas with bendy bits. It would have almost been fun on the bikes were it not for the potholed roads and crazy bosnians overtaking us at the same time as oncoming traffic. In cars! I got severly pulled out in front of but luckily emergency stopped in time. The worst driving we saw all trip was in Bosnia.

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As we wound our way down the final hill into Sarajevo we were filled with a deep sense of foreboding. Having seen all the news reports of Serbians shelling the city from these hills and sniping at civilians for 90 days, it was quite unreal decending into the city. Here Stuart poses for a shot in front of the roadsign.

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As we turned the final corner and went down into the heart of Sarajevo we were greeted by a truly shocking sight: thousands and thousands of graves in huge cemetaries lined the main road. I have never seen so many in my life. We couldn't take a picture because we were on a main road, but here is one from the web. You can even see it all from Googlemaps.

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So in solemn silence we rode into the centre. Which was perfectly fine! It is all redeveloped and bustling like any other large eastern european city. There was a lovely jewelry quarter and bars and cafes, all very pleasent. As we parked the bikes, some local lad shouted "Welcome to Sarajevo!". The kind of shout you hear from a soldier when you have been freshly transferred to the front and a huge mortar has just hit :lol:. The odd thing about Sarajevo is it's muslim influences too, there were mosques all over the place as well as churches.

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You could happily spend a nice few days there but sadly we had to move on. Upon exiting Sarajevo you could see huge apartment blocks with shell holes in the side, and much more evidence of bullet and shrapnel damage than in the rejuvinated centre. Stu forgot his ear plugs so me and him pulled over whilst the others went on ahead.

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See that look in Stu's eyes? Thats an "I'm going to motor it to catch up" look. He said "lets motor it to catch them up, ok?" I shrugged and followed him as he pulled off. As we were overtaking a line of cars in a 60 kph limit a pair of Bosnian policemen walked out ahead of us waving a stop lollipop and gesturing at us. My stomach turned over. They waved a car that had stopped in front of us on, and motioned for Stu to get off his bike. They showed us a radar gun which read 100 kph. They then pointed at me and waved me on too! I asked Stu if he was ok and he just told me to go on, catch the others and meet at Mostar. I rode off, shaking like a leaf. About 5 minutes of extremely slow riding later I stopped, having just remembered that The cash machin in Oxford had eaten Stu's card, and so he in fact had no money and no way of getting money! I rang him but there was no answer. Full of dread I had no option but to ride on. I soon caught up with the rest of the guys who had stopped at the sid eof the road where two old ladies were selling tomatoes and fruit juice. My ashen face told it all: "Stu's been nicked". We discussed our plan of action for about 5 minutes when all of a sudden Stu appeared round the corner on his shiney Guzzi, like a triumphant knight! He said that they had threatened to take his passport and fine him 30 Euros or something, but after a lot of looking innocent and showing them that all he had was 10 Euros they got fed up with him and let him go! The relief was tangible. To celebrate, I fancied a glass of freshly squeezed juice. So armed with my phrasebook, I approached the two old women and asked for orange juice. They pointed at a large glass bottle of cloudy looking brown liquid, so I gave them 5 marks and bought it. They offered me a cheap plastic cup but I turned it down, motioning that I would just drink out of the bottle. After a lot of protestations, I walked back to the bike taking a big swig from it. It was actually really nice! Not orange juice at all, but kind of like a really sweet and sickly honey and elderflower drink. There were still more protestations behind me so I took another gulp and headed back to the old women. They again tried to make me take a plastic cup so I tried to refuse again, being a good eco-minded individual etc. They had none of it and gave me the cup. They then took my bottle of "orange juice" and poured an inch into the cup. Then they filled the rest up with water. Ah. Now I see. It's squash. Much hilarity ensued and after the laughter wore off I bought and ate a mutant looking tomato and bade them fairwell.

The road from Sarajevo to Mostar goes past some really beautiful reservoirs, gorges and rivers. Its certainly the nicest part of Bosnia.

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As we finally reached Mostar, along miles and miles of scraped mid-repair roads, we were greeted by the same grim sight as in Sarajevo, some really huge graveyards.

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As we stopped and took photos, some really cute kids came up and poked our bikes. I put my helmet on one of them and tried out my Bosnian on the other. "What is your name?". Total shyness. That or my Bosnian is lousy. The other boy wanted a go on the bike so we started the engine and let him touch the throttle. "Brummmm". A small twist and a squeel of delight! Brummummmmmm". A bit more of a twist and the kid is in raptures, grinning like and idiot! Then came the inevitable. "BRWAAAAAAAAAAAOOOORAORAORAORAOR" bouncing it off the limiter! Everyone stopped and stared and his mother/sister hustled him away quickly telling him off but with half a smile on her face :).

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Mostar is absolutely gorgeous. It is like a French river gorge with lovely restaurants and shops lining either side of an ancient bridge (which in fact was 4 years old as it gets blown up everytime Mostar sees military action :().

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I felt immediatly relaxed and so we got a hotel room for cheap as it was still being built and hit the streets. PJ, in his inimitable style instead of buying an "I love Mostar" T-shirt or a keyring, bought an AK-47 bayonet. Here he is brandishing it at Stu:

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Its actually quite cool, the blade and sheath combine to form wire cutters! Exciting! It isn't? Oh, must just be me then... :D.

We had a lovely meal and slept very well despite intense 30 heat and having a shower that only went from cold to ice cold settings.

[Warthog]

Gotta cook some food now, will continue in a bit! :)

[Warthog]

Day 12

Walking around Mostar in the morning it the damage of the war was still plainly evident. There were some ruined buildings too dangerous to even approach

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And even some buildings with clear RPG hits and bullet holes that were still lived in:

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We headed out of Mostar and crossed the border into Croatia heading just north of Dubrovnic. Out in the middle of nowhere we came accross this house that was built exactly like a ship! We had a nose around and could see a swimming pool in the front part, but it looked rather abandoned. I have no idea what the story is behind it, but someone clearly had a vision but sadly couldn't complete it.

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Croatia is very pretty but actually a lot more barren than I was expecting. It is largely rocky with scrubby gorse bushes, rather like bits of Spain. We had to miss Dubrovnic due to being behind schedule, so we opted for the motorway to Split. It is a newly built thing with tolls on it, and very swish. After making up time, we turned off the motorway at the peak of some mountains it was busy climbing up. Here is a picture of the three orgers under the explicit instructions to look hard hahaha :lol:

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109084.jpg

Well at least the mountain in the background is nice :lol:. We then realised we had missed the turn-off to the coastal road, and decided to head back to it despite it getting late. This is the best decision we have ever made. The Croatian coastal road is a freshly resurface black tarmac road, which sweeps in and out of coves and bays round headlands through sleepy villiages and trendy marinas. There must be something like two hundred bends in a row. AS someone put, if we had three of these bends on an english road it would be called an amazing road! The sun was setting ahead of us, so I donned my shades, opened the visor, and just rode this road for ages with Stu. The heat of the 32 degree motorway was fading into a pleasent warmth, the sunset was bathing everything in a glorious red light and the road was so long and perfect I just thought I was having one of the best experiences of my life. It's like the great feeling you get on a perfect rare bend in the UK but going on and on for miles and miles. Utterly perfect.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109088.jpg


We have some videos of this road, but are hoping to collate it all into one video diary so I will save them for later. I did make a google map of the best roads we had ridden. Check it out here (http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&msid=115529206609422652449.0004556febac32fcb5676&z=7) and zoom into the Croatian road for the true volume of great bends.

We found a campsite for the night and headed out to a restaurant for a meal. After ordeing 6 "Zagreb" steaks, we noticed that the only waiter in the place leapt into a van and tore off. Then 15 minutes later he returned and ran into the back with a plastic bag. Then 15 minutes later our food arrived :lol:. Oh well! Back at the campsite, we erected our tents but largely without pegs as the ground seemed to consist of a fine sprinkling of earth coving a heavy sprinkling of concrete :).

[Warthog]

Day 13

We left our campsite and rode the rest of the coastal road; still every bit as good as the day before. We then turned off and climbed through the mountains to get to Slovenia. As soon as we had passed the peak of the mountains we were surrounded by a much different climate, much more alpine, like the black forest.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109109.jpg

The roads were brilliant again, and we even hit a section which had clearly been used as a hill climb as there were red and white striped kerbs and advertising on the hairpin walls!

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109114.jpg

Totally brilliant set of roads winding up and down the hills, but there were a few dodgy patches of dirt and holes that caused a few brown trouser moments for Phil and Andy (I already had brown trousers owing to not bringing enough pants).
We had a lovely pizza in a small villiage and made our way to the Slovenian border, back into the EU!

Slovenia was actually quite modern, I guess being the only former Yugoslavian country to be in the EU. It is very pretty and still quite cheap. Bit like Black forest, Switzerland and Italy only cheaper and less discovered. I would totally recommend it. We made our way (allowing for some closed off motorways) to lake Bled, Slovenia's number one tourist destination. For good reason, this mountain lake is stunning, boasting a castle and a church on an island as well as a swimmable lake.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109131.jpg

We camped at the camp site there amongst a lot of other western tourists. The prices were back in Euros and were near normal prices, so Lake Bled is certainly back in Western Europe really which is a shame. We could have done with a lot more time there, it is a very nice place, but time was not on our side and we had to spend the night and get going again.

[Warthog]

Day 14

It was at this point that Stu's front tyre really wasn't having anymore of it. We had been poking it for the last week, thinking it wasn't going to last. It was looking worse and worse and so we decided to get him a new one. This proved quite hard. After a quick consultation with a brother in England with the internet, we were presented with the number of a motorcycle tyre place in Austria, 30 mins north of where we were. I rang them and in my best German attempted to order a tyre for the following day. (Well, this was done yesterday, so today was the following day). Stu and PJ departed early to do the detour to Austria. In the meantime the rest of the gang headed west towards Italy. Now we kind of had a hunch that you had to pay to use motorways in Switzerland, Slovenia, Hungary, Austria etc (ok ok we knew!) but we had never been challenged nor seen any place to buy vignettes. However PJ and Stu crossed into Austria at a large toll tunnel where they were stopped and forced to buy Austrian vignettes because they were on the motorway. By an astounding piece of deduction, the border guard worked out that they must have also been on the Slovenian motorway, so there was another 35 Euros each for a Slovenian motorway vignette! All for a 2 hour detour to get a new tyre fitted (which went fine thankfully). If anyone wants a Slovenian motorway vignette they can buy PJs half price, it is valid for 6 months :).

In the meantime, we had made our way into some truly phenomenal roads in the Italian dolomites. The roads began with an SS road following the motorway which was perched high up on concrete pillars whilst we enjoyed sweeping bends underneath it down the valley. We then wound our way into the dolomites through some mountain passes as marked on the previous googlemaps link in the previous post. These roads were phenominal! Great surface, loads of crazy bends and beautiful scenery. I had an absolutely great time again; we also did more recording which should be available on the DVD when we release it (£12.99 from amazon :D).

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109137.jpg

We visited many mountain villages with stonking views and solid good roads for miles and miles and miles.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109145.jpg

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109149.jpg

When it was getting dark, PJ and Stu were still 1 hour behind us, so we were tasked with finding a campsite. Unfortunately we had wandered into the poshest region in the whole of the Italian dolomites! If you have been to Gstaad in Switzerland, it was like that. BMWs everywhere, ladies in mink and so on. The only campsite for miles around was 19 Euros each! Anyway, we booked in and finally had a nice shower in the card-access showerblock. Here is a shot of my SV with the dolomites in the background. You can see the many stickers that now adorned it from the various places we had visited :).

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109166.jpg


We set up the tents next to a Mercedes of posh camping people, and made our way to the nearest restaurant. Ahead of us was a family who went into the restaurant hand in hand, father with jumper draped over shoulders, kids in neat little matching clothes. Then we went in. 6 unshaven smelly men (you can shower but then only have dirty clothes to get back into!) who swaggered in and attempted to order some red wine in poor Italian accents. Our attempts must have impressed the waitress, as before long we had 6 lovely pizzas, a bottle of excellent Italian wine and guns and roses on the stereo! The rest of the night is a blur I'm afraid.

[Warthog]

Day 15

The Stelvio pass. We set off from the campsite along yet more gorgeous Italian mountain roads, having the time of our lives. As we wound our way towards the Swiss border, we started the ascent to the "Passo Del Stelvio". The roads became steeper and steeper, incorporating some amazingly tight hairpins. they literally swiveled straight back onto themselves, so going right round them meant swinging out to the other side of the road and still dropping the bike in and turning on a sixpence. Dragging rear brake, high revs and riding the clutch was the only way to do them, I finally saw why you have to practice U-turns on your DAS! The scenery turned more and more mountainous and soon glaciers were appearing.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109182.jpg

As the tree line disappeared the temperature plummetted and we all got significantly colder as the climb continued. Hairpin after hairpin, it never seemed to end! Shortley after we were greeted with the following sight:

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109186.jpg

The road winding all the way up to the Stelvio pass. Lots of bikers going up it, so we chased a few Porsches up there, frightening ourselves on jsut about every bend! The view from the top was breathtaking though:

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109192.jpg


We have of course more videos of it, but that will have to wait :). Once at the top we bought a sticker, bought a bratwurst, and sat on the wall to contemplate the climb. It wasn't the best biking road per say, as the bends were so tight, but it was an incredible experience, and well worth it.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109196.jpg


Now I have to admit here that we didn't all make it up the pass totally without incident. As Matt was following Philbut, he watched him swing rather wide on the exit to one of the hairpins, which resulted in a resounding "CLANG" which echoed down the mountain. Phill had clipped the outside wall with his pannier! In true Phill style, there was barely a wobble as he continued to storm up the pass :)

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109193.jpg

The road down the other side was equally impressive. As we entered Switzerland the road to Davos turned out to be totally glorious! I think it had been on Top Gear as the best road ever or something. It was a mix of hairpains and sweeping bends through ravines, over rivers and through forests. Sadly I have no photos of it as I was enjoying it so much! Here is a piccy of the road back down the mountain in Switzerland:

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109201.jpg

These roads were so great that despite many internal voices telling us to take it easy with the luggage on and unknown roads, all care went out of the window and we just pinned it and had the time of our lives. Almost got no chicken strips left and that is with full luggage! Matt's Ducati 600SS had a bit of a fit after a while as he lost braking thanks to his single front disc just fading to nothing. We did think he was rather fast round some of the bends :-P, it was just he couldn't stop and as he put it "tip in or fly off the edge" :D.

After Davos and the amazing road, the heavens opened again sadly and we had the smiles wiped firmly off our faces. Soaking wet we got to Hinwil near Zurich where we met up with Andy's mate. Luckily we were allowed to stay in his house, so we got dried off and went out for a meal. After the meal (20 different types of cordon blue!), we went to a huge pirate ship bar! It was a biker gang called the Hinwil Pirates that made it, and it is like being inside a galleon once inside. Really impressive. They also had a cover band doing ZZ top and various other classics, so we grabbed a load of beers and had a thoroughly good time!

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109219.jpg

I have many photos of this night, but there is a lot of gurning and arsing around inside a huge pirate ship so I will spare you that!

Day 16

In the pouring rain we set off for Luxemburg. After not buying a Swiss motorway vignette (stingy, us?! Europeans don't have to pay to use our motorways do they!) we exited Switzerland safely into France (or Germany by mistake for me). We made it to Luxemburg mainly by boring motorway, eating up the miles as we had no time. We made it to PJ's friend Feona's house, and we were allowed to camp in a tiny grass section of her allotment hehe.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109227.jpg

Sadly there was a price to pay. They were redoing their house and so had a whole shed of wood that needed getting rid of and did we mind awefully burning it for them? Hehehehehehehe :D we didn't mind!

Day 17

Just more motorway miles to Belgium to stay at my parents house where PJ made an **** of himself with the largest of my Dad's collection of shell cases.

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109241.jpg

Parents were there this time and welcomed us with crates of beer and a slap-up meal. Thank you!
Only thing of note that happened on this day was Matt's chain jumped off his sprocket. It had been stretching somewhat cronic so he had been adjusting it every day. But it had just had too much and leapt off at about 5 mph luckily. No damage was done, the chain was reattached and adjusted again and we managed to limp home.

Day 18

Everyone left to get the ferry back home. Not sure how we got 18 days out of a two week holiday, but who cares! When we got to the ferry terminal the computers had crashed, causing a slight delay. Three cars back in the other lane was an English bloke yelling his head off effing and blinding at everyone. He had a watch with and England flag on, and England wallet, England back patch, his car sticker said "This is Anfield" and his number plate was as follows:

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109243.jpg


After so many great experiences and friendly people this guy just made us feel utterly rotten about returning to England. Driving a German car too we noticed ironically! Anyway, met two other loverly English blokes, so proves you can't ever ever generalise! :lol:



All in all, the trip was incredible. Totally exhausting, full of excitement and danger and some truly excellent roads. I would do it again in a heartbeat, I would recommend it to anyone with a heart of adventure. The SV perfomred admirably. I had a painful bum but after 3500 miles I think everyone else did. Having no fairing was tough work, but my neck turned into a bull's neck, and if you stop moaning for a while you notice that you really don't have it that bad at all, as you tear off into the sunset riding those beautiful roads again and again.

Nick

[dizzyblonde]

This is spectacular:riding::notworthy::smt041

[Demonz]

Love it. Great read and pics!

[Speedy Claire]

Fantastic, well done all of you. Has been a brilliant read and some truly superb photo`s.

[dizzyblonde]

Matt just said he'd find it massively amusing to go up this on his YPVS...but er maybe not so much on the way down!!
http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109186.jpg

[Balky001]

I went through France, Germany, Austria Liechtenstein and Swizerland last year in the car (and family!), I have some good photos but yours really are superb, great write up too. Thanks

[Stu]

Awesome, can't wait for more campfire stories next w/e :D

[melody]

Absolutely fantastic write up and pictures!!

Looks like you all had such a great time.

The hairpins look brilliant.

Thanks for sharing.

[falc]

Simply stunning, nice one Warthog, thanks for writing up and the great pictures. I think everyone reading this is thinking of doing this now ;)

[AndyL]

Fantastic pics and write up. Great job :-)

[MrTom]

Nice to see the picture of Lake Bled, such a beautiful place and arguably where my interest in bikes first turned serious when I rented a scoot and had my 1st experience on two wheels there!

[Mr Speirs]

Cheers Warthog. Throughly enjoyed reading this thread. Its great to get such a good write up and pictures from a good biking holiday.

I cant wait to do something like this. The closest thing Im guna get at the minute is biking to spain for a weeks holiday instead of flying. But that not until next year :(

Thanks Again

[walkaboutandy]

Nice write up their Warthog. :cool: You wrote it so well I feel like I was there!!?!?!?!!:p Seriously though it was such an intense and actioned packed trip that the memories and details get blurred from one day to the next and that puts it back into perspective. Although I don't think getting slaughtered everynight helped!?!

Tank bag cam footage to follow..................

[Foxy]

Great thread, awesome stories and pics...:cool: thank you :D

Loved it!!

Foxy

[jaffacakes]

Great stories, superb pics. Looks like you guys had a right laugh! I wanna do something like that some day.

Very inspiring.
Is this the same place that was on the Long Way Round(or Down)?



http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV108907.jpg

[Warthog]

Hi guys, thanks for the wonderful comments! Yes I think it is the same place as the Long Way Down, although it's been a while since I watched the DVD.

Matt's dads barn has a website here http://www.classicbikesuk.com/ for anyone interested in classic bikes.

As soon as we get all the video footage together I will make a little youtube vid with all the roads and onboard footage, some of it is really great!

[jumjum_0214]

Absolutely superb!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks for sharing with us, im totally inspired :-)

For those of you that enjoyed this as much as i did have a look at advrider.com click on pics and read ride reports till your hearts content!!! Its also very inspiring.............:-)

[philbut]

Thanks for doing the write up Nick. ii would never have got round to it, being the lazy bum that I am :p

Hope you all enjoyed reading it, cos we sure as hell enjoyed riding it! can't wait for the next adventure...

[Tim in Belgium]

A great write up and read for a wet Sunday evening with some nice pics, a real adventure!

[DanAbnormal]

Finally read it. Awesome! Next time I'm coming, there seemed to be lots of kneedown bends and ditches for me to crash in. Perfect! :p

[philbut]

Er i believe the idea is not to crash Dan. come on, even I managed not to bin it! I'm sure you'd have been fine :p

[Jinxy43]

That was one awesome trip you guys did, I sam soo jealous.

It has got me thinking about doing a little trip around europe next year or more than likely the yr after.

Thank you for sharing your experiences and allow everyone the pleasure of reading, and looking at some stunning pictures

[pegasus]

well done ....:p

[Viney]

Sure beats the daily commute thats for sure

[monkey]

That looks like a brilliant trip! You lucky people. 3500 miles?!

:)

[Cazza]

What an amazing trip. Really enjoyed reading that and looking at the great pics.

Hmmm... Somerset, Devon and Cornwall pales in comparison I suppose - but we all have to start somewhere!

[blueto]

vid yet? this was a awsemone read

[ixlr8]

Excellent. Great way to see Europe from the other side of the world.

[plowsie]

Excellent read Nick, some great pictures there also. I went to Switzerland a couple of weeks ago and am determined to go back there on the bike :)

[Warthog]

vid yet? this was a awsemone read

I have just finished 10 minutes of the video. I am doing it as well as I can though, naration, subtitles, music, jokes etc! So it will take a while. Can only upload it in 10 minute sections for Youtube too IIRC. Be patient, it will be worth it ;).

[sam anon]

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh301/deathUK2003/SV109114.jpg

That photo is absolutely superb! Sounds an awesome trip, I'll look forward to the video!

[Bluefish]

just seen this thread, excellant report would love to do same.=D>

[skeetly]

F***ing nice one lads!
I am deeply envious....

[Zen Beetle]

In the true spirit of adventure, without the over the top backup that Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman had. Truly inspiring. Thank you.

[Thingus]

Really quite glad someone bumped this up from 6 months ago, amazing adventure :p i'm sure a lot of people would look at some of those countries and **** themselves at the thought of going there.

[STRAMASHER]

Yup thanks for bumping this! Missed it somehow.

Fantastic read and pics!

Wanna get the maps back out now. :)

Guzzler, 600SS, GPZ9, NAKED SV.......... you show you can go tour on anything, who needs a GS/Pan?:cool:

[philbut]

The only down side is once you've done something lilke this, you want to do it again and again. I have no spare time this year at all to get a way on the bike :-(

I have only just finished the jar of honey I bought off some gypsy ladies in bosnia. My Mrs says she wants some more - thats a good enough excuse to go back isn't it ;-)

[chompy]

where is the video then?

i have just read through this and found my self glued to it. Totally inspiring and makes me envious i want to do it my self

[philbut]

where is the video then?

i have just read through this and found my self glued to it. Totally inspiring and makes me envious i want to do it my self

If you go to youtube and type in "Bosnia bike" you will get all 6 parts of the video I think.

[chompy]

nice one found them, ill be watching that then cheers :D:D