Balkans_2018...You Only Live Once!

glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
Last of the "late-starts"...
... for a day around Bucharest Old Town and shaking the jet-lag while having a gaze at what Romania's Capitol has to offer.

More stuff that leaves you speechless...


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Balkans parking...pretty civil, once you see them in motion...


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Library


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Yeah, Mitsubishi had a special on...


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Serious business this soccer stuff...pedestrian arcade.



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What was that last Dictators name again? Ceau-wot?
1100+ rooms you said?
OK, I'll take it!



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You want a driveway?? HERE'S A DRIVEWAY!!



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Pretty easy lingo to pick up on, really...



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Heart of the city...


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glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
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Roofed shopping arcade....memories of Milano/ Italy and the Tornanti #1 trip.



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Early deliveries for the 10am warm-kitchens


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Central Plaza


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Historic Street Lights..

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...with flash bang LED inserts


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Stumping workmanship: The Copper-Tops


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Local paper??? NOPE!!! Just the menu of the Caru Cu Bere Brewery in the Old Town :eek::clap: https://www.carucubere.ro/#


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glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
Old-School Basement book-shop



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House of Theater-tickets....the local TicketTek


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A rare Litfass-Column!!! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Litfaß
( a European-style billboard/ community-board) :eek:


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Amongst all the historical, old buildings....make no mistake, the RUSSIANS OWNED THIS PLACE UNTIL RECENTLY! DA!!!



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I bet they'll do vasectomies, too :killingme



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Rattling the soul...
An open-air display of huge photographs of when Russia flexed its commie-muscle for the 1968 Invasion of Czechoslovakia...I remember those pics well from when I was a kid...



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Makes the Italians pale with envy:




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Goodbye to Central-Bucharest



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More of the 1100+ room idiocy of Parliament House



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The minions-quarters opposite...



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glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
Time for a walk into the other direction to pick up the bikes.

There's some strong cabling underneath that one...


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The 2 near-new Baby-GS's....



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Boss and daughter....welcome to the family behind https://www.rent4ride.ro/


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No idea what that pics is of...any ideas?


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Getting ready for the morning...



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Tucker anyone?



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Never ask this mob a dumb question!
Here's to a cruisy 3 week ride then.... :bs:whistle::whistle:



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glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
Bucharest (Romania) -Sofia/ Lake Iskar (Bulgaria) https://goo.gl/HnpZuN


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Hiding a small, quirky and very friendly place behind a drab city facade... Villa Tamara/ about 1km from Bucharest Central https://goo.gl/Wf8mmb


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10mins of drizzle make for a damp start on an early Sunday morning ...with a looong day in the saddle ahead!
The ONLY rain/ spittle for the entire 3 weeks!!!


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Getting seen off like family :cdle



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I still wonder what came of the 2 Polish girls who'd come to Bucharest for some weekend-partying and crawled into Villa Tamara just on breakfast after spiked drinks, stolen passports/ money/ phones etc.
One of them had at least 3 bottles of Rakia on her breath...if she'd tried to blow out a candle she'd taken off like Apollo13.


Everyone there?


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Just short of crossing the Danube on the "Friendship-Bridge"....and slipping into Bulgaria after the first hour-and-a-half.


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Sure??...better check that again!


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Checking out of Romanian Customs, Goodie gets attacked by a trio of scruffy, feral fleabags snapping away at her legs. The attempt to run interference and sink a boot into at least one of the mongrels nearly makes me drop the bike :doh: :)


Across the Friendship Bridge spanning the nearly kilometer-wide, dirty-grey and industrial Danube ....



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...and straight into Bulgarian Customs on the other side.


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While the main roads aren't too bad, traffic, mainly trucks from all over Europe (and beyond) are thick (and smokey) on the ground, traffic is heavy.
A short while after leaving Veliko Tarnovo in a vain attempt to find some less frequented roads towards Sofia, the capital, the group unravels and somehow bogs between trucks and other local traffic.

"Kat lost a pannier, the thing just disappeared!... somewhere between the last town and here".

Arghhh...that's 20k's or more, a hell of a long stretch to scour for a black Givi pannier...and in this sort of traffic! :doh:

An hour of 6 bikes slowly scouring the road-verges, holding up traffic while looking for a pannier that really should have exploded when coming off at 100+kmh .... or one of the trucks running over the top of it...but there isn't a single sign of either pannier-plastics or contents anywhere!

We do get some suspicious stares from the truckies though....and the yellow mini-skirted hooker plying for business at the entrance to one of the local gravel side-roads (what the hell is she doing out here in the middle of no-where?).
It's time to abandon the search and keep going, too, the afternoon is running away from us.
"One last sweep, ok? The others are waiting in the lay-by up the road, we'll meet there"...and Andrew is off for one more lap.
I wait for the gap in traffic and do the U-turn, then pull just off the verge of the road onto the tiniest bit of extra-asphalt, checking the mirrors for his headlight to appear.

Traffic roaring past, I "disconnect" for a minute nor 2, just letting the head roam as it wants.

"Wouldn't it be fumy if the damn thing just lays there in the scrubby ditch down there?"

After the 3.take I still can't believe it. :doh::doh::doh::wot:

What I'm looking at is a scuffed, but intact, Givi pannier exactly down that scrubby ditch down there!



The odds were impossible...but we're back in business. :thumbs:


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That deserves a coffee!


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glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
The day is getting long....caught in the returning-weekend-traffic jam 20k's short of Sofia.



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Still just made it in daylight....and our "Kamelot-Castle" turns out a Bulgarian lakeside resort for some of the new-rich ex-communists.
It sure is a nice spot though and after 500+k's on country roads those thoughts are brushed aside.


Letting the pictures of the day pass by... doesn't make this place sit quite right!



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Black Vinyl-padded doors?? WTF?



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Who farted?



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Lake Iskar...nor bad, aye? :chug:



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Padded doors... and pictures of some Punky-Monkey??....I still can't get this place.
Maybe, for A$190/ night for 3 rooms with dinner + breakfast for everyone I should just go to sleep :eek:

The Kamelot on booking.com https://goo.gl/9ezRLj


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glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
Lake Iskar (Bulgaria)-> Dupnica crash -> Panichishte Ski Mountain (Bulgaria)

https://goo.gl/PQqF1W

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Early light across Lake Iskar....


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...turns into the full "BURNER"!! :drool:


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Always good for a surprise...down the expressway, wrong side of road, blocking the towns key roundabout or the busstop in front of the hospital....anywhere, anyhow, anytime. Just like those lonely figures in the middle of no-where, men or women and their shopping bag/ bundle, trudging down the road, emergency lane, freeway... :eek:


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Not long after... and the "Balkans-Raid" comes to its next screeching halt.:wot: :doh:
A weird, tightening spiral on-ramp got Goodie undone and the 650Thumper bucked her off into that waist-high groundcover on the left, providing an injury-free getaway (should have bought a Lotto ticket right then!).

The G65 didn't fare as well, there's bits of panniers and bike everywhere, neatly mixed with clothing and other colourful bits and the backpack with the lappy had escaped the cracked topbox.:(

It all looks like a bomb-site....mixed in with all the obvious leftovers of previous prangs at the same site.



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In disbelieve we stand around for a few minutes, slowly colour comes back into the faces as realization sets in...and some action is hatched to somehow get things back on the rails.
The busted luggage, screen and mirrors etc are somewhat surmountable...


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...but the busted front wheel is the showstopper. W-)


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A pile of phonecalls and SMS's later and Cristian and Alexa of Rent4ride, 500km away in Bucharest, Romania have brought order into the mess.... and are pulling all stops to get us going again.
Goodie and I are off to the local Cop Shop after some Israeli tour-bus group managed to somehow alert the traffic-cops, while the "troops" are trying to make the best of an extended brunch at the nearby highway-servo....and Alexa and dad are on their way within 2 hours with a replacement F800GS on the trailer.


Police accident report...anyone reads Cyrillic?


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Stephan, the cop you want to have on your side when the shit hits the fan!

Awesome guy with good English, who saved the day and made the crew smile again. :clap::clap:

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He even lets me ride the busted Bimmer from the crash-site to the highway-servo...with flashing lights and into oncoming traffic up the exit ramp.:bow:

With locations marked and a new place for the night sourced
"found something a bit back the way we came",
a midnight rendevouz at the servo arranged with Alexa to swap the bikes,
it's off into the hills....2-up on a 300, while the crew carries all the extra luggage. :thumbs:


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A last look back...

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glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
...and some hastily memorized turn-offs, hairpins, awesome vistas and single-laners through tiny rural villages later, the "some place up a hill" offers a beautiful setting and surrounds to start looking forward again.


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Great find!! :chug:
(ok, dinner was a lake of molten cheese whatever the dish...but the beer was cold!) :killingme



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glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
Fat-finger-Pete...texting just don't work, ever.


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Quick, little buggers...


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Bet, she wouldn't smile if she knew what it all meant :bs


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The call comes by 11.30pm : " I'm an hour away from the servo, see you for the bike-swap there".
Alexa and her dad have run the 500km and tedious border-crossing in record time!! :lao:lao
Andrew and I rug up for a return-ride down those pitch-dark twisties at near freezing temps...and by 1.30am the blanket is tucked in for a few hours sleep.

The new day sees us back on the road again...with a "HUGE THANK YOU" to all who helped to kick things along.



Hotel Luch, Panichishte (Bulgaria) https://goo.gl/uA8sEJ


:clap::clap::clap:
 

glitch

Mapping the next ride...
Staff member
A few Johnny-come-latelies for the Hotel Luch...



Skilift Russian style...looks like a raid on the spares-bin of the Kamaz truck factory


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Industrially-sized BBQ...fit for a pig on a spit.


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Cozy biker-accom :killingme


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