Meeting People on the Road...

[psmiffy]

Isn't it possible that in reality they can't really? It would seem extraordinary if all stays were immediately tapped into a central computer. Could they just have been checking your personal details to see if you were on some sort of watch list? Or could they just have been bluffing/fancied killing some time while making you sweat? What would the penalty have been?

I did wonder at the time if they were pulling my metaphoricals - but i have since read accounts that seem to confirm this - the computer register that is

not connected but these days in europe practically 75% of campsites bigger than a few emplacements will have your details on the computer before you have put your tent up.

 

[Brains]

Now you tell me!

On reflection I was in Croatia when I got the 'grilling' I crossed the Danube into Serbia at Ilok without fuss.

The hostel owner in Belgrade made an issue out of telling me to carry her receipt for my stay when out and about in Belgrade and I have vague memories of reading about the need to carry proof of stays/receipts when travelling in Eastern Bloc countries a couple of decades ago. At the time, any notion of travelling to anywhere other than package holiday destinations didn't figure in my holiday plans.

I'm old enough to remember when even in France you had to have a 'proof of overnight stay', this was in pre-computer days, and every hotel, B&B and Campsite owner had their "overnight stayers tickets" complete with passport numbers picked up every morning by the local postie or gendarme and taken to the local town where they were all collated. It meant that well into the mid 1970's (and possibly early 1980's) the French Government could pinpoint any roving tourist within a matter of hours.

If you read/watch 'Day of the Jackal' which is a semi-fictionalised story on an assassination attempt on Charles de Gaulle in about 1963, the French attempt to trace the assassin using the overnight stayers tickets

 

[BalkanExpress]

I am coming to this one rather late. Apart from the residual old style "we need to know where the foreigners stayed" the main reason for asking for proof of stay is to ensure that owners of accommodation are issuing receipts so that they can then pay taxes.

On another point it was great to hear Vernon's experiences down the Danube. I know some of these places well: the hospitality the amazing and some of the stories deeply depressing and mind blowingly life affirming by turn.

 

[Nigeyy]

Well first, Tim Hortons does serve exceedingly good iced coffee -had the best iced coffee I've ever had at the Tim Hortons in Niagra Falls of all places! Secondly, I've met some interesting people (not quite in a Tim Hortons though). Standouts include:

-an old guy in the Czech Republic waayyy back in the mid 90's. Couldn't have been nicer or more welcoming, left a very nice impression.
-the younger kid in the Netherlands who after giving a myriad of instructions in perfect English, then proceeded to apologize his English "wan't that good"
-young mother of 2 kids in classically New England general store in central Massachusetts who was really friendly and trusting enough to offer my friend and I accommodation (we didn't take her up on it as it was lunchtime and we were mid way through our destination).
-the great Canadians in a bar in Nova Scotia who, upon seeing us abort a tour in a horrible Spring storm (horizontal sleet, I swear!) plied us with free beer. What a night that was.

My favourite? Being in a bar in Northampton Massachusetts ("The Beer Can Museum of the World"). Sitting at the bar we found out the old guys beside us (who looked like kindly elderly grandads) were indeed skydivers. While we were talking, the bar tender whipped out a fiddle for a quick tune, and the clientele of the bar included a punk lesbian couple, a business guy in a suit, some "regular" looking folks and of course, the 3 of us as tired cycle tourists. Thank goodness for diversity!

Of course, one of the nice things is that instead of being enclosed in a metal and glass structure whizzing by you are much more accessible and approachable on a bike.