Across Europe - Part 1

Saturday, 19^th of May. Getting ready to depart into another quest for the horizon, a metaphysical journey from the west to the east. The bike’s odometer shows 79912 miles. Google maps says about 2000 miles to destination and about the same for the way back. We’ll see. 

I still have some things to take care of around the house before departure and my trip partner Andrea keeps me company. But hours pass and I’m still not ready, departure hour, 2am as usual, closes in without me getting some sleep. I finish around 11pm, try to fall asleep and can’t. It finally happens around midnight, wake up a 1am. I think Andrea slept even less. Tired but aching to go I grab some coffee and finalize packing. 2am comes in and we’re mounting the bike, fire up the engine and depart. England is cold and wet, too cold for comfort. As we make our way past Oxford the coldness gets in our bones, hands and feet go numb. I can feel Andrea dosing off behind me and try to hold her tight. Miles go by, it’s dark, noone else on the road. I thought this was a good thing until I see a rabbit in the middle of the road and I’m doing 80mph, with an almost asleep passenger and a heavy bike. I manage to swerve around the rabbit, but 2 minutes later there’s a badger in the line of my front wheel. This time I swerve harder, scared shitless. Hitting the rabbit would’ve pulverize the poor thing, but if we were to hit the badger, we would’ve been the ones pulverized. I try to calm myself down, open the helmet completely for a better vision and light a cigarette. I can feel Andrea being really alert, wonder if she saw the badger. As we approach the Beaconsfield Services she signals me to stop. I park the bike up at the services, she gets off and storms inside without saying a word. I light up a cigarette and wait. One cigarette turns into 3 and she’s still not out. I have time to think things through and realize she’s probably annoyed, expecting her to want to go back. I finally go in after her expecting the worst. She is pissed off, she is cold, she is tired, she’s not wearing proper bike boots, but trainers, and her feet are cold and wet. I was too tired to realize this upon departure, and start getting angry myself. She wants to know what happened back there. Did I fall asleep or something? I explain about the animals and she begins to calm down. We grab a few more cigarettes, some hot coffee and we’re off, both wanting to be out of England as soon as possible.

Finally morning kicks in and Dover approaches. By the time the sun is rising we’re on the ferry, bike strapped and with some sandwiches in our hands. She manages to fall asleep on one of the couches, I have a Red Bull and some vodka and try to rest my eyes.

We jump off in Calais, just as tired but not as cold. It’s a sunny day, blue skies. Soon I’m desperately looking for a petrol station, both for petrol and cigarettes. I decide to leave the motorway to look for one, though I’m aware it’s Sunday morning. What the GPS said 4 miles to station turns into 15 on narrow country lanes. The one I chose on the GPS is closed. At this point I use my rusty French language skills for the first time after almost a year since I’ve been in France, and the lady I was talking to starts making fun of me. All in all she directs me to the nearest petrol station. We fuel up but no cigarettes to be found. After spending another half an hour around the village looking for cigarettes, not even knowing where to look for them, I give up and head back to the motorway. 

Soon after getting back a petrol station comes into view. I could’ve stayed on the first time. It doesn’t matter, it felt good to be in the open countryside, woke me up a little. We stop to buy cigarettes and coffee, enjoy the free WiFi for a bit. My French is quickly getting better and I start thinking about breakfast. 

But miles fly by and I decide against breakfast at a petrol station. An hour and something later we enter Paris. Even with loads of cars in traffic, it’s fluid. It takes us less than 20 minutes to get to Notre Damme. I park the bike up in a not so legal spot in front of a café and take a seat. I don’t want to leave the BMW unprotected. We eat and I tell Andrea to go around without me.

After 2 hours in Paris we’re back on our way east, heading for Geneva, planning to see my friend Izabelle for a coffee when we get there. But plans are one, reality another. Even though the day is perfect, the skies are blue, the road is good, tiredness finally starts to kick in… hard. Around 7pm France time we stop at a petrol station and decide to call Izabelle to tell her we’re not gonna make it. We’re still a good 300 km away from Geneva, the hour is getting late and she has to work in the morning. Luckily, she has a doctors appointment at midday and she’s free after. We agree to leave it for the second day, and me and Andrea head for an Ibis Hotel nearby. 70 euros for a double room. Sounds good, the room looks really good. We settle in and go in the garden to grab some beers. Everything feels great. Tired but happy, with the smell of French countryside in the air. As I always say, in England even the grass is fake, here it smells good, fresh, natural. Flowers, bees, birds flying about, tranquility. 2 beers later we call it a night and head in for some well deserved sleep.

Overslept a bit we wake up at noon, jump on the bike, and head south-east, speeding a bit. A camera flashes, but I don’t care. Best case scenario they have a picture with me grinning at 90mph. As we close in on the Alps the landscape becomes even more beautiful. I signal Andrea to keep taking pictures and it’s worth it. 30 feet waterfalls, high snowy peaks, it’s beautiful.

Finally Geneva comes into view and we pass the border with no issues. The road system in Geneva seems crazy to me. I just can’t find a sense to it but struggle to go through it untouched. We meet Izabelle and the 3 hours break is more than welcome. We chat away drinking coffee and eating some Indian fast food, and manage to call Chucky in Brescia, Italy, to let him know we’ll be there tonight. 

Departure, out of Geneva, into Mont Blanc. If I thought the mountains earlier were beautiful, the Mont Blanc is amazing. The crossing into Italy was through a long tunnel beneath the Mont Blanc. 

I love caves and the such, but in this case I was really wondering when the hell is it gonna finish. Out into Italy the air turned cold, high up in the mountains. At some point I decided to screw the speed limit and just go for it. The road was exceptionally good, it even affected the fuel consumption, in a good way. 2 hours later we stopped for coffee and cigarettes and thought I could go like this forever, the road is too good. I call Chuck again and confirm we’ll get there by midnight.

Back in the saddle, the perfect road turns into good road. Soon we get through a patch of rain, just to remind us that perfect is boring. A bit more rain, a road closure and a 15km detour behind some lorries later we’re one hour away from Brescia. We leave the motorway for some 30 km of country roads and finally, at quarter past midnight we get to Chuck who was kind enough to wait for us with a warm bed and cold beer. Cheers to you Chuck!

Reveille at 7, departure at 8, 2 bikes leaving the garage at the same time. One going to work, the other towards Croatia.

Just over 400 km to go, past Verona and Venice, into Trieste, across the border into Croatia. At this border someone finally stops us and asks for ID’s. 2 minutes check and we’re into a beautiful country that Andrea rightly compared to the south of France. Good interesting roads trough mountains and valleys, a river at our side and eagles dotting the sky. Weather was still good, which made it even better. Final destination, Motovun, a citadel village on a hill top. Reminded me a lot of Rennes le Chateau. I was happy to finally hit a longer stay destination. We first stopped at the local café, met some of Andrea’s friends, had a few shots.

I spent almost 3 days in Motovun, and it was worth it, can’t wait to go back to pick Andrea up for the return trip.

On the 3^rd night, after a few hours of sleep, I set to the road again in the middle of the night. Still sleepy, after just over half an hour I hit some roadworks that I didn’t notice. First, a half of meter drop from the paved road onto dirt taken at 30 mph. I literally flew. Landed safely, but before I realize what’s going on I find myself into a 20 meter long gravel field. 30 cm deep gravel field. I get scared and hit the brakes. As soon as I realize the mistake the bike got slow enough for the front wheel to lose it’s way and turn completely to the left, with me thrown out of the seat. For a short guy like me, lifting a 300 kg bike, plus luggage, after not enough sleep and with feet on uncertain grounds was a nightmare. I kept lifting it a few inches at a time, then rest it on my knee. Few more inches, rest again. It took me almost 5 minutes to get it to vertical, and by that time I was dead exhausted. Luckily a car came by, stopped, and using some extremely rusty Italian I asked for help pushing the bike out of the gravel field. Even in 2 people that wasn’t easy. Police came soon after, asked me if I’m ok, if I need medical assistance, if I need anything at all, and then left. The next 3 kilometers were slightly better. Still a full off-roading experience, not the best thing for my combination of rider and bike, but at least no more gravel. It took me another 50 km to get the “scared of falling” and “unsure of what damage” out of my system. I finally stopped at a petrol station and did a checkup on the bike. Main damage: top case mountings. One came off on the left hand side, the one on the right broken in half. Bad but rideable. Also checked and topped up the oil. 
The rest of the night was the continuous ride through Croatia towards Hungary, and by 10 o'clock in the morning I've reached the Hungarian border. Soon after, on account that the bike felt really strange, wobbly, I had to stop on the hard shoulder for a quick check. The topcase mounting was really loose, which moved the left hand sidecase really close to the exhaust. Result: the strap I had around the sidecase was melted, and a bit of the sidecase surface. I had to think fast for a way to solve the issue, and improvised some rope and knots to secure everything back into place.
Back on the road I continued the trip towards Budapest. A bit before reaching the Capital I stopped in a petrol station for breakfast and to make some calls. One to Andrea to tell her where I was, and one to my folks back home for an approximate time of arrival.
As usual, the Budapest bypass was filled with road works, lorries and slow riding speeds, but soon after I got out of there I started getting bored. That side of Hungary is nothing but a vast countryside. Nothing to see, no bends in the road. I couldn't wait to reach Romania.
Around 4-5 in the afternoon I passed the Romanian border with no issues. Soon after I met some fellow riders that joined me for a good half an hour for the pure pleasure of it, then saluted and went back to Arad. The road itself was awful. One lane road, lots of villages, lots of lorries, potholes and deformed asphalt. At some point I hit a pothole so hard I thought I bent the rim. Luckily it wasn't the case. About and hour or two into Romania I was pulled over by the police for speeding, lots of explaining to do on my lack of paperwork for the bike: "But sir, in England everything is computerized, the V5 has a big mark on it saying "This document is not proof of ownership!" and the insurance documents were sent to me via email." Not very convinced, they were. Eventually they let me go with a minor fine for speeding and a warning on the lack of documents. 
Trip kept going at a slow, annoying pace, retarded drivers, especially the lorry ones, but soon got into the mountains and it was good. Night crept in, and with it came lots of insects. Had to stop to get some tissues in one of my jacket's pockets, so I can wipe my visor every 5 minutes. Past Sibiu, into Fagaras, stopped again to call my folks. 1 hour more, a slow one. Tired, not in the mood for much, pitch black. I was going at 10-15 kmph under the speed limit. My eyes were already quite tired, and wasn't seeing very well in the darkness. So I took it slow for the last 50 km of the trip. 
Finally, Brasov. Oh, how I missed you. I received the best greeting possible: pulled over again by the police. "License and registration... and the bike's paperwork!" "Have a nice middle finger, how's that for paperwork!" They let me go soon enough and 10 minutes later I arrived safely home, tired but happy to be there after almost 1300km in one go.
Date of arrival: late evening on the 24th of May.
Final bike odometer: 82058. 
Trip mileage: 2146 miles / 3454 km.