Monday 9th August

We picked up our camper on Friday afternoon after spending time in Ljubljana, where we spent nearly 3 hours in a café using the internet and having a few coffees and lunch. We were able to talk to some family, catch up with our emails and look up information about our future destinations.

After the café we rode our bikes to the park and were able to sit on a bench and read our books for a while. While we were sitting there the clouds rolled in and we could hear the thunder approaching.Time to head back to the garage and it seemed like a race to get the 5kms back before the rain started.

We go back just in time before the heavens opened, good timing too as the camper was just about finished.

With our camper fixed and the rain bucketing down we thought it better to find a place to settle for the night and decided to head to Kamnic which is about 25kms out of Ljubljana. A good place for the night, quiet and rustic, it has very basic facilities and if you don’t mind sharing the shower with others or having a cold one (solar heated) then it’s good enough. Lucky for us we have our boiler so we were able to have a hot shower in the convenience of our camper.

After a good night sleep we headed for the Croatian border, we drove along the motorways and noticed how quiet they were. All the truck seemed to be parked on the car parks of the petrol stations and in lay ways by the side of the road. Nice for us as we didn’t have to sit behind the trucks and smell all the diesel fumes. ( probably why we like the smaller roads too)

We entered Croatia by a very small road, scenic and quiet and went through the border station with no trouble. They seem to be a little amused by us and our camper with all the Aussie stuff displayed on it. Some of the border guards are friendlier than others, but why do you always feel that you have done something wrong when you are approached by these “official” types.

We didn’t manage to find any campgrounds or places to stop and after a long drive we were ready for a break. We stopped in a car park next to a small restaurant and decided to ask if there was somewhere we could stay, she said there wasn’t but we could stay in their car park for the night. She spoke a little English and seemed very nice so we decided we would eat our dinner there that night in payment. We then had a bit of a nap and a shower to freshen ourselves up and went to dinner.It seemed that we were the only ones to dine there that night so we had very good service. She was very interested in where we were from and were we were going and she said she were very lucky. (I agree with her)She came back a little later with a gift for us, it is a string of beads with a cross on it; she said it was for luck and it was something they gave to the soldiers when they were fighting in the war. A very nice gesture which we appreciated. We had already decided to give her a little souvenir Kangaroo as she had been so helpful and she was delighted to receive this gift as well.

The next morning we drove on through the north of Croatia heading towards the south-west of Hungary. As Slovenia is a less manicured Austria, Croatia is a little scruffier that Slovenia. The parts we passed through were not dirty, but you can see that the standard of living is less and although their houses needed work they were often painted brightly and the gardens full of flowers and vegetables. The road we traveled took us through one small village to the next often merging into each other. Luckily the roads were quiet at it was Sunday morning so we had no trouble with the traffic.

One thing that I was exited to see was the stork nests on the top of the power poles along the side of the road. It is amazing to see them sitting or standing up there with their great big nests one after another along the road.

We are now stopped in the south-west of Hungary, in a campground that is part of a thermal bath complex. Quite a nice place with plenty of shade and adequate facilities.

When we arrived here yesterday we got to do our washing and then spent a few hours at the pools. They have about 5 pools ranging from about 38 deg c down to a cool “normal” chlorinated swimming pool.

The thermal baths are very warm and smell a bit like tar and sulfur. We shared the baths with nearly a hundred people all sitting around and chatting to each other. A very social time. We also tried the other cooler pools and were also entertained by some Hungarian folk dancers and singing. Quite a busy place as it was Sunday and it seemed most of the locals were out enjoying the nice day.

So.. today after some time spent working on our planned route and uploading the blog and checking the emails we will head off after lunch across the south of Hungary and then into Serbia. Should be an adventure as we are off the map as far as the Tom Tom is concerned. Will have to find some maps.