Last update: Monday, September 05, 2005

5 August 2000 Greece, The ancient city of Kassope

We're on the road!! It was an incredible feeling actually starting our long planned trip. We left our home in the morning of 2 august while wading through a huge list of last checks in and around the house. When we closed our door, we felt confident we couldn't do more :-) The evening before we kept ourselves really busy till late thus making an early start possible. We went to sleep (sort of) in our camper on the driveway with spinning heads going through endless lists of things to do :-) How did we manage to get some sleep anyhow?

When we drove through our street around 10 am we both realised "this is it"! Now it's going to happen, 6 months out into the world. It was a mixed feeling one of happiness but also one with a bit of sentiment. Leaving friends and family behind was the source of that feeling and lingered on the full day.

That day we drove till approximately 22:30, a long day. We stopped along the Swiss high-way close to the Italian border to be able to make it to Ancona the next day before noon. This to have some time to negotiate ourselves into the available deck space of Minoan Lines and SuperFast ferries since we didn't reserve in advance.
Our routeplanner indicated that we should start driving at 5:30 am to be there at 11:30. Again a long day ahead on busy Italian roads passing Milan, Bologna and Rimini. Our night was restless along a noisy highway thinking about the incredibly busy past few days.
 

Incredible, we left even earlier!! 5:15am what a brutal time, but the empty highway compensated an incredible lot. We passed Milan around 6 and drove into the first traffic jams around Bologna, which was around rush hour. But again we stood on the quays of Ancona around 11:30am, which was packed with cars, trucks, backpackers and campers. A deja vue from '95 and '92, the place hasn't changed much, a hectic place full of people going places.

Janine went to war trying to get a "camping on deck" ticket allowing us to sleep in our camper on deck. Very comfortable, packing of bags and stuff is not necessary just drive-on and camp. Well 20 minutes later Janine had arranged an incredible deal with SuperFast ferries, allowing us to leave within 6 hours with a "camping on deck" return ticket of 40% below our budget with an 'open return' going to Igoumenitsa! Whow!! And this in high-season!! We felt lucky but also really tired, the past few days had almost drained us to the bone. Strangely that afternoon we both could not sleep much, the change of weather (33 Celsius in a blazing sun) kept us sweating in our beds. We both had the feeling that we would die thinking about the temperatures of 40 degrees Celsius and up.

Late in the afternoon we could drive our camper on board as one of the first. The ferry looked brand new. Parking our camper on board went almost as efficiently as we knew from Scandinavian ferries. What a difference with what we're used too!! No screaming, shouting and stressful manoeuvres with cars, just a smooth transition from quay to deck. Phew, kind of a relief.
A bit dazzled we went on reconnaissance on this HUGE ship. On the highest deck (Sun and bardeck) we couldn't resist celebrating our ticket with a beer and a NesFrape. We felt like kings!!

Well the crossing to Igoumenitsa really is fast!! Our GPS indicated a cruising speed of 50Km/hour, making an estimated time of arrival of 10:30 in the morning. Again we where amazed, things really have changed! We where used to the 1 day and two nights passage, which is now reduced to a one night passage. Whoweee again :-). Two hours after we awaked we stood on the quays of Igoumenitsa. We didn't even plan our route through Greece yet! Travelling the fast lane indeed!

That day we drove to a spot which we knew from '92 and '95 where we could refill our water supply. A nice location, overlooking a fruit and vegetable valley near Amoudia. We also drove past Gliki where we camped in the wild in '92 allong an ice-cold river. Unfortunately the place had changed, dust roads where asphalted and the parking lot was packed with cars. Not our cup of tea so to say. We took out plan B and went looking for parking lots of ancient and archaeological sites. The ancient city of Kassope attracted our attention, remembering the view from this place over the valley of Preveza. At approximately 550 meters in the woods it was an ideal spot to spend the rest of the day and night.