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After five years of procrastination I finally got my act together and rebuilt this site. It only took a global pandemic to do it!

We're still alive and reasonably well and will be uploading content from more recent trips soon.

Our New Zealand trip is slowly coming to an end and with sadness we're getting ready to sell our great companion - Nismo (the van).

We just landed in Auckland, for a new van adventure. Unfortunately, due to her height and the shipping costs, we were unable take Bluestar with us. So the plan is to buy a van here, drive around New Zealand for 6/7 months and sell it at the end.

Few stats and a breakdown of costs for our European van trip in 2013.

After a few days of bad weather and our departure to Nepal in two weeks from Warsaw we decided to make a dash for it to Poland, it would take us a couple of days. We were heading for Andrews parent’s place and the thought of creature comforts and a Mum to look after us was very appealing.

We took the border crossing into Montenegro from the south of Shkodra, Albania. It was a very short queue and we just needed to purchase an insurance doc which was 15 euros. Montenegro was stunning. Lush green mountains so colorful with flowers everywhere.

Tires swapped over from the previous flat and we continued our route North.

After a few hours driving along windy mountain roads dodging goat herds, pigs, donkeys and pot holes we spotted the most beautiful beach for a swim. It was down a steep unpaved track of about 150m from the main road. Moments later... Boom and Hissssss...

After making use of the valuable free showers on the beach in Greece we hit the road again on our way up north.

We drove towards Itea (a coastal town) for the night before visiting Delphi. On the mountainous route we came across large numbers of goats crossing the road.

From Itea we drove 10 miles north to Delphi, which once was a home to the famous Greek oracle.

From Sparta we drove to a beautiful salt water lake in Limni Vouliagmenis, north of Korinthos.

We visited the extensive ruins of Mystras a World Heritage listed site near Sparta. It was an old Byzantine fortress town with the ruins of churches, libraries, strongholds.

Our next drive took us down the very rugged peninsular of Mani. This area in history is know for its internal feuds and darted about the mountainside you can see houses of a fort like structure and castles.

This five day beach stop, 30 minutes south of Kalamata, was our favourite place yet. The beach was not the best so far (but it did have showers which was handy), but the generosity and friendliness of the local people made it.

From "the bay" we headed further south down the western most ‘finger’ of the Peloponnese. Our first stop was the Voidokoilia beach.

This spot was recommended to us by Costos, a barman (and a surfer) who worked at the campsite further up north and gave us many decent tips on where to go next.

From Patra we headed down the west coast of the Peloponnese. Around half way down the coast we found an excellent family run campsite next to the beach with a very friendly vibe.

We set our foot in Greece mid day on Friday the 30th of August at the port of Patra. Our first mission was to find, the very appraised in travel guides, tourist Information center where we could get a decent road map of Greece. After unsuccessfully wondering around for a while, Holly popped into to a travel agent to get some directions. A few minutes later she emerged with a friendly Greek-American lady who explained that during the economic crisis a lot of civil servant jobs were cut and the information center we were seeking for is now closed. She very kindly took us to a good book store with lots of maps and gave us some initial schooling about Greece in a lovely New York accent.

We headed south into Italy’s heel awaiting our departure from Brindisi to Greece that was due in three days. About an hours drive south of Brindisi, past Lecce, we found many excellent free camping options right by the beach.