`Avoiding Europe` enters final stages

[Percy]

Hi all

About a month left on the road for me this year - I`m hoping to get back through Austria, Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium and The Netherlands by the end of October. I`ll be in Bratislava in the next two days.

Since I last posted, from Greece, I`ve come through Turkey, Bulgaria, Serbia, Romania and Hungary. I entered Slovakia yesterday but have actually come back to Hungary today, partly just because I can and partly because the route looks nicer, along the Danube.

My surprise recommendation from the last month or so is that Romania is a great place to tour - traffic isn`t too bad, especially if you stick to the little roads (although you do lose some surface quality then), the countryside is amazing, the way of life is just a million miles from a lot of the rest of Europe and the towns are really nice, very neat and well kept, decent food, good hotels, nice beer etc etc. Hungary is ok too, even neater, if you don`t mind ignoring No Cycling signs on a lot of the roads. I got into and out of Budapest without any problems at all.

Usual blogations and stuff here:

www.avoidingeurope.blogspot.com

Map here:

www.avoidingeurope.com

Cheers

Percy

 

[Cathryn]

It sounds brilliant!!! Hope you've got some warm clothing though as it's a bit nippy here now.

 

[rich p]

I fancy Romania having done a bit of touring in Poland, Slovakia and Hungary. What are the campsites like or are the hotels very cheap?

 

[friedel]

Wow, you win the award for the first person to say something positive about Romania! We kind of fancied going there but heard so many bad stories we have decided to stay well clear. Well, we are far off that track now anyway but even so.... even Romanians we met told us to stay away. Nice to know it isnt always bad.

 

[Percy]

I heard nothing but bad things too, Friedel, before I got there, so I was a bit nervous, but I still wanted to see for myself. "It`s full of thieves, watch your back!" all that sort of nonsense. I was there for five days in all and never felt threatened or anything.

Rich - I didn`t camp and didn`t see any campsites, I don`t think. Hotels etc are reasonable, but perhaps not as cheap as you might imagine. Not like Slovakia or Bulgaria, outside Sofia. More like Hungary prices - 30-50 euros a night. All that I stayed in were decent quality though, not like the sh!t holes I encountered in Bulgaria and Serbia!