Closing this chapter..

This will be my last post in this blog, as I made it back home safe and sound and already planning the next three big events this year ;)

It was a really great trip and I was mostly blessed with good weather! I stilled my hunger for the road and quenched my thirst for adventure (at least for the moment ;)

first a few numbers:

I travelled over 7000km through 10 countries in 4 weeks (it's a small step to participate on an actually rally now ;)

Countries (in bracket are those that I was just trespassing and didn't spend a night)

Switzerland - Italy - Albania - (Greece) - Albania - Macedonia - Albania - Montenegro - Bosnia - Croatia - Slovenia - (Italy) - Austria - (Italy) - Switzerland

assuming that my bike uses 4.5lt/100km I needed 375lts of gasoline and spend about 450CHF to travel. Another 500CHF was tires and some maintaining the bike.

I spent approximately 2100CHF  in 30 days, so I that's a 70 Euro per day in average. That's totally fine, thinking of that I was scuba diving, horse back riding, ziplining, paragliding, visited lots of churches and fortresses, slept well, eat lots of yummi food, took a ferry ride and bought some souvenirs.

For I knew nothing about these countries before, I learned a big deal about them now and I feel I covered as much as possible in this very limited ammount of time! Now I'm really happy to be back and to pick up the many things I left here behind.

....

I drove to Ljubljana in one day from the bay of Split. This time I took the roads through the hills instead of following the cost (was really nice!) twice I almost got busted for speeding, but I didn't exceed the speed limit enough that they would have stopped me (fortunately, because I would not have had any money to pay the fine). But still.. didn't encounter cops on the road the whole time until then.
I stopped at the Plitvicer lakes and wanted to take some pictures. But you need to pay 15 Euro to get in and should reserve a whole day to check out the place (it's very touristy though and the 100 hotels they built in the area are probably quite pricy). So I sneaked in to get a glimps of it, but didn't dare to proceed as I had no ticket. Bummer.. I really wanted to see them, but I didn't know that you can't just circle them on a bike. Anyway.. got one or two shots and was an experience. I also wanted to get to Ljubljana to  take care of the transmission chain.
When I got there I just passed the Yamaha dealership and they helped me to find a hostel in town. It was a great idea to check in in that place! mets lot of great people and had really good times!! (went out for drinking at night and had a good laugh! ;). The next day (a bit hangovery), I took care of that chain. When I got to the garage, there was another guy on a newer Tenere and he knew a lot more than I did, so with his help, I managed to reduce the rattling sound without buying a new chain. Tightened some screws and got a lot of information about the bike and some good ideas how to improve my equipment (spares, tools.. etc).
the same day I drove to Skocjan cave, where you can walk through on a guided tour and it was really impressive! As the weather was not suitable for skydiving, this was the second best thing to do in Slovenia. Then on the way back, I caught some rain, but with no luggage and good equipment, it was not so bad. Again going out at night and having fun! ;D ..next day packing up and checking out some caves (there are 11 400 in Slovenia ;) with my new friend Sebastian from Germany (riding a very old bike, but also being traveling on his own). Together with Liz from the states, we had a great day! having lunch (some sandwiches) in pitch black inside a cave :) great experience!!
I made my way up then to Villach in Austria. Was still quite a long ride and I arrived there after 8PM (getting tired along the way, but suddenly waking up again). The night at the lake was boring as boring can be.. but as I was so tired, I didn't really care.
Then there were only 660km between me and my home and I made it all in one day.. started at 6AM and got here around 7PM.. at least being 11hours driving. I didn't get any more rain until 2 hours away from home. Then it pissed down and I had to take the highway.. that was aweful! but anyway.. managed to get here. After 100km there was a traffic jam on the highway and I had to take small roads to get back. It was a victory I had to fight for, but nevertheless I made it back and took a hot bath and fell tired in my (own) bed! Feels good to have successfully completed this trip!!
There are a lot of beautiful roads between here and Albania and I mostly enjoyed riding very much! (only having a few times some rain and me or my stuff never got wet). For the moment, it's okay though to be off the bike ;) haha ;)
All that I need to do now is sorting my stuff out and organizing my trip to Finland, the festival on the next weekend and Burning Man (and some more festivals and LARPs). I got so many plans and tasks on my list.. I will be busy the whole summer. but I LOVE it! :D

as a little sneak-peak onto coming roadtrips of mine, this is what I still got in mind:

- Chamonix - Ardeche - Pirenaes (climbing trip with my friend together)

- Bretagne - Wales, Scottland, Ireland (in June probably ;)

- Rumania and Ural (then somehow circling back)

- Trieste - shipping to Albania and drive around the Mediterran Sea and back over Gibraltar

- finally (and probaly not to realize because other plans in my life): Russia, Mongolia, Kyrgistan, Kasachstan etc. to India and China (if even possible on a bike). That would bring it up to a good ammount of Km on my bike ;)

but I already know: Yamaha Tenere is my favorite bike!! cheaper than KTM and BMW, but can be fixed everywhere and extremely reliable!! (in the end, it didn't fail me once.. and I had some moments where I would have been pretty fucked if my bike would have broken down ;)

okay.. sorting the last pictures and letting the experience settle in. Now I could use some holidays ;) haha ;)

Life is a beach ;)

ziplined - check - horseback riding - check - deep water solo climb - missed - skydiving - depends on weather the next days.
Yes.. I truly can't complain. So far, so good! :)
I passed that zipline place just when they started in the morning and had a (fun!) ride over the Tara canyon, before heading on to Zabljak and trying to find out where to mount a horse. I didn't find the tourist information (probably just closed), but ended up in a bar where I got invited a turkish coffee (happens a lot in Montenegro ;) and one of the clients organized the ride (didn't really figure out how he knew these people, but probably his brother ;). No one spoke English, but with some signs we agreed on time and price and I could pick a horse. The first one they gave me was a young (and wild tempered) stallion that just wanted to run. I really hold these reins tight.. so tight my arm was hurting after a few minutes, but I couldn't control that beast. So it started running with me across the meadow towards a steep slope (I saw myself already flying), but then I could turn it around and it ran all the way back to the barb wired corner of the fence (where again I thought this might end badly), but then it stopped and they gave me another horse (a pretty slow one ;). I probably would have had to tear more on that reins, but I was afraid it would rear up and throw me off. Next time I'll be mercyless if a horse tries to burn-out with me! :P
It was a lovely ride out and instead of going with one guide and two horses, it were 3 guides and 5 horses ;) I'll go back to this place the next time I get to Montenegro for sure! Then I'll also handle that wild stallion ;) Was again invited for some coffee and raki and listened to some local folk music (grandpa sang a song :)
It was already a couple of years ago that I was riding, but in the end I got pretty much into it again (always have to get a feeling for the trot). Compared with a bike, where every bike from the same model handles the same, there are no two same horses on this planet (they might be similar, but not exactly the same.. they all have their character). So you can't expect the horse will just be happy to have you on it's back and read all your thoughts ;) In the end I got even to ride a third horse that would also have been a good choice. Should really go riding more often! ..on the other hand, my body is still sore from these two hours (and it was only a single HP ;) I'm much better handling my 47 HP where I can sit in the saddle for 10 hours and walk away with a smile ;)
It was only three o'clock in the afternoon and I figured that I can make it to Sarajevo this very day. It turned out to be a pretty long ride.. first through the Durmitor National Park and then along the Pluzine canyon. When I crossed over to Bosnia, it was still a 100km to go and before I reached Sarajevo, I ran into heavy rain (I should have circeled around it, as there was blue sky behind me and left of me). I drove in it, turned around and drove a few hundred meters back and put my rain gear on. It took me longer than the actual rain, but without it, I would have been wet to the bones. It was a long day and I was really tired when I got to Sarajevo. After asking around, I found a nice and affordable place in the center, eat some local food and wanted only to pass out on my bed, what I successfully did. That horseback riding grinded my completely! :P
Sarajevo would probably hold more things, but it would be nicer to be there with friends. Then you can hang out in a hookah-lounge and go partying at night ;) The old town is also quite touristy, but I didn't really mind (after such a long day, it just felt good to have arrived somewhere).
The next morning I checked for deep water solo climing in Croatia and found a place called "the split" that looked very promising. So I started early (slept long enough) and made my way from Bosnia to Croatia. The boarder crossing took as usual not more than 5 minutes (it's so easy nowadays.. and no one would ever want to check my stuff). I also made close to 300km today and when I had to choice between 10km through a tunnel and 10km on the highway, I chose the highway.. unfortunately, I took the wrong turn off and rode 15km in the wrong direction, before I could turn around.. so it where 40km of highway after all :P Then finally I could make my way to the sea again. It was actually pretty lovely in the beginning, but then there were too many houses and towns along the road (can't imagine, why someone would want to build houses on the sea instead of having a gorgeous road to ride ;). So for tomorrow I will leave the sea and seek out some curvy mountain roads ;) the highlight will be the Plitvicer lakes (known from the Winnetou-movies) and tomorrow night, I will spend the night in Slovenia. If the weather changes for the better, I will even be able to skydive on this trip, but so far the conditions don't look too promising.
as for Split, it turned out to be a bigger (and very touristy) city and the place where I asked to stay on the beach was 100 Euro :( There would have been a hostel (probably fun people there), but the catch was that is was sited in the middle of the pedestrian zone. So I would have had to walk twice 800m with luggage (I start sweating after 10-12 steps when carrying my stuff :P so I left Split and abandonned my plans for bouldering. Drove on and on and finally found a place for 20 Euro. It's a lovely room, but I'm alone in this building.. at least I have time for pictures and blog. First I was at an abandonned camp site and then I asked for a cheap room and it would have been 50 Euros. So I just rephrased the question the next time and asked for a 20 Euro room ;)
was in no mood to check that town here nearby.. Trogir.. that's between the mainland and this pretty big island here. I feel that this trip is coming to an end and that I've seen and done a lot and ridden bike even more. So the only thing left is getting back home in one piece and eventually to get a new transmission chain along the way. If skydiving isn't happening, then I could even be back by Thursday (seems a day early to me, but why not.. probably figure out what to do with my time and if it's only lying in my own bed and chilling out! ;D haha.. oh yes, I'd like that! 

Tales of mead and meat

another two days passed and a lot of things happened.. really amazing, how intense life can be! (lot better than being stuck in this everyday life where days fly by and you don't know what you accomplished). So I got up really early and figured a way to get to the prison island "Mamula". In the beginning, I wasn't sure if you can walk around on the island and where and how I should charter a boat, but then it all worked out. Found the port (after lots of asking and driving around), a suitable parking spot for the bike, had breakfast at the peer (these people don't have prober breakfasts.. horrible.. just coffee-bars, where they have coffee and a probably some Raki). Got supplies for the day and found a guy who has a boat and does the trip. It's smaller than I pictured it, but it has some great rooms that are just perfect for playing didgeridoo ;) It's not exactly like Alcatraz, but nevertheless I will camp out a night on it when I get back to Montenegro! :) After that we wen't to the "blue grotto" where some of us jumped off the boat to take a swim (me too). There was a boat packed with Polish girls (I'm sure the boat was not made for that many passengers) and they dropped a cellphone into the sea. I was about to dive it up as our captain steered his boat out of the grotto and left me behind :P ..told me that he's doing this job for 35 years, but after that I wondered how many customers he left there ;) maybe he should do a headcount (we were 9 ppl on that boat :P  anyway, the Polish girls would have saved me, but then he turned around (still didn't pay by then). ..maybe he should have left me with the Polish girls ;)
the rest was being on a rocky beach where I did some practice with sticks and balls to be ready for the performing act at the parties in Switzerland. Looking forward to that! :D (and feels graet to be a "famous" performer  in the scene ;). I made some Serbian-Montenegrino friends and we had fun drinking together ;) ..oh.. btw: I figured out that Montenegro is NOT part of the EU :P (they just use the Euro.. guess never stop learning ;)
Serviced my bike on the way back (oil change, chain tension, air pressure.. the usual stuff) and was excercising when I got back to the campsite. Had dinner with a guy from Portugal that is also traveling on a bike on his own. Quickly gave up speaking Portuguese, as I was too tired and lacked practice lately. But still understood each other pretty well :)
This morning I packed up very early and took the ferry to the other side of the bay (as I was already driving around it and didn't find it sooo spectacular, taking the ferry at the most narrow part was a good alternative. In Kotor and needed to ask around a bit until I could leave my bike and stuff with the fruit sellers on the market. I crossed the old town (pretty big for an old town, but stuffed with touristy shops) and climbed up to the fortress. There are a lot of steps, but for someone in good shape (like me ;) it didn't take that long. Was nice to see the light of the rising sun covering the bay and took some nice pictures on top. Then someone told me about a trail going back down to town that starts behind the fortress. I found it and descended this way, what entirely saved me the admission fee ;) (when I was going up, there was no one collecting money downstairs). I drove back up the serpentines and this time the view was better (less hazy). Continued to Cetine. Stopped along the way for coffee and a sandwich with home made cheese and ham (delicious!) and bought a bottle of mead and some dried meat. Drove on to the Podgorica (the capital.. felt as I never heard this name before), where I tried to get a new chain for my bike, as the one on it might be still the first one (then it would have 36 000 km.. :/ but I couldn't get one at the shop. So the actual chain will have to do it still a bit longer. Will also check in Sarajevo.. hope can find one along the way! From Podgorica the old road to Matesevo and Kolasin.. felt like a thousand curves to get there ;) got a bit tired along the way and stopped at a place where people were drinking beer and Raki. Got invited for a strong turkish coffee (that was so thick that I could chew on it ;) and felt energized again! Would have filled my water too, but where the water was dripping out of a stone, they had a leave that served as funnel and somehow little black larves got into my camel pac. Probably would just have been proteines and digestable, but I didn't feel like trying it out ;)
As it looked like a nice road through the natural park Biagradska Gora and was not too late, I decided to make a little detour. But the map (as usual) turned out to be wrong. So I ended up on a dirttrail to some abandoned Eco camps. Met a local guy in a shut down ski resort that told me it's possible to drive to that lake in the park. When I made it further uphill, the road was covered by a snow patch. The last time I encountered such an obstacle, I took the stupid decision to ride directly at it (was a deep river and drowned my bike then). This time it would have slided down and I could have kissed it good bye :P Instead of listening to the signs and to turn around, I continued a bit further up and found tracks from a car that went straight across along the slope above the snowy patch. So after checking the ground, I did the same and it just worked out fine (never underestimate a Yamaha Tenere! ;) the guy told me approx. 30km to the lake and it was another leap of faith, as I didn't really know how this will end and if other people do this track (at least not on a bike). But then universe helped me by sending some trackers along my way and they told me that the road will be OK. In the end it were only 20km and half a dozen people was walking on that trail (would just have sucked to get the bike out if something would have failed.. like the chain or a flat tire or driving off the slope). But yes.. nothing happened and it was a nice ride (even when mostly observing the road ahead of me and being aware that a break down would be shitty out here). Then I made it to the lake and decided not to camp there but drive on (having another boost of energy after I made it that far ;) and found now a room for 15 Euro, where I can catch up with blog and pics and feasted on mead and meat. Tomorrow it's just a stone throw to the place where you can zipline over tara-canyon (or at least so I heard) and then do some horseback riding. I'll figure it all out tomorrow.. right now nothing else to do than having a shower, watching TV and getting drunk ;)

Done it all! :D

..So after I hopped on my bike in Macedonia, I was riding for 2 hours in cold and rainy conditions (was just too early and still clouded and few raindrops). But at least I made some kilometers and brought me close to the boarder of Albania. I found some small road on the map (and GPS) that would bring me back to Debar, so I was about to take it (it looked interesting and scenic ;). I asked some mining people along the way and they told me, it's gonna be rough. And it was! Another leap of faith to make it up the mountain on a road that looked as it hasn't been used at all! It wasn't so scenic after all, but led through a forest (on top of a mountain) and it got muddy and again I needed to put all my skills to use to keep the rubber side down. Well.. finally I made it over the top and the other side was smoother than expected (there were some houses and I felt "safe" again). From there it was just a stone throw to the boarder of Macedonia. I crossed and took the road towards North that looked the most interesting. I started really early that day, so I was feeling tired when I was getting to Kukes but I still continued. Then later on I spotted a parked Honda Transalp p in the corner of my eye and stopped and turned around. So I met Tom from Germany, who's also traveling on this own and down here for the second time. It was so refreshing to meet another foreigner (even a biker!) and he totally made my day(s). He started in Valbone this morning and told em about a ferry and the Teth-Loop (a place I thought, is a dead end). So pushed by all this good energy, I continued and made about 380 km this day (even got to Valbone and stayed in the place he stayed the night before). Got some good pictures of the bike out in nowhere and finally went to bed early.  The plan was getting up at 4 AM and going to Fierze to take a special ferry (a Bus mounted on a boat.. truly the most adventurous Ferry I ever took). So all worked out. I was there in time, the people pushed my bike on that boat (I stopped breathing for a moment!) and then driving peacefully 3 hours down on the dam lake to save some road.. but above all: to have an awesome ferry ride! I met a local guy.. talked about this and that and got off the boat before I knew it. From there it was another 80km to Shkoder, where I unloaded my bike at a campsite Tom recommended me. With a light bike, I headed for the Teth-loop. Really interesting, but extremely challenging and I was a bit late to start it, but wanted to do it all! It was a smart move to drive it counter-clockwise and go for the hardest part first (that took me 5 hours!!). I really was in need for a massage, but after 75km (5 hours of riding!) of extremely bumpy road, I got my massage a ten-fold :P So I had a really intense day of riding.. 280km and quite  a lot of them off-road (really off-road!). If you intend to do it, then let me give you the following recommendations:
1. be an experienced driver (I'd like to call myself as one)
2. don't take a BMW 1200 GS (or any other bike that weights 300kg)
3. DON'T attempt if it's raining or recently rained!
4. unload your bike (I made many dirt roads with luggage, but I was soooo happy to be empty on this one!)
5. don't bring your girlfriend or any other passenger along.
6. get enough fuel (and enough water for you)
7. make it your daytrip and start early (not like me at noon :P
8. be sure to have good tires and the bike is working fine (as mine ;)
9. don't check your odometer, as it will seem to not working properly (it takes soooo long to make a single kilometer on that road)
it just took FOREVER to get to Teth, but it's actually a bad-ass ride and some crazy tourists that got here with their tuned 4WD were also doing it. When I felt lost after 1 hour of not seeing any sign of civilization (only doing 15km.. that would take at least 3-4 hours to walk back), I came across a Minivan that told me that I can do it :) Now I'm completely and super done with Albania. Will head to Montenegro tomorrow (after fixing my number plate that fell off during that ride ;) and I'm trying to organize some skydiving, even if it has been 5 years since my last jump (these skydivers are so picky about their trade, even if it's so fucking easy to jump off a plane! :P ..they should try to paraglide.. that is by faaaar more complicated and needs much more experience than skydiving!
So yes.. camping on the lake next to Skodher and getting ready to continue to the next country.
just one day passed, but I feel like writing it all down right away (even if I'm soooo tired and it's only half past eight). Crossing the boarder this morning was very easy.. it's a combined boarder crossing and I didn't even realize that I entered Montenegro already :P Food here is good, but it's much more expensive than Albania (especially lodging). For a moment I got this feeling of being tired of traveling and that I'd like to be home to process all the impressions that I got in the last weeks. I also didn't have a plan for this country and if you don't have a purpose, things mostly don't get as epic as they can be. But then by following the roads that were marked as "especially scenic" on the map, I got my spirit back! :) ..at a certain point, the road was completely gone, except for maybe 20% where some cows were walking past. One more time I was so happy to ride a bike and not to sit in a car. I hold my breath and was driving through the narrow passage, without looking down. There are apparently only 600 000 people living in this country (how is this possible to maintain a working economy?) and a lot of this are just falling apart.. roads, houses.. lot of things lies just in ruins and gives this country a special touch (as I like ruins ;). People are though not so helpful as in Albania, but I feel a bit more home, as they are part of the EU (even if Switzerland is not ;). Just seems more civilized, but also much more touristy! (first I really was shocked.. like riding from Bolivia to Chile). In the meantime I figured out a few things to do and won't be bored here.. tomorrow (let's hope this works out), I want to go on a boatride to an abandoned prison on an island. I've fallen in love with it, since I saw the picture and now just figured out that it's here in Kotor bay. Yes, I made it through a national park to Kotor (where I'm camping out and still paying quite some money for it). On the way to here, I took small roads (really small.. like < 2m wide) and had to be careful driving (expecting a car behind every curve). Then I also passed this Mausoleum here.. didn't go in (golden ceiling and a monument but paying extra for it), but climbed just on top of that hill where it is and the views are breath-taking!! too bad the whole day today was somehow hazy and therefore I didn't get clear shots with my cam (contrast is really bad with this conditions). Right now I'm sitting in a restaurant on Kotor bay and I'm observing a bad ass thunderstorm on the other side of the bay (with huge lightnings :D I figured out where to do a little service for my bike (well.. mainly changing oil and checking tire pressure and chain tension). I'll do that myself, but I'll need some tools to do it.. so all prepared to do the task tomorrow. In Kotor itself is a fortress on a taaaaaall rock that I want to climb, before heading on to Tara canyon (rafting? or at least do the rope-thing across the canyon). Then further up to Durmitor national park and see if I can do little (horseback)riding, before going to Sarajevo. Won't have much time in Croatia and still the skydiving is on my list. Probably do some intense days of riding and in worst case, I sacrifice my buffer days in Switzerland.. it's good to have many plans and ideas. This is was is thriving me for great things.. FULL POWER! :D
Here are a lot of people with RVs (so older generation), but they're actually pretty nice (even if I would have hoped for younger generation). Still had some good conversations and it's nice to share good vibes (as finally, we're all one big family on this planet!)
That's probably it.. will just go to bed right away and then get up (as usually) at 6 AM or before that.

Up, up in the air :)

Still having a full iterinary here, what I really like! ..it was a tiresome day to drive to Skopje (maybe connected with that drunken phase I had the night before). Was driving along some dam lakes only stopping for food and for gas. Then I arrived in Skopje and it really tore me down. It's an ugly city with a depressing vibe that got hold of me from the beginning. I wonder why any tourist would ever go there, except because you flew into this place. Best thing was taking pictures of the statues in the center and imaginaging what characters these would represent in a first person shooter and what special abilities they would have. Oh yes.. and I got some furs for not too much money and sent them home (as I'm not sure if they are all really legal.. they should. it's at least no wolf amongst them). Could have bought all kind of pelts (from house cat to Macedonian wolf), but first of all, I don't support poaching and second of all, they still were kinda pricy. Might also be, I was getting ripped off in this town. The center is full with shops that sell juwellery, souvenirs and shit and as mentioned befor: I didn't like the vibes at all!! Skopje is expensive (I paid more for my room and got much less) and people are even more struggling for survival and you can feel that. After the peaceful ambience of Ohrid, this was really shocking.
So I changed my plans immediately of staying two nights and left the next morning as early as possible to Prilep, where I just made contact with a local paragliding instructor who told me, that he has some equipment to rent. With the prospect of flying, I speeded thing up and drove down the highway to meet him as soon as possible. We spent part of the day doing some ground handling on a hill that pops out in the flats that are surrounded by some mountains. The rest of the time I tagged along with him, met his family and had really tasty food! In the evening we were going out and it was a lot of fun!! :D There was even some electronic music and lots of drinking and very pretty Macedonian girls that of course all like to talk to you, once they figure out, that you're from Switzerland ;) (it's pretty easy to let them know by just saying "hello, how are you" in not-Macedonian ;) haha ;)
Today we spent the whole day back on that fly site and I did more groundhandling and practiced some take-offs and landings. Didn't really have long flights (couple of times a minute of soaring or so), but could re-activate all my paragliding skills and hunger for more now!! :D I actually think of post-poning my plans for Burning Man for a year. First of all the uncertainty if this will work out or not is killing me and second: I have another reason more to go back to Colombia, what I definitively should do in Fall! (that would be about reason #4). So if I'm back and I haven't heard of my camp, then I'll do the Colombia-thing (would be OK though, if I'm not hooking up until then, because Colombia is way more fun if you're single ;)
So all in all the last days were stuffed with interesting activities, good food, fun, meeting new people, learning some cultural stuff (e.g. here you don't drink grappa to digest, but you have it with the salad that makes the entry of each meal ;) and way too soon, I need to get ready to move on. I still have a couple of days left of this awesome trip, but also a few thousand kilometers to ride. So if I want or not, I need to continue tomorrow and see that I can bring me and the bike a bit further North (as I was driving South all the time when this trip started). I'll still make it back in time, but as there are still plenty of places I want to visit, I'll be more relaxed, if drive the next two days at least 400km each.
So after diving and paragliding it's only horse back riding and skydiving that's amiss. I should check for horses in the Tara-Canyon and let's see if Montenegro has a skydiving club ;)

Which country is this again?

If I found before, I really arrived in the travelling mood, well it's now ;) ..I did some little off-raod to Bisthtit and crossed the boarder there. I really thought, I'm going to Macedonia, but actually it was still greece. I only figured out when I was paying a coffee and they charged me in Euro. My first thought was "what, you just changed your currency from Dinnar to Euro?!", then it came to me that I accidentally entered Greece and suddenly all made sense. The fact that they sent me the other way in Macedonia than I was actually going, the strange letters on the street signs after the boarder crossing, the European flags :P and the good roads and normal driving skills. haha ;) I didn't really think about, but I marked the boarder crossing before and I was just convinced to go direction Macedonia. Well.. was just a little detour and was nice riding anyway. Just became aware once again that I suck at geography ;)
My first impression of Macedonia was so good that I even forgot about the riots and shootings that happened here just a few weeks ago. Even if there's some tension in this country, it's not that everyone goes savage and start killing people. First they had enough of it and second they need the tourism here badly (and all these countries are fighting to get in the EU). So despite all that they went through and everything they are still facing, they sill are very nice and friendly people and it's a great experience to be here!
After I passed the burning dump site at the exit of Bitola, landscape became much nicer. In the meantime I got my own map of this country and figured out gorgeous riding through the mountains. Once I've seen the 3D-map in a travel agency here, there's nothing that can stop me now to explore all these places! I might even end up paragliding here, but that would be on Sunday and it's still a bit of a long shot, but I already talked to the people doing tandem-flights here and they would have an solo-equipment to rent me out (would be awesome to fly in Macedonia!!). On the way to Ohrid and raced up a mountain (sticking to my side of the road and honking a lot) and took it slowely down enjoying the breath-taking views on the other side over Ohrid lake. When I arrived at the lake a guy stopped me with some photos in his hand that were showing his apartments and I was convinced on the spot! He's really nice and his son a pretty sharp cookie and we drank coffee in the evening and talked out his country. I took a hot bath, played some didgeridoo and finally hosed down the bike, as it was more mud than bike after all that off-road trips I did ;)
Yesterday I went diving in the lake and it was a nice experience. Just so damn ugly cold! brrr.. I dived for the first time in a 7mm suit with hoodie and gloves and I still felt my feet going numb. There's not so much to see in this lake (somewhere would be small wrecks, but we didn't go there) and aparently there's some historical site under water (this I wanted to see, but was on the wrong dive). So I ended up seeing a billion of mussels (they cover the whole ground in certain parts) and the highlight was a tiny water snake catching a small fish. But it just lasted for 2 seconds as the snake felt disturbed by us and postponed it's lunch. So it let go of the fish and hid back under the rock it came from (I beg the fish was happy about that ;).
they're having quite a few snakes in this lake.. but didn' see any of the bigger fish (the ones I was eating the day before.. also a very yummi experience to have fresh fish from Ohrid lake). I met all kind of travelers here in town and found finally some time to practice my skills at the shore of the lake (at last I could put all my sticks and balls to use ;). But somehow got too drunk in the process and ended up going to bed early yesterday. At least I found some time this morning to do pictures and blog (woke up at 5.30) and will be ready to ride on early to enjoy this wonderful day! It was raining all night long, but now it's blue sky! ..not sure how long this will last though as the weather is changing quickly here. During the dive I was picturing how warm it will be once we emerge again, but it just started to rain heavily, then a double lighting was hitting the lake and hailstones were falling on us (7mm diving suit was pretty useful then ;). It all lasted only for a couple of minutes and when we drove back with the dinghy to the dive shop, there was sunshine and blue sky again. Quite and experience after all ;) ..okay.. I'm getting ready here and loading up. Plenty of things to do today, before I will reach Skopje to spend the weekend there (should be fun ;)

Back on Track..

as such minor setbacks could stop me ;) ..the hotel owner called his friend Eduardo, a jack of all trades that has a workshop with some tools. Finally all that was needed was a 12mm wrench and an iron tube ;) We bent the gear lever back in shape and the handle bar was even easier. I really thought of taking it apart, but having a closer look, it would have been really complicated and time consuming. I was already thinking of getting spare parts in Tirana, when the solution came to us. Instead of making a big deal of it, we just applied the same force that deformed the connecting bolt in the opposite direction. Nothing you can't fix with an iron tube ;) So it took only 10 minutes before everything was the way it used to be (except that side cover.. but as it's only cosmetical and no vital "organs" of my bike were hurt, I shouldn't be to concerned about it). I offered him 500 Leks (about 4 Euro), but he refused and said we should have a coffee together. So we went back to the hotel, drank some coffee and talked about various things (even if he just spoke greek and albanian ;). I wanted to start early because I feared that it might rain in the second half of the day again (don't trust blue sky around here ;) and it almost looked as it would, but still has not so far (I hope it still will over night, as my bike now urgently needs to be washed ;)
First stop were the hot springs just 7km off the road. Not as "it's-boiling-me-alive"-hot as the hotsprings in India on the way to Gangotri, but still much warmer than the river flowing next to them. I met a Swiss couple traveling with a old firefighter minibus and a BMW 80 strapped on the back of it (cool idea :) and continued direction Korce. Along the way coulds started forming, but it stayed dry and warm all day long until now. I'm still waiting for my Italien friends that tend to be always waaay behind me ;)
I made a little excursion after I unloaded my bike to see a monastery. Ordered some local speciality when I got to the village (Voskopoje) that was tasty but didn't look as described in the guide. When I stilled my hunger and got to the monastery that lies hidden up in the forest, the guy was just closing it. Anyway didn't look like the super cool monasteries in India.. more like some houses built around a church. In front of the gates I met another bike rider that brought his BMW 650 GS over from British Colombia and we had a good chat. I told him to do the Panamerican Highway and I'm pretty sure he will ;)
on the way down I spontaneously decided to do a little detour through the mountains here, but after 7km gnawing doubts made me turn around. First of all, I was low on gasoline.. the reserve that I would have hit on this little bail out should have been enough to bring me back, but it's just no relaxed riding if you're further away than you could walk back and not nowing when the enginge will die. Then I didn't have my GPS with me, didn't have anything to fix a puncture (small chance that it happens, but it still could after all), Would have taken longer than 7pm to get back and it might have gotten chillier and started to rain (we all know now what it does to Albanian dirt roads) and the only thing that actually was still left for this day is trying a dark Korca beer. So before I end up asking myself why I just did this stupidity, I decided to head back to town. If not alone or a bit better prepared with other circumstances, I would have done it, but if one of the named above cases would enter, I'd become tense on the bike and then stressed out and this is when bad stuff happens. The combination of two things above would probably not kill me, but leave me in a very sticky situation (like wrong turn off and puncture). So common sense took over and I don't regret, as I feel it in the bones that I've done something today. I also finally had time while waiting food was served to read the history of the last 60 years of this country. Unbelievable that these people are still so lovely after what they had to go through!
So tomorrow it will be Macedonia.. probably having fresh fish out of the Ohrid lake :)

still in one piece..

..unfortunately, it doesn't apply for the bike, but it's not as bad as it could be.. just got some scratches and a bit of plastic missing.
This day started so fantastic with one of the best breakfasts I've ever had. Definitively the best since I started this trip and for sure the best you can get in whole Albania. They didn't stop to bring things.. next to coffee and juice, there was rice cooked in milk with cinnamon, home made butter, jam and honey. Fried egg, cheese, olives, tomatoe and cucumber and a plate with fresh fruits. I was happy that I left out dinner yesterday ;)
So after filling my belly with yummi things, I ventured out towards south. Perfectly blue sky and at laest 30 degrees (I was cooking by only standing next to the bike, but once driving, it felt just perfect). It was planned to ride all the way up on top of a mountain. While being on the paved (boring) road through the valley, I decided spontaneously to drive up a dirt road as it was marked on my GPS and I felt like giving my bike what it deserves! So I rode up many kilometers and drove down on the other side, circeling the mountain and passing through villages that are definitively not used to see tourists on Enduros (always nice when children are waving ;). When I got back on top, I ran in a summer storm with tunder and lightning and while first gambling on just riding through it (first there were only few, but heavy raindrops), I finally gave way to urge of staying dry.. well.. I was already soked and I pictured my things in the back doing no better than I did). So I covered myself all up and continued the way down direction main road. Of course it just changed then to very little rain and it was pretty much in vane to put on all my gear. It was over 50km dirtroad through the mountains, before I got pavement under my wheels again. Had some beef stew at the village belown and checked out a pretty nice (and deep) canyon that runs parallel to the street. As I needed to dry up, I already got rid of all the water proof clothing, but put them back on as I saw some heavy rains ahead. As expected I ran into them, but it was nothing that could have me stopped. The idea was to take some small dirt road from Corovode to Permet, because otherwise I would have to had going back a looong way (that I partly already rode and partly absolutely wanted to avoid). So the dirtroad through a national park in the mountains sounded a lot like fun. Unfortunately turned the rain it into a big slippery mud hole. I don't even know how it happened.. it was so fast (despite I was going barely 20km/h). Probably tires filled with mud, a slight slope and my front wheel bolting (what affected slightly the throttle control). Before I had any chance to react, I dropped the bike and it was so level on the ground that I couldn't lift it up without getting everything off. As it was pouring down, I made haste and threw my bags next the trail, stemmed my back against the bike and lifted it off the ground. First thing was putting in in neutral and check if it would start again. It luckily did! then I had a glance at the bike itself and yes.. there was some minor damage done. Gear lever bent out, deep scratches on the side and two fragments of the side cover broken out. Buhuuu.. it was so so damn shiny nice and looked like new! :'( well.. not anymore :P I myself just got a very small scratch on my knee.. to small to even take a picture of and put it online (in Asia I got some bigger scratches, but even those were just fleshwounds). Yesterday we talked about if you ride a horse and it bucks you off, then you should immediately get back into the saddle and ride it again. If the horse is a 200kg motorbike and your only mean to get yourself and your equipment back to civilization, then replace the "should" with "must" and if you're not able to pick up your bike on your own, then you're screwed anyway :P
So I hopped back on and continued in first gear.. luckily I could still move the gear lever, but I tell you, I didn't take the eyes of the road for a single second and I felt pretty unsecure back again in the saddle. I was sweating big times to drive up these trails that turned into mud rivers. Soon thereafter I laid it down again, but this time it was standing still and I could pick it up without unloading it. Also no further damage was done. My handlebars are slightly tilted to the left, So this is another thing that needs to be fixed. Won't be expensive, but to find another side cover for that bike is almost impossible (or then too expensive to purchase.. I mean, the whole bike was 2000CHF, so I don't intend to put a piece of plastic for 1/10 of the price on it). Well.. shit happens! There are like a hundred things that could have gone wrong and would be rather major than a piece of broken plastic. Still.. hurts my pride and just started to have such a close relationship with my bike. Unfortunately threw away those fragments when I continued after the fall.. couldn't really think straight then, but yes.. true beauty is on the inside they say ;)
so after an hour I relaxed a bit more as the road got better.. drier and covered with gravel. Thanks god, because I wouldn't have know how to get down from that mountain. Riding up is one thing, but riding down a 300kg sled without controls is no fun thing at all! At a certain point I dared again to switch to 3rd gear and was happy that I made it out in one piece (there were plenty of slopes that would have ended this trip and probably all trips ever.
So then I finally hit the mainroad again and happy that just a few more kilometer part my from my final destination. I didn't wear my glasses, as they were covered with mud (normally I have the visor up and just wear glasses). I NEVER close my visor on paved roads.. only if raindrops are hitting my face like little needles or a truck on a dirtroad is wrapping my in a cloud of dust. But this time I felt, it might be a good idea to not catch a 80km/h fast bee with your eye, so I closed my visor. Didn't even take a minute and then a bird flies into my face!!! I made more than 80 000km on the road traveling, but I never ever got hit by a bird! I don't know what happened to it.. I assume something between a headache and a skull fracture, but I'm sure that I would have not only visited a mechanic, but checked in a hospital. Don't want to picture how this would have looked, but it banged so loudly that I'd compare it with a fist battering into your face. Phew.. close call!
Now I'm finally where I wanted to be.. sampling local wine and grappa and having a neat and clean room (still neat but not so clean anymore after I cleaned myself and my gear) in a 3-star hotel for 20 Euros (it helps when you tell them that you don't need a bill ;).
Today it's french that makes my life easier.. yesterday it was English and the day before my broken Italian. Somehow all my languages come in handy in Albania ;) After my italien friends were struggling on the last ride (that was not sooo tought after all), I wonder if they will arrive today at all. If not, I don't blame them. Would have been smarter to go the long way around, but with hindsight you're always smarter. Nothing else to do than getting drunk and watch some TV here. Enough adventures for one day! 

Seriously Bad Ass!

Just a short resumee, as I'll be off doing more fantastic things here ;) So I went over to greece to have my salad as announced. Greek salad just tastes best in Greece ;) Getting over the boarder took literally just 5 minutes and getting back was didn't take much longer, except they wanted to see a permit that allows me to drive this bike (as it's registered in the name of my Dad). The next time, I'll just say that they used my second name to register it that happens to be the same name as my Dad.. that should save me some trouble ;)
Somehow it are the same mountains in Greece, but they are covered by a lot of trees, what makes riding in Albania just much more scenic! I was glad to be back!
I stopped in Gyrokaster and checked out the fortress and all the canons it holds (I was excited like a little child, climbing on every rock, sitting behind canons imagining how loud they sound when fired (I'm pacifist!) and descending into each dark space there was. Was drinking beer and going wild with the socialist party (that was crazy!) and met other bikers that totally made my trip in Albania and back home. I got plenty of ideas what to do and it will be BAD ASS! :D I just took a pen and drew some lines across the Albanian map. Turnes out two Italian riders are doing the same, except they pointed out some more things I should do. I'll tag along with them tomorrow, after todays ride was extremely off-road and it came to my mind that having some riding buddies wouldn't be a bad idea. But the bike did fine and so did the driver! The first 20km was mainly in first gear and I got over a lot of rocks and through muddy pot holes. That was fun!! :D no way a car without 4WD could do this. In fact, the bike I'm riding is just perfect (well.. could be a little lighter, but then I couldn't carry so much stuff with me). For the first time I was happy to not have a girlfriend on the back. Really got to some limits during that ride. I'll let the pictures speak, as I couldn't describe it with words.
Just checked in a great place in Berat (Hotel Belgrad Mangaleni). You probably won't make it out here, but it's actually a really nice place and almost makes me want to stay for longer. But as there's plenty of road and adventures ahead, I'll carry on in the morrow.
In the meantime I got to try a lot of tasty food (getting in shape must be postponed to later ;) I had Tatsiki (or Xixiq) what in fact I'm eating right now. It's yoghurt with cucumbers and maybe something more that is eaten with bread as a starter. Tried Musaka (Patao, minced meat, egg plant topped with cheese crust) and tonight it's gonna be Japrag.. if I got it right, it's rice cooked with redwine served in leaves. I'm sampling all the beers of Albania and so far Tirana is my favorite (but I haven't been at Korces brewery, where they make some famous black beer). oh.. and fried mutton cheese is also extremely tasty! :D
I got a lot of stuff with me (as my didgeridoo and juggling toys) that I don't necessarily use every day, but my shaving equipment I'm not missing at all, as my beard is growing nicely. This is part of my roadtrip to let grow my beard so that it depicts the progress of my journey ;)
Okay.. I'm off to squander around in the old town of Berat. So far so good.. and just getting better! ;D

Smooth as Summer Cherries

it was long past time when they finally let us board. I was three times at the terminal and went back to town, because I couldn't stand waiting for so long. I met some interesting people though and when I was back in town, eating my last Pizza in Italy, I realized that I was nervous for that trip. Like people who are experienced actors or magicians but still have stage fever. Well.. it's probably part of the trip, otherwise I wouldn't do it, if it would just be easy. So after all the experience I got along my journeys, I'm still getting excited when I do something new for the first time :)
I made sure that I'm there ahead of time to not miss the boat, but it took them so long to unload that I was waiting another two hours next to the gate while a cold wind was blowing. Finally they had mercy and let me proceed. I passed the police control (without realizing) and the guy was yelling at me. I stopped and he had a quick look at my passport then at my back and then he told me that he was riding bike in Switzerland and named me all the great passes. Instead of checking my luggage, he showed me all the epic roads I have to do in Albania and Montenegro on his smartphone. It was just really cool! Then I got on board, someone tied up my bike and they told me that I can leave the luggage strapped on (I was happy to hear that, as I unloaded it at least 5 times this day.. just to have things in eyesight). I went up to the reception (they have a reception hall on the boat) and they gave me a room with four beds for myself. I was so incredibly tired that I just throw myself on the bed and was falling asleep on the spot). Suddenly there was a knocking in my dream and when it reapeted a couple of times, I realized that they are waking up the people. I just thought they should make another loop, so I can sleep a little longer, but then I had a coffee and met my Albanian friends from last evening again. They are just hilarious! :D ..we had really good laughs about culture and women and what happens when you don't marry them afterward ;) Yes, the people here are totally cool! I paid 20 Euros for an insurance I need, rolled off the boat and since ever then I got all the help I could ever ask for. Hospitality is sacred in this country and people are just so incredibly friendly and helpful. Wether it's English, Italian, French or just hand and feet, they put themselves really into helping you out!!! (one old man was warning me about the dogs by making some barking sounds ;). It's just 12 hours that I arrived here, but I already got some noisy plastic cover fixed, went to see really small ruins (that lies within a miliary compound), found a dead and an alive turtle, saw some snakes (unfortunately rolled one over :( eat clams (and they were SOOOO tasty --> I never had those and I really intended to never eat them, but they were fresh from the see and just very, very tasty!), went to see some more bigger ruins, got plans where to go and what to do and above all: was riding some of the most beautiful roads that I've ever seen!! Albania just TOTALLY ROCKS!!! Now I know why I decided to ride a motorbike down to Albania! I'm so happy I got my own bike down here.. it seems to me that coming to this country without a motorbike is about the same as playing football without a ball ;) The roads are not that bad (well, there are a lot of small roads that I haven't tried). Compared to the Italiens that put roadsigns but don't follow them, they Albanians don't put any signs at all (makes more sense to me than what the Italians do ;)

I heard a lot of good things about Albania, how beautiful it is and how friendly the people are, but what I'm experiencing here just tops it all! I'd wish I have more time to drive around, but I'll try my best to use it as good as I can. Tomorrow I will quickly go to Greece to eat a salad and then come back and stop in an old historical town here in Albania. So much to do and so little time! but I'll take it slowly.. especially on the road where I'm used to people driving on the right side and people driving on the left side, but the concept of driving in the middle of the road is new to me. They just turn over quickly when someone approaches, but as long there's no one else on the road, why not drive in the middle? The weather is just stunningly beautiful and no clouds on the sky whatsoever. The colors goes perfectly with the sea (that is also shaded in different blues) and wonderful beaches (for those who like beaches). Now it's time to go out and have some fun! :D ..man.. I can't believe how wonderful life can be! can it get any better? ..let's try ;) 

ready to set sail!

I'm happy this last night is over. It was.. well.. at least cheap. But I got attacked by hundreds of mosquitos and so much for lazyness to pitch a tent. Next time I will just take the 15 minutes to have a safe shelter and the satisfaction of these little fuckers staying outside and trying to get in (and hopefully die of exhaustion by the attempt) will be reward enough.. and a deep sleep without waking up. I put that mosquito-net over me, but it kept sliding off, what was a surprise by it's size of 1.5 x 2.6m :P so this night's nightmare was that I got attacked by thousands of mosquitos (and it was unfortunately not just a nightmare). I woke up at 2.20AM and was happy when I fell asleep again. Then at 5.20AM it was getting bright and was sick of fencing these buggers off, so I happily packed up and hit the road!
it was a bit overcast in the morning and chilly when I arrived on top of San'Antonio Mountain. But then I rode down and finally the sun hit me. There's not so much to see down here and while clouds were forming up on the hills to my right side, I decided to stick as close to the see and watch the endless blue flat, rippled with white waves. Today I learned two things. First.. Bar is actually not in Albania, but in Montenegro (my geographical knowledge keeps surprising me) and the ship is only departing at 10PM, so it didn't help at all to speed my way up to get to Bari. On the way there I took the superstrada and it felt extremely dangerous. Even if it says "70km/h", you need to drive at least a 100km/h to go with the rest of the traffic and still then the police overtakes you with super speed (no, they didn't have their lights on.. it was just normal driving). So when I figured this all out with the ferries, I decided to drive down a bit further to the next port. I would just have gone to Montenegro and drive down to Albania and back up, but it doesn't change a thing.. all ferries leave at night and there's only one ferry per day. So now I know. The next time this would all be smoother and I would know already the best roads, but the fun thing is to do it for the first time, so this is all part of the experience. Was a lovely ride along the beach and through small villages and towns (with a lot of one-way-signs) and I stopped in "Monopoli" to drink a Cappuccino. Luckily I didn't stop on one of the expensive fields ;) hahaha ;D I always hated this game, but I didn't know they have a town with this name down here. Along the way I saw many tourists and was happy that my journey is not being stuck in a place to visit churches, but that I just can drive and drive and see what lies ahead of me.
Here in Brindisi it was easy to get a ticket.. 47 Euro for me (with cabin) and 20 Euro for the bike. I can embark at 9PM, so I still have 6 hours to kill. I might just go for another little ride or find myself a beach and stare out to the horizon. It's so nice to have time and enjoy life! ..whenever I need a break, I sit in a restaurant and drink a cappuccino. They really know how to prepare it down here and it's super cheap as everybody drinks coffee all day long ;) Finally my hayfever dissappeared as the flora changed a lot the further I got south. Italy is really amazing.. it is so diverse and I understand people who come down here to make holiday. It just seems to be a very long way, if you drive it for the sake of being here and not for the sake of driving down. Finally I got internet and would have time to upload these blogs and some pictures, but now this crappy laptop won't connect. I'm an engineer and I can't fix it and if I learned something about technic in the last 20 years then it is that you should never trust it! ;)

Stranded somewhere in nowhere..

Phew.. today I made at least 400km.. was sitting on the bike for minimum 8 hours and I'm happy I finally arrived somewhere.. well.. somewhere in nowhere. On second thought I should have stayed in Vieste, where there is food, drinks and girls. I could now be even dancing in a Disco after having a big pizza, but no, I'm on the other side of Gargano in an abandoned camping (it will open in 4 days from now). Anyway.. it could all be worse. In the morning, it looked very promising with the weather when I started, but as I got higher in the mountains (1300 m.a.s.l.) I faced a cold wind blowing in my face and an overcast sky that blocked out the sun. I carried on several hours before I yielded and put on some warmer clothes. The drive though was still spectacular and would even be more stunning with nicer weather. Nevertheless I made it pretty far throught the national park "d'abbruzio Lazio" to Iserna (no, I didn't see any bears, even if I was looking everywhere for them). From there I took the "superstrada" (not highway) direction sea, but I soon turned off to choose the small curvy roads. It's just more fun and less traffic and whoever takes it, doesn't speed, because of all the potholes in the road ;) My bike did just fine!
Finally when I reached the sea also the clouds gave in to blue sky. I was like eating fresh fish in a restaurant at the beach but I just got some pasta in a strange place that didn't look open either. I can't tell you how much I hate beach holidays. What possibly can be fun being stuck on a sandy beach (driving a bike along it is a different story though). I was pretty tired when I got there and was happy to get something to eat, so I didn't complain. It took me also a while to find a way to the beach, so I was in no mood to look any further. From there I continued further down to the "Gargano", a route that has been highly recommended to me. After passing a few ugly looking hookers on the way, I finally got some nice views on the open sea while driving a curvy road up the mountains. On the map the name "grotta smeralda" got my attention (sounds like a old pirate hideout ;) and so I set my course for it. Passed the touristy Vieste (where I probably should have stayed) and had some more epic kilometers to drive. Well.. in the meantime I figured out that you can only access this grotto by boat and the boat starts in Vieste (I passed it over an hour ago) and only on Saturdays.. and then it would be one of the touristy things I don't do. But anyway.. as the policemen in Vieste told me that I can camp in Baia de Zagare (what isn't true either, because it fancies only a hotel), I now got stuck in something "..a flores". I was really in no mood to drive any further (will enjoy this road tomorrow) and unloaded my bike and had the beer I wished for so long. Unfortunately the restaurant here is still closed, so I'm not only saving money by camping out wildly, but also save the money to get some proper food (I gladly would pay the couple of Euros to get a decent meal). But no, now I'm feeding on some emergency nut-bars. I hope they will keep my warm during the night. For lazyness I didn't want to pitch my tent, but attached my hamock between two trees with a nice view over the ocean. Turns out it's muuuch to windy to spend a night like this, but fortunately a retired Italian guy let's me sleep on his porch. Ah.. can't wait for it to become morning when I can drive to the next village (10km away) and have a decent breakfast!! But after I had a beer and a shot of home made lemon liquor (really tasty!!), I don't want to drive another meter. So it will be a cheap night (but not so much a fun night). This "promontorie del Gargano" is really a blast for riding motorbike! It's like super duper nice and I was even thinking of doing an extra round tomorrow. But after I had a chat with this nice Italian guy that let me hang out outside of his place, I figured that I can make it to Albania tomorrow and don't need to spend a night in Bari. That's absolutely fine with me as I can use the extra day in Albania and probably will get a nice hotel there (as I'm saving now the money here). It's the second time that people are telling me that there are no mosquitos, but there are! screw you damn little bastards! ..they got me totally off guard, as I don't carry any DEET with me. Well.. maybe I just through that mosquito net over me that I got in the last minute from Ebay. It will anyway be a tough night compared to the last one in that big and comfy bed. ..hmm.. by the way: I had my last smoke 6 days ago and I don't feel any urge to have a spliff whatsoever! pretty cool! :D I'm still looking forward to roll again in Switzerland, but it's not amiss and that's a really good thing! ..I don't have any troubles falling asleep, but I woke up twice last night. Always in the the end of a 4 hour sleep phase when I get back to REM I remember my dreams so vividly, I'm just waking up. I always thought, it's a shame that I don't remember my dreams, but now I'd wish I wouldn't remember them. Twice it was kind of nightmarish, as I had a fight with a good friend and second time I got into a sticky situation that let me wake up with a wierd feeling. let's see what this night will happen.. the wind just picked up a great deal :/ I tell you what.. in my hamock, I'd be blown away by now. I will keep all my clothes on (my sweater is stinky anyway by now, but as there's just me, noone really bothers ;). Maybe the situation I'm in is not exactly what I wished for, but there are alwasy adventages to it. It somehow evens out for more expensive nights and brings my budget back on track and I'll survive anyway. And it's what is traveling is about! I always ventured out without making detailed plans and it always turned out to be a good thing. You need to leave things open in order that the quantum universe can collapse the way it's best for you. If I would have organized everything before hand, I would not just have spent a lot of time, but would have altered the whole trip in a way that seems predictable but it's not anyway. So better give way to the chaotic randomness that makes things so perfect as they are! ;)
I'm having another sip of beer, as beer supposedly has calories too and will keep me warm during the night (as I lack of female company that would to the same but in a more joyful way ;). There's something I noticed today: even the smallest interaction with people can give me so much energy! Sometime after a long ride, freezing my ass off and getting tired, my mood isn't exactly high flying. But then when I stop to ask someone for the way, even if it's only 30 seconds of interaction, it boosts me so much!! it's like I'm connecting with the diviny energy of the whole universe by one friendly person helping me out. Every time I throw myself out there and have faith in the law of attraction, it totally works out! This is an experience you can't possibly make back home, but whenever you dare and let god of the well known structures that you built around you, then universe will take care of you. Most of the people I know, don't even know what I'm talking about, but whoever tried this out knows exactly what I'm talking about. Like this guy here that asked me: "you're alone?" and invited me over. (well.. he asked in Italian and I tried my best to explain myself in the following conversation). I wanted to talk about so much more than just traveling, job and family, but there are limits to what I can express in Italian. After I had a little refreshing course last night, I realized how rusty I am with verbes and tenses. I don't even dare to get back to this stuff like: "sorebbe" as I'm more used to "serian" in Spanish and don't want to mix it up completey.. yes, it's quite different and if it happens that my girlfriend will speak Italian, I will learn it again and otherwise I must get by with whatever crappy mix of Spanish and English that I can provide :P
Weee.. I just found a peach and a yoghurt that I brought along from breakfast. So now I'm pretty confident that I will make it through the night ;) Man.. if tomorrow I arrive in Albania, I hope they have decent hotels (at least 3 stars) with WiFi for an affordable price! ;D Oh boy.. I was sleeping in abandoned houses and creepy churches for long enough. I'm probably getting too old for this type of adventures ;)
so.. it's a quarter past nine and already dark. If not for the porch light, I would be in bed by now and I'll do it anyway.. I will probably wake up at 6.30 and leave the place at 7 sharp. Going for a cappuccino or two in the next village and then maybe even doing some extra turn in the area (for it's so damn beautiful around here) and then checking in the port in Bari to find out when and how and how much. Day by day, step by step.. it's easier than you might think. And yes, compared to what I experienced along the Panamericana and in the Himalayan Mountains, this is just a walk in the park! ;D
be safe out there my friends and my best blessings to you!! it's a pleasure to know you all and it's all of you that make my life so wonderful and worthwile!

Over the Top!

I hoped for WiFi tonight, but as I'm only paying 30 Euro for a giant fairy tale bed, a hot shower and an included breakfast, I'm not complaining. I'm happy I brought this crappy laptop along, so I can write down all the awesome things that keep happening to me! :D
Where should I start? ..maybe with the Cappuccino I had in the morning while sitting down, grabbing a pen and marking the road, I plan to ride today. If there's a definition of freedom, this is it! Fuck yeah! what is greater than hopping on your bike and hitting the road?! I made it from the lake of Bolsena to Terni where I took two consequent wrong turn offs passing a garage. Thinking of it, it was more like two people talking about a car.. not even a workshop. Don't know why I stopped, but I did and asked them about tires. Terni is pretty big and I didn't want to spend half a day looking for new tires, but as it happened, they told me of a tire shop about 300 meters away. So I followed their instructions and ended at a pretty big bike shop. Despite the other guy in Corciano said that it was hard to find a 17" tire for my bike, I had plenty of choice there. So I chose some on-road-off-road Metzler tires that seemed suitable for me. The man in the shop took his bike and drove off.. soon thereafter he returned with two tires on the back. While they borrowed me a bicycle to ride to avenida Roma (300m away ;) and sent someone to accompany me. Turns out the guy lived in Neuchatel for some year, is electrical engineer (and crazy inventor) and some very good company. I would have guessed him 50 something years, but he told me that he's 67 years old. There you go.. when I reach that age, I want to look as fresh as him! :) After eating some yummi food and a good conversation I returned to the shop. They were all quite busy and no one touched my bike yet, but then Mario came back (the chief mechanic as it had the look) and he was working on my bike for about 90 minutes before everything was "pico bello". Well.. the tires I've chosen weren't exactly cheap, but let me tell you something about riding a bike: if you want to save money on brakes and tires, you might as well just jump off a cliff! If you think about.. I bought this bike for 2000 CHF and now I spent 420 Euros on a set of new tires and tubes. I really try to stay on a budget here, but there are some things where I can't make any compromises. There's a good chance I could have made it with my old tires and there's still a small chance I won't even make it with new tires, but to eradicate the percentage inbetween is priceless! In other words.. two new tires: 340 Euros. Not dropping your bike, crushing your kneecap under it or to sliding off a slope: priceless. two new re-enforced tubes: 50 Euros. Not having a flat tire in the most remote  part of Albania: priceless. The 30 Euros for the work is waaaaaay underpaid!! if you ever fixed a tube along the way, you know how how much sweat this will cost you. Not considering that I lack all the tools to do it anyway, it is so fucking hard to break the beat and to get the tire off the rim. Not speaking of that I most of the times punctured the new tube while putting it back on the rim. I was cursing big times and almost freaking out doing this job, so having someone experienced doing it for me with a machine is just PRICELESS!!! Not only he rounded down all the material cost, but he also drawn the perfect trajectory for me to get to Bari. This once more confirms the law of attraction. If you're in need and your heart calls out for it, then the universe will answer. ALWAYS! Not only I didn't get ripped off by these fellow bikers, no I got set up in the perfect way to take the most epic route down through Italy! Turns out this season of the year the days are as followed. First it's still overcast early in the morning but then the sun disperses the clouds and you find blue sky above you. In the afternoon it becomes cloudy again (due to extrem sunshine vaporizing water from the sea) and some raindrops follow when the sun gets low and the temperature cools down (compared to Monsoon and the storms I faced in Costa Rica, it's actually negectable). So I made it from Terni over Rieti to L'Aquila ("eagle" in Italian) and then down over Rocca di Mezzo to Celano. All very, very beautiful roads to drive and very little traffic on it. Being covered up in my awesome heavy-duty gear, I took this with a grin on my face and was shouting out loudly all the pleasure I felt along the way. This is just so FUCKING AWESOME!! :D ..after I licked blood with this trip, believe me, many more will follow. I will ride my lovely bike until it reaches 80 000km and if I have to drive it all the way to China! At the bike shop today I could get a glance of almost every bike that I know (some of them in a pretty used state). There was my BMW 650 GS, Toms Yamaha 660XT, Renzos 990 KTM Adventure, a four-cylindre BMW racing bike, African Twin, all the small off-roaders and a Super Tenere 750 (that has almost twice the power mine got with only 16kg of more weight). Damn.. I should have one of those :P but then I find my bike is suitable enough. You can ride easily with 2500RPM, but if you want to accelerate it needs 3000RPM. While a stronger bike requires less changing of gears, I need to switch down to get through narrow curves.. but whatever, the fun of riding lies in switching gears ;) furthermore the KTM 900 uses about 50% more of gasoline than my bike does. assuming that I make 4000km, I will spend about 350 CHF in gasoline.. so it's about 175 CHF that I save at the cost of having a bit less of power. But let me put it like this.. if you ride a 125ccm, then you might easily reacht 80km/h, but riding a 100km/h is a pain in the ass. if you ride a 660ccm, then a 100km/h is easy, but a 130km/h is a pain in the ass. If you ride a 990 KTM adventure, then a 130km/h is a piece of cake and you can speed up much more than that. But honestly, I don't feel save at a 120km/h and 80km/h just seems fine for me (yes, all the Italians pass me, but they even do if I ride 90km/h when it's supposed to be 80km/h. So long story short: 660ccm is absolutely enough for my style of traveling. I'm sure I could handle a few more horses, but the expect of saving some money by having a low fuel consumption compensates more than enough. One more thing: I really fell in love with my 650 GS Dakar and it undoubtly is very, very comfortable to ride, but there's so much electronic in it, that you need a BMW motorbike dealership to get a proper service for it. KTM and Yamaha is much more wide spread and Yamaha is just much cheaper as KTM and thinking of it, I started riding bike on a 125ccm Yamaha DT and I did the Golden Triangle and Mea Hong Som loop in Thailand on a 250ccm Yamaha as well as ALL of cambodia. So I'm just tending to convert to Yamaha. While KLR is a piece of crap (but cheap) and KTM is luxurious (but expensive), Yamaha might just win my heart ;) Having this bike now, I feel as I could drive around the world once more ;) I as well might, if not the right girl steps into my life.. but let's hope for the later ;)

Just checked in

just about 24 hours have passed and I totally arrived in the traveling mood.. even faster than I expected. So I got up early and was waiting nearly an hour for the bike shop to open. When it finally did, the guy told me the mechanic will show up at 3.30 PM, but when I was waiting outside, I met another dude that told me to check out Assisi (yes, the place where holy Franz comes from ;) So I decided to pay the place a visit to kill the 6 hours until the mechanic would show up and it turned out to be awesome!
Assisi is a city on a hill overlooked by a mountain fortress. Ancient military installations always got my interest, as I just find it extremely fascinating picturing all the wars that have been fought in these places. While churches don't really touch me, forts definitively do! Assisi is similar to Gruyere in Switzerland, except it doesn't feater a H.R. Giger museum. But they have the remnants of holy Francis of Assisi burried deeply in a church. Well.. I still like Giger waaay more, but as I heard of the holy Francis more than twenty years ago, it was pretty cool to pay him finally a visit. If anybody wonders what happened to him, well.. there he is. Assisi itself is though much more awesome than Gruyere. Just stay on the upper level and avoid the souvenir shops and the hordes of tourists swarming on the lower levels. There's at least half a dozen of churches but as I'm not very religous, I didn't feel bad to not enter them all. Bloody wars that have been fought in the past really get to me while prayer is just boring :P ..here in Italy almost every city has some old town and is full of history. I past dozens of places that are built heavily fortified on a hill and by the look of them, I don't wonder why there still there.
So I was walking around in this ancient city on top of a hill and imagined how all this must have been looke a thousand years ago. I'm happy I met this italien girl a few days ago that speaks German, studies history and looks just gorgeous. And best of all: she invited me to Rome, so I will be able to catch up with what happened here the last 2000 years! :)
On the way back I stopped in Perugia and had lunch on the plaza principal before I got back to the main mission of today: fixing my bike.
So I got there half an hour  early and after a cappuccino and some more waiting the machanic finally showed up. His English was pretty good but the only issue was that they were on a tight schedule and had plenty of bikes to fix. I told him that I suspect the temperature sensor or the thermostate, hoping it's not the pump or the piston seal. The guy let the bike run hot and checked the fluid that was dropping out.. then after a few moments of reflecting, he opened the tap of the cooling container and showed it to me. It was pretty worn out and the sealing looked bad. He ran around muttering "tapa.. tapa.. tapa.." and then he picked up a tap from a dissasembled bike and screwed it on my bike. Ta-daa.. the dripping stopped. I couldn't believe it! that was a really simply solution to a problem I thought might cost me a couple of hundreds Euros. This guy is my hero!! not only he's a bad ass dirt bike rider, no he must have pure oil for blood! Despite they were super busy, they changed the cooling fluid (as I poured it a couple of times drinking water) and had a very good look at it in the end. So now I feel the bike is just fine (as it always was, until I tempered with that tap). I even wonder if it was me messing this up when I tried to fill up the cooling fluid in Switzerland, but then he probably would have felt that tap screwed on incorrectly. So I want to believe it was not me but just an old tap that now has been replaced. I bought some chain lube and  a emergency tube-inflation-kit (as the tire is not tubeless after all) and for the work of changing the cooling fluid and checking through my bike he just charged 35 Euro. I wanted to give him a good tip, but he refused. This man undoubtly has incredibly good Karma and I finally know, why I looked so long to find this place and waited all this time to talk to the right person! Only thing that's still not done is my back tyre. Turns out its 17" and there are no Off-Road tires for that size. Even worse.. it's a very uncommon size and hard to find at all (so much for "I will do this later during the trip when it's cheaper" :P ..darn.. I should know by now! Well.. I will try in Bari and then in every major city I come along. It's just.. I should have done it back home when it would have been easier. But anyway.. it should last a bit longer and at least I know now what's the deal about my back tire.
When leaving the shop (it was around 5 pm), I drove to a library and got finally a map of Italy. I opened it and picked a camping ground on a lake about 100km away. I activated the navigation app on my phone and after downloading the maps of Italy, it worked pretty well. So I got to the place where I'm staying now. I'm just incredibly happy and thrilled that my adventure is going so well! :) along the way I hit some rain (I developed an eye for it) and even if sometimes you can just drive through, I prefered to go with option B: make everything water proof (including the driver). This just takes 10 minutes and then I could proably drive through a car wash without getting a drop of water inside ;) It then wasn't too bad actually and after driving over a hill or two I got the sun shining in my face again. It's just awesome when you see the clouds opening up a few kilometers ahead and then you reach that zone. So I drove down to the lake and along the shoreline until I found a camping. Pitched my tent, had some beers, did some artist things and finished it all with a yoga head stand. Now I'm going wrap myself in my sleeping bag and mark the road that I drove and the one that I will take tomorrow on my way down to Bari.
Life is just awesome and this trip is fucking EPIC!!! Love you all and hope you have as much fun as I do! :D

Mamma Mia!

Sometimes I wonder what the hell I was thinking when I decided to drive a motorbike to Albania? But then in the end it always turns out to be a great idea doing such an epic trip. But until the end, there are many obstacles to pass and many decisions to take.
So far it was pretty easy, as a good friend of mine joined in and helped me getting so far (I probably would have even struggled to leave Switzerland as most of the passes were covered with snow and therefore closed. Luckily he called me late night before I the day I started and told me to join in. So I changed my plans for the third time and decided to tail along and it was exactly the boost I needed to start this trip! It's just so much fun having a wingman when heading out for adventure!!
I would have been lost a zillion times without his GPS and after I made him the biker he is, he returned the favor by escorting me all the way to Pisa. Today he ufortunately had to turn around, but I guess someone has to stay in Switzerland and see that things get done, while I'm traveling around the world.
So now I'm facing the state of mind that evey journey begins with: what the hell am I doing here?? It's the absence of safety, friends and a known environment that hits me. In solitude I realize once more how much I appreciate my social life that I have back home. But those who never set sail, will never reach new lands. So it's all part of it and it has always been like this and will always be. It's nice to share laughs and cries and makes it all so much easier. But in any case I always succeeded and I always will. My bike starts overheating when I don't drive (a problem I was struggling with for month on my last trip a couple of years ago) and it's a bad idea to set over to Albania while it's not fixed. So I made my way today to a small town with a Yamaha dealership and I hope that tomorrow Monday early morning these people can fix my bike. Or better said, I hope they can fix it with a reasonable ammount of money in a reasonable time. I also need a new set of tyres as the ones mounted now seem to be pretty old and hard. So yesterday when accellerating in a curve on a wet road, the bike almost slipped. Scary stuff! So whatever new tyres will cost, I will gladly pay the price to feel safe again on the road. I already drove more than 80 000km in 20 different countries and soon it shall be 25. As for the gear I'm ready for battle! lot's of protection against the asphalt, the rain, the cold. In fact all hell could brake loose and I would just smile peacefully in behind my visor. Only the damn pollums are killing me. I don't even know where they come from. Some tree or bush or weed.. just that's blooming right now and that this species also grows down here in Italy. It's just so annoying to have a dripping and still blocked nose with tearing eyes and sneezes that almost blow my helmet off. I hope it's getting better further south. It's a vital part of riding bike to have my helmet open so I can feel the wind and all the smells surrounding me. Only wearing glasses is a must, as some big ass insects are suiciding while I come along. Some are banging really hard against the helmet and by the sound of it, I definitively don't want them smacking onto my eye balls.
While typing these lines I'm eating some original Italien yummi pizza after I took some pictures of that tilted tower in Pisa. Somehow it is already an epic trip, but there's still a long way to go and the adventure didn't even start yet. While driving here, I learned something about Swiss geography and a big deal about Italian geography. Of course I heard of all these places we were riding through, but I never got it straight where they actually lie and how they're connected together. So day by day, ride by ride I start understanding how the world actually looks.
Mostly I'm a low cost traveller, but as Europe isn't exactly cheap, I have to deal with it that getting a bed and a hot shower cuts deep into my budget. Probably have to adapt my budget a little bit, then I can travel easier without thinking too much about money. What is money anyway.. I got plenty of it and as I don't know how long I have to spend it, I shouldn't save it all up until the last moment, but enjoy life to the fullest day by day! Carpe Diem they say and they're damn right about it!
So far I'm fluent with German, English, Spanish, French and I'm trying to improve my Portuguese, but as I'm here in Italy all I speak is a horrible mix of all of them and it probably doesn't make a lot of sense. I actually studied this language for three years in school, but then I converted it to Spanish and since then my Italian never recovered. I'm also afraid to mix Spanish and Italian too much, so I just stuck to Spanish that covers a much bigger part of the world. But now I'm here and I really start liking Italy! Food is incredibly tasty, girls are super sexy and the countryside is just breath taking with all these old castles and monasteries. They even make delicous wine and great beer! I could grow old here, but then I probably wouldn't, because the people here just don't know how to drive. I start wondering if they even have indicaters installed in the cars or if all Italien models come without'em. Luckily I keep my eyes always open and expect every car hitting me, so I'm always a step ahead if they actually try.
Even if I give a crap about fashion, I have to admit that people here are dressed nicely and they are all super friendly (when not sitting behing a steering wheel). As the common man lacks of proper English, I might improve my Italian after all. Tomorrow will be another real life test when explaining the mechanic what's wrong with my bike. Maybe I should just turn it on and let it idle for a while until the cooling liquid vaporizes but I'd rather not let it happen again. Yeah.. I start remember how traveling is. You're never bored as there's always something that has to be taken care off and once everything runs smoothly, there's plenty of things to see and to do. So I shouldn't be too scared of what lies ahead of me. It always turned out to be great in the end. But there's still a long road to go.
time to head back and make some use of my pricy room. I really should bring a chick along to such a trip. Then I wouldn't have to type some dorky lines but instead could go down on someone and have some real fun ;) but yes, I use to say, you can't always have it all at the same time (but you should always aim for it ;). Take this as a good advice from someone who's conquering the world every day anew.