See here for Part 1 (Days 0 to 7)
See here for Part 2 (Days 8 to 14)
See here for Part 3 (Days 15 to 21)
Saturday 22 October 1977 (Day 22)
Start: Kartal
Finish: Kartal
Mileage: 0
Cumulative Mileage: 3681
Weather: Fine
Visited the Fortress (Rumeli Hisari Fort).
Rumeli Hisary Fort (dating from 1451/2)
Tayfun on the lower citadel of Rumeli Hisari Fort
Rumeli Hisari Fort - Southern Citadel
View from Southern Citadel
View of Lower and Upper Citadels
Lots of rich food. [A constant bombardment of sweet pastries etc whilst in Istanbul.]
The Egyptian Embassy - it used to be a palace
Istanbul street, and another mosque
Went to see a film - Suspiria - in English with Turkish sub-titles. Shame the sound was turned down!
Above and below: The Blue Mosque at sunset
Sultan Ahmet pudding shop was visited.
Above and below: Istanbul at dusk
Sunday 23 October 1977 (Day 23)
Start: Kartal
Finish: Kartal
Mileage: 70
Cumulative Mileage: 3751
Weather: Fine
Went to Surije for the day with Tayfun's family. Lots of traffic. Very slow. Continuous jam verging on gridlock. Signs ignored. Visited casino to watch singers and belly dancer. Sunday family outing.
The Casino, and a Turkish Classical Singer
Nice fish meal. Then we went to a beauty spot in the dark.
Tayfun and family
Monday 24 October 1977 (Day 24)
Start: Kartal
Finish: In car, 50 miles over Yugoslavian border before Nis
Mileage: 527
Cumulative Mileage: 4278
Weather: Another beautiful day
Up at 7am, pack up and leave Tayfun at 9:30.
Top up with fuel and extricate myself from the traffic jam that is Istanbul, by 10:30. Go through Tekirdag at 12:30 after 109 miles. Give a lift to Mike and Jim.
.
The road out of Turkey, near Kesan
Use many coupons to keep topped up with fuel, and also use a plastic container for fuel.
Reach the Yugoslavian border [probably via Thessalonika and Skopje] at 11:30pm after 471 miles. Border officials try to remove my back seats, looking for drugs. They fail. Stop at 1am after 527 miles for the day.
A good run - pity I feel tired. [I remember the pleasure of reverting to my stock of baked beans tins, which were most welcome after all the rich food of the previous week.]
Tuesday 25 October 1977 (Day 25)
Start: In car, 50 miles over Yugoslavian border before Nis
Finish: In car near Maribor just before Austrian border
Mileage: 622
Cumulative Mileage: 4900
Weather: Foggy, then fine, then overcast, then very foggy
7am start. Lots of lorries. Mist at 8am. Stop for breakfast 9 - 9:30.
Fog in Yugoslavia, near Titov Veles
Reach Nis at 11am, but it's really 10am as the clocks go back. 500Dr changed for 220Din, and £10 changed for 318Din. Nis is a nice place - pleasant cobbled streets and not too busy. 160 miles from start of day.
Overcast as I skirt Belgrade airport around 2:15. Encounter a fleet of portable houses down a side road.
In traffic jam for 2 hours, then all vehicles disappear after I'm stopped at a level crossing. Very foggy. Somewhere near Maribor I stop for the night, at midnight.
Wednesday 26 October 1977 (Day 26)
Start: In car near Maribor just before Austrian border
Finish: Salzburg
Mileage: 260
Cumulative Mileage: 5160
Weather: Foggy start, then sunny before clouding over
Foggy 6am start from Dravinje. Maribor is a nice place, but a bus crash is a bad sign. After buying fuel I only have 10Din left. 7:30 - cross border after 39 miles, in Setinje.
8:30 to 9am - breakfast near Graz. Decided to use autobahn to Salzburg.
View in the Salzkammergut, approaching Bad Ischl
View in the Salzkammergut, towards Salzburg
Austria bright compared with grey and foggy Yugoslavia.
The Gap to Salzburg
Caught speeding in a big group of cars all going the same speed, all stopped. On the spot fine paid for with my remaining cash - Turkish lire that are without value anyway.
Reach Salzburg 1:45 after a good run. Sunny, beautiful colours.
It's a Bank Holiday in Austria. Banks are shut and I have no money. Lots of English and US. Even Russians are here. Go to the chess board in a main square and persuade a lad to lend me the cost of a night in the hostel and go to a bank tomorrow, but eventually decide to drive to the outskirts and sleep in the car again.
Salzburg - Hohensalzburg (C11, 400ft) from Residenzplatz
Salzburg - street scene, Hofstallgasse, with a church
Salzburg - Horse Trough with Frescoes,1700
Salzburg - The Residence (1595)
Salzburg - The Cathedral (1614 - 55)
Thursday 27 October 1977 (Day 27)
Start: Salzburg
Finish: Hostel in Meiringen
Mileage: 343
Cumulative Mileage: 5503
Weather: Beautiful sunny day, rain after dark
Gave a lift to an American - Reed. Fun driving over the mountain passes, but dark after Chur.
[That's the extent of today's notes. It appears from the photos that we went: Salzburg > Lofer > Innsbruck > Fluela Pas > Meiringen]
Hohensalzburg, from the south west
Salzburg - view west from below the castle
Lofer - general view with houses
Lofer - general view with mountains
Innsbruck - Maria Theresienstrasse
The Arlberg - near Landeck
Switzerland - the Fluela Pass
Good hostel in Meiringen.
Friday 28 October 1977 (Day 28)
Start: Hostel in Meiringen
Finish: Beyond Provins (in the car)
Mileage: 364
Cumulative Mileage: 5867
Weather: Wet but not raining
Spanish omelette for breakfast in Interlaken.
Interlaken at breakfast time
Fuel in France no hassle - get 160Fr for £20.
In France - near Pontarlier
Dropped Reed off at Dijon - a nice guy, I missed him. Gave him Fr20.
Stopped soon after Provins after 364 miles on good roads - the N71 and N19.
Beside the River Seine near Chatillon
Got a mediocre meal in Provins for Fr19. Have 45Fr left for tomorrow, including buying another film. [Probably didn't buy one, as there are very few more photos from the trip.]
Decide I need to leave early to get to Paris. Just a weekend left - how time flies!
Saturday 29 October 1977 (Day 29)
Start: Beyond Provins (in the car)
Finish: Lay-by near Beauvais
Mileage: 101
Cumulative Mileage: 5968
Weather: Very overcast
Good night's sleep in the car outside Provins.
Woke at 6:30, still dark. Depart for Paris 6:45. Stop for breakfast, 7:30 to 8:00. By 8:45 I've driven 40 miles and am parked near the Notre Dame.
Paris - Notre Dame, completed 1345 (towers 226ft)
Notre Dame - West Face Portals
Spend the day in Paris, just wandering around.
The Invalides - Cour D'Honneur
View from the Eiffel Tower to Ecole Militaire
Chaillot Palace from the Eiffel Tower
The Eiffel Tower, from Chaillot Palace (1051ft, 1889)
Place de la Concorde - The Obelisque
The River Seine and Gare D'Orsay, from outside the Louvre
Leave Paris at 8 pm and get to 101 miles for the day to a layby at Beauvais. A good day, I must return to Paris. [I have done, several times, but not since the start of this blog in 2007.] It's rather like London compared with the other cities on this trip.
Sunday 30 October 1977 (Day 30)
Start: Lay-by near Beauvais
Finish: Blackley, Manchester
Mileage: 412
Cumulative Mileage: 6380
Weather: Improving to become a nice day
Last day. [No photos were taken; I may have been out of film.]
Up and away by 7am. Still dark - it's staying dark until late these days. Lots of traffic. I pick up a hitch hiker who has literally just emerged from the ditch and is very smelly. He is a New Zealander returning to the UK after a holiday in mainland Europe. We debate whether to go to Calais or Boulogne for a ferry. [My notes are unclear, and pictures end in Paris. I think it was Calais, either 11am or 1:30pm.]
My hitchhiker was refused entry to England and it took a while to get him back in. It needed confirmation from a senior partner at the law firm where he was working, that he was who he said he was.
I had another hitchhiker, Chris, and we stuck with the NZ lawyer, Rich, until he was allowed in. Eventually we got through Customs (all other vehicles were long gone) and had a meal in Dover at 4pm.
I left these last two companions at 6pm and got home at 10pm. Work tomorrow.
[Back to auditing Ferranti!]
2 comments:
It would probably be difficult to repeat that trip these days.
Good to look back on those times and places.
Yes BC, good to look back, and the data was transferred from a spreadsheet to the blog, to enable easier copying and pasting into a photobook.
I think you could repeat the journey now, and it would be interesting to see the effect of the disintegration of Yugoslavia. It's not in any current plans though!
M
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