GRAND EURO OUTER SUBURB TOUR

Yes`n how many times can a man turn his head, pretendin he just doesn't see?

The answer my friend is blowin in the wind, the answer is blowin in the wind..

Bob Dylan 1962

Yep that's what it says.....funny we didn't get those coke signs in Oz
How did they get the building next door so mismatched....there's a wasted skill there I'm sure

Visa..rly Speaking

We've just spent the last week knocking over about four thousand K's. We're slowly getting the hang of life on the road. Bikes are packed quicker, socks and jocks wash out nightly and dried on the bike as we go - well um ... I do. We've left Germany and followed the GPS through Austria, Hungary, Serbia, Bulgaria and tonight I am punching away at the keyboard just around the corner from the Blue Mosque in central Istanbul. We left a roadside motel in Bulgaria this morning in perfect riding conditions and reached the border around lunchtime. I had done the E visa for Turkey on line but even so this was our first visa type border crossing. Oh what fun. First up the border control on the Bulgarian side is a pretty rough. Vehicles dumped everywhere the road torn up and rough as well as roadside shantie shops here and there - what a mess! You hit the Turkish side  and it's all concrete and customs efficiency. Ride up to the first box - passport - rego - insurance. "You do not have insurance, you must park your vehicles and go back out and buy it. "shit" We park up, walk half a k back into no mans land in the sun, spend an hour haggling over useless Bulgarian currency "you want to change this...Ba ha ha ha" hand over 27 euro and get insurance. We stomp back and ride to another box. No no no you must have bar code on your passport you must go back. "Shit"  We ride back grab the bar code man and get the sticker. We put our gear back on and line up in the sun for another half an hour at box three. "No no no you must go back to box 67 and have your papers processed. "Shit".  OK we go back and find 67 "No no go to 66" F!@#$k (darn) I mean "Shit". We find 66 and they spend a half hour over coffees and chat amongst themselves and once again we gear up and head to the last box. Caaaatchiing......what a lovely sound and the stamp goes on. "Enjoy your stay in Turkey"....."mmmm patience Deano"

You put ya papers in
You take ya papers out
You move ya bike on in 
You move ya bike on out
Then spin round and round and round
That what visas are aaaaall aboooout

Out through the Back Door
In our effort to get to Istanbul asap we basically set the GPS and followed the little electronic bike. First up was Austria which was a stunner. Ron described it as riding through a bowling green. Seriously they must sneak out at night and mow it! Perfect roads, motorbikes everywhere (mostly GS Beemers) and great weather.

Hand me my leather shorts and mower.....no I don't really have erm leather shorts
...not my own anyway but I have been known to mow.

A Beemer GS is a Beemer GS setting...all very clinical.
Hungary
We drifted into Hungary pretty much unknowingly at first. The lines on the GPS are impossible to see and the lack of mowing and fresh paint signalled somewhere new. It was a religious holiday and the towns were all but deserted like after some apocalyptic occurrence. (maaajor scrabble score). We had the GPS set to follow "B" roads and we passed through literally dozens of dorps or towns one after the other. Some were visible from each other and we soon were losing time so I cracked the shits dialled in toll roads and headed for the freeways. We did stay in a nifty little castle lookalike restaurant thingo for cheaps though. We awoken by workmen digging up the front tiles about sevenish and by the time we came down at eight they were already well into their beers!

Authentic five year old castle restaurant/hotel. Much less draughty than a real one and serves beer!
Serbia.
We hit Serbia on a long flat toll road. On leaving Hungary we had ridden down a sixty k stretch of narrow road jammed with trucks. On this road every ten kilo's or so prostitutes stood beside the road waiting for customers. I swear the first one I saw didn't have pants on. I was dopier than usual with the man cold and I just thought "oh there's a woman with no pants on"  Thirty seconds later "W!@#$T%^F!@#$ (crikey) no pants??? The Serbs look to be doing it tough with lots of abandoned half finished infrastructure all over the place. We skirted Belgrade and stayed at a roadside restaurant with a couple of rooms. The rooms had been recently renovated in about I reckon an hour. It was hilarious. All electrical fittings were hard  wired through holes in the wall so there were no power points. The skirting boards were already falling off and lent against the wall. The aircon made moaning noises and that was it. The modern looking floating handbasin leaked water on your feet as you washed your hands and the shower had a mind of its own as well as leaking....until the water was turned off....Ron ...please don't use the toilet for a no.2.....just wait until ..um ...we can flush.The toilet seat was too small for the bowl and the lid was off some other model.The food and beer was excellent though and the staff cool. There was some kind of religious spring thing next door and buses came and went day and night to visit it.

Restaurant/motel below Belgrade great food and hilarious reno's

Ron is including this in his coming book "great schnitzels I have known and loved"

When you want something tasty to lick why not an icecream?
Or is this bad taste?

Serb renovations......don't lean, touch or use anything
and nothing straight adds character..don't you think?

Just before we exited Serbia it turned it on with some nice scenery and curves...nice one.
Bulgaria
I'd never thought I would visit Bulgaria. Having to present passports at the Serb and Bulgarian borders signalled things were changing. Hands up who knows anything about Bulgaria? Maybe if they had got in first with a bearded transvestite in the eurovision contest we would all go "aaah yes Bulgaria"...but nope. It's kind of like Serbia with a bit more happening, a bit greener and more old school communist stuff. We followed a Bulgarian hat man (old guy with hat who never has accidents but causes hundreds) in a mint pale yellow Russian sedan for ages. Usually I like old stuff but this was like a cross between a HR and a Vauxall Cresta...nyet nyet nyet. What was cool though was the little simson two stroke  bikes seen in all three preceding countries. MMM a must have for the shed.....Bulgarian ebay perhaps? We stayed in a newish motel below Sofia with was behind a servo. I'm pretty sure you could rent rooms for an hour there (or three minutes if your over fifty!) - once again the truck prostitute thing. What was cool here was there was an unposted village right behind the motel. We headed off in search of food and beer and were rewarded with a great snapshop of village life. It was around seven o'clock and there was a lovely park in the village square packed with families and kids enjoying the cool of the evening (and maybe a respite from seriously bad TV). If it wasn't for the plethora of hacked peugeot 206's, and opel astras and corsas rattling about (I didn't see one car running well...either the local mechanic needs a kick up the arse or he is dead!) you would have sworn it was 1955.

Peak hour in Bulgarian Village. Think I'll pull up a chair and wait for it to die down.

"Oi"  walk faster we're waiting here! 

First stock a condemned building with Chinese stuff no one wants. Then go home or to the pub and leave it unstaffed.........Bulgarian tax dodge.......I dunno 

You think because my car rattles I worry eh?
Well I worry when it stops rattling haw haw haw

Welcome to Bulgaria...see we wash it just for you...."mate it's just rain ok" 

Next oooooh Istanbul

Reality Check

To be honest motorcycle touring like this is bloody uncomfortable. "Oh the call of the open road" blah blah blah. Doing five hundred k a day on a chook chaser is a recipe for stiff neck and limbs, lots of boredom an slowly going deaf and insane from bad earplugs and Ron's crap jokes on the bluetooth. The older I get the more I know that I dont know shit all and watching what unfolds through the visor so far continually confirms it.

 Which of course keeps it interesting.  

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