Greece for beginners

About pandemic time travel – a year later

Let’s just say that covid has grown into our climate. On leaving the house we already naturally check for keys, phone and mask. Social conversations are the news of the number vaccinated, border restrictions and “will there be a fourth wave”.

Last year we went all around Poland. This time we came to the conclusion that we had to move somewhere further afield. Vaccinated, disinfected, we want to take advantage of the moment of recovery.

We decided to fulfil a dream and go to Greece on wheels. Since Greece has a warm climate, a yellow convertible is natural. What else would be better? 🙂

Idea

The plan is to glide with your eyes closed through Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria to Greece. Tour the Greek mainland. Return to Poland via North Macedonia, Serbia, Hungary, Austria and the Czech Republic.

We originally planned to make it in 2 weeks + a weekend. However, as we drew up our itinerary and dug deeper into the list of potential places to visit, we extended our trip to 20 days.

Trip planning

Recent years have taught us that a planned trip is cheaper, and we get to see more.

Without unnecessary stress. This holiday, as before, we planned it our way, in the Furkot app.

Apart from that, we created a sheet with basic information as usual. Sign of the times: we had to add a column with information on what the current COVID restrictions are.

The assumption was that we were focusing on mainland Greece. Saab could fly, but it doesn’t swim. 🙂 We want to feel the atmosphere of Antiquity, Byzantium, touch the warm sea and generally have a concentrate of the country. We still want to avoid the crowds.

We have estimated that by driving around Greece we will cover a distance of 3000 km. The drive to and from Greece, including the obligatory places (Vienna, Bucharest, Budapest), will cover about 4k km. So we expect to travel about 7,000 km.

Preparations

We have registered with the government systems of Greece, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

We bought online the vignettes needed for Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Austria and the Czech Republic. In: Greece, Macedonia and Serbia, you pay for the motorways at the gates. We will probably take side roads anyway, but we want to have peace of mind if we need to use the motorway.

As far as the preparation of the car is concerned, it did not require any special attention as we always try to keep it in good condition. On the occasion of the trip, we have applied anti-steam treatment to the windows from the inside, an invisible wiper to the windscreen and a solid dose of impregnating agent to the roof.
In addition, this trip will be the premiere windshot of our project.

Accommodation

As usual, we decided to cooperate with booking.com. Travelling so far and having such a tight schedule, we cannot let ourselves get lost and change our plans unannounced. We feel safer that somewhere on the other end of Europe, there is someone who will pick up the phone and help in a critical situation.
But we are not planning to sleep in hotels (unless there is no better option) but in rented flats. To see how the local people live. Or at least to see how they prepare their flats for rent to tourists.

Food and ways to pack

We packed for 10 days. There will be a washing machine in almost every place, and it will be warm, so there’s no reason to take a whole boot of clothes.
We also took an iron supply of Profi soups with us, as well as a travel cooker and a set of plates and cutlery – we always feel better with the idea that lunch is with us, and we’re not doomed to adjust to siesta time, for example.

We set off on August 6, 2021. See you on the road.

The conclusions soon.

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