Another gorgeous day in Norway.
So to take advantage of it, we planned a hike up to a waterfall. But this waterfall is somewhat special because you can actually walk behind the falls. It's really quite something!
As you might have already guessed from the title, we passionately believe that a trip to Australia is a safe and awesome choice. We have to be clear and say that most of the time it is pretty expensive and tiring to fly there, but it is totally worth it. Australia should be on every self-respecting tourist’s travel bucket list. Why?
We used to think that Iceland was the most photogenic country we had ever been to. But Norway has now taken over first place in that category! The gorgeous scenery just never stops. It's just simply beautiful here. In fact, someone mentioned the other day that I'm running out of descriptive terms to express what we're experiencing.
So we found ourselves in the town of Laerdal, and decided to take a relax day and just hang out. But of course for us that means we only did a short 6 km (3.7 mile) hike on a trail above the town!
You’ve lived in a comfortable home your entire life. Whether that be a cozy apartment or a full-sized house, you’re well-acquainted with a bedroom, kitchen, bathroom, and living room set up. Up until recently, this has felt just fine, but perhaps the need for some sort of adventure has captured your mind. You wouldn't be the first person to feel like this, and you most certainly won’t be the last. In an era where everyone is ditching their conventional living spaces for time exploring, trading your house for a life in an RV isn’t that far out of an idea. If this has been buzzing in your mind, we have some tips for selling your house and preparing to live in an RV!
We had arrived in Norway with a full tank, knowing that Norway is probably the most expensive place in the world to buy fuel. But we knew that full tank wouldn't last us for our entire time here, and yesterday was the day to pay up.
Yesterday we did our first longer hike in Norway. Not really that long though. In fact, at just under four hours it was more of a training hike for some of our upcoming Norway adventures!
Well, May was an interesting month from an expenses perspective. We drove a lot of miles, having started the month in southern Romania and ending it at the northern tip of Denmark!
Our planned budget was about $1,700 CAD, and we spent a total of $1,817 CAD ($1,437 USD, €1,338). Not bad, considering we drove about 2,600 kms (1,615 miles) and visited 6 different European countries.
Although we had no problem finding decent overnight spots during the past seven months, it is refreshing to be back in Germany where it's downright easy. Many towns and villages have dedicated motorhome parking, and many of those have facilities for emptying and refilling holding tanks.
Taking the backroads through eastern Hungary. There's not really a lot to see in this area. It's flat, with mostly farmlands. We were headed to the hills though. I had read about a great hiking area near Hungary's Bükki National Park which is closer to the Slovakia border.
Romania is not a new country for us. We were in Romania for the month of November, 2016. We liked it so much at the time, we knew we would return some day. It's unfortunate that we're only going to be here for about two weeks, but that's the way it goes.
We've only been in Bulgaria for a day and a half, but there are some things we've noticed already. One of the first things is that the roads are not in very good condition! We missed a pothole yesterday that would have done some serious damage. It was a crater! And this is on a major two lane road that is part of the vignette toll system with a lot of truck traffic.
It was chilly when we woke up Tuesday morning. Glad to have had the electric heat on overnight! But outside, it was only about 2C (35F) and windy. Not nice.
We got all of our chores done and filled Max's water tank and hit the road. We weren't planning on a long drive... only about 80 kms (50 miles) to another campground with electricity.
We got up at 6:00am and did the 25 km drive into the center of Ankara.
We wanted to do one more hike in the Ihlara Valley before doing the fairly long drive to the big city of Ankara (pop 5 million).
We finally said goodbye to our hosts at the little campground by the river. We had a really good time there. When we had arrived, we figured it might be good for a two night stay, and we ended up there for four nights.
There were two things we wanted to see in the area. The Moses Tree, and the Titus Tunnel. The maps all said that the Moses Tree was in a little village on a mountain road, but we figured that if tour buses can make it there, then we can make it there.
I know I said yesterday that we are done with museums for a while, but when we were at the Antakya Archeological Museum we had bought the combined ticket which included access to the Museum Hotel and St. Pierre Church along with the Archeological Museum.
We didn't really do very much yesterday, except we spent a lot of time with Duygu and Timmy talking about the many things to see and do in this area, as well as talking about their road trip to India and looking at some photos and telling stories.
We left Max parked up by the river and walked the 3 kms (1.8 miles) over to the Adana Museum. Other than the riverside, this was the first we had seen of the city itself. Adana is a modern city, very clean, and with lots of green park space. For a big city, we were pretty impressed.
We left our quiet overnight spot at the Men of Rock parking area and drove back down to the main coastal highway heading east towards the big city of Mersin (pop 1 million).
We are now only 60 kms (37 miles) from the ferry port that would have taken us to North Cyprus. So we needed to make a decision.
