England to Turkey trip planning

[chopper]

hi just done very simular trip , france , belguim, holland,germany,austria,hungary ,romania ,then bulgaria in 3days night boat out dover calias first overnight stop in austria < st valantin > then to romania second overnight near arad 25 euro motel {good} then ferry from sillatra over the danube {3 euros and works all night ]then the east side of bulgaria {black sea } to turkey border no problems at all , just the heat warm in northern europe ,austria down 40 c very hot you have to keep stopping to cool down ,just riding in t,shirt and jeans. romania is slower ,smaller roads but drive like mad men on crack , bulgaria same slower speed limits you speed you pay ,but watchout for dogs they like chasing you.i stayed just over the border with friends,turkey not cheap i couldnt wait for trip back, hope yo
u have a great trip i did . B)

[desmo666]

Desmo, I've just come back from Bulgaria and wanted to come back up through Croatia. I tried to access South Croatia from Serbia. I didn't have mapping for Serbia on my sat nav and my Europe atlas was 6 years old. I ended up crossing into Kosovo (It wasn't shown on my map!). That cost me 70Euro for insurance. I spent 14 hours getting lost, there are no road signs! In the end we just followed a major(!) road and ended up in back in Serbia Doh.
So still not been to Croatia

was using a zumo and a compass, but you can not be lost if you dont know your destination !
didnt have to pay any insurance cost`s anywhere other than africa and Israel.
carry a green card and photo copy your insurance on green paper, it works honest.be savvy and convince them you are ok to pass. Same with speeding, show them your muggers wallet with low denominations of other currencies, plead insanity and humour them,got me of every time. PS always mention bobby charlton and david beckham

I also concur about the dogs, at night they roam in packs, riding after dark is dodgy and means wild camping is at your own discretion , they scared the shit out of me.

[BrianGS]

Hi did this trip last year, if you choose to go through Bosnia take a green card.We did not have one and got really pissed around. We had a good week riding around with no hassle at all, having crossed from Coatia.

Went to cross into Serbia and got turned back at the border.

Spoke to the Bosnian border guard who even shook his head and said "Green card". He told us that we could get one for Serbia at the next border post.

Next morning we went to the next border post, where the Serbian officials helped us by getting a person from the nearest town to come and pick up my wife to go there and get the insurance.

Then the Bosnian border patrol wouldn't let us back into the country. This meant we had to go a long way round to our destination and cost us an extra night's accommodation, meals etc. So I would say get a green card for all countries you would like to visit.

Kosovo, Macedonia and Turkey insurance can all be bought at the borders.

[SomersetJohn]

Just noticed your posting while I was browsing and I’ve done exactly the same trip last year, under the same circumstances, due to work cock ups the wife ended up flying out to Bodrum to stay with her sister and I rode the bike out to meet her.
This was my first ever long journey with a mission of just getting from A to B in a certain time frame. It was 2475 miles one way from Somerset via Birmingham airport (drop the wife off to get her flight) to Akbuk just north of Bodrum in Turkey.

The route euro-tunnel Belgium Germany Austria Slovenia Croatia Serbia Bulgaria Turkey

You’ve got to prepare yourself and get in a certain mind set to do this.
It took me four and half days to get out there so your looking at doing 500 to 600 mile days, I did it on a 1200gsa with a standard seat I bought a blow up cushion from pound land which I broke out of the packaging after dropping off the wife at Birmingham airport because my arse was killing me after that bliss. So you’ve got to be comfortable because you’ll be sat down for a long time.

I did take a one man tent with me just in case I got stuck but I hotel’ed it all the
way, no problem finding cheap accom the reasoning behind this is you will be knackered at the end of the day you just want to throw your kit in room, shower, food, a beer and a good sleep in a comfortable bed, a big fat boy breakfast and your off.
I aimed to be on the road by 07:45 and start looking for accom at 18:00 ish you’ve got to give yourself frequent stops just for five mins drink some water eat a cereal bar.
That’ll be from your stash of water and snacks you carry with you.
I didn’t do this through most of Germany and had a banging head mid afternoon because I was dehydrated; the temptation to crack on is great so set your time limits and say right now at this certain time I’ll pull over at the next stopping place for 5 mins, it will pay dividends and it gets you into a riding routine and that for me was the turning point of the journey because things became more achievable after that.
Treat yourself to lunch for 20 mins or spend your precious 20 mins answering questions from pensioners on a Sheerings coach trip in Austria because they used to ride a BSA Bantam 60 years ago.
As much as I would have loved to have taken more twisty roads you can’t do it, you’ve got to stick to the main motorway to get the mileage done, because after the Serbian Bulgarian border the road changes between great and diabolical pretty swiftly so just be aware because there is no warning the same goes for Turkey, so your progress rate will drop.
Border crossings no problem just have all your documents handy Turkey was the only slow one had to show my documents four times and buy an entry visa for a tenner took about an hour to get through. Vignettes for Austria & Slovenia also going into Bulgaria huge sign buy your vignette for the motorway so I pulled over to the office queued for 25 mins only to be told when I got to the front motorcycles are exempt…Doh!
Speed… I tried to keep on or within a few mph of the limit especially as Bulgaria and Turkey seemed littered with speed traps a lot of them as you approach villages in Turkey you would get three or four within a 20 mile stretch. Also hundreds of miles of nothing in Serbia and Croatia but trees and lovely new empty dual carridgeway , the temptation to crack the throttle open at this point is great then ooh look it’s a police car middle of nowhere hiding pointing his speed gun at you.
The overnight stops I had were end of day one Gent in Belgium day two Passau German/Austrian Border day three some place just off the motorway about 25miles past Belgrade that looked derelict but was open I got a great welcome and a good meal. End of day four another little hotel about 35miles past Edirne £22 for the night inc breakfast and the breakfast was epic.Then last day via Canakkle to Akbuk.
You can get to the Turkish border without a sat nav just write down a few places names the signage along the route is that good. Going through Croatia and Serbia I turned my sat nav off especially when it said next left in 326 miles.
Anyway I’m rambling…..again. I’ll say one last thing after you get through your last check at the Turkish border and you’ve pulled over to put your documents away I defy you not to have the biggest grin on your face as you pull away with wailing coming from the nearby minaret just saying ‘yes’ to yourself as you realize what you’ve just achieved. There are some memories that last quite a while that’s one of them. Enjoy.

[AndyG]

Thank everyone especially Somerset John, excellent advice.

I have 6 days for the journey each way so (hopefully) won't be doing quite as much in a day as you managed! Then again my GS will need more fuel stops than your GSA.

I will be going via Hungary & Romania as there seems no chance of getting bennetts to cover Serbia even though they are now part of the insurers agreement and don't want to muck around getting new insurance. Did you have to get insurance for turkey at the border?

Found out that most of the vignettes for Hungary & Austria can be bought online which may save a bit of time & hassle.

Was planning on camping as have found places about where I need them.

I can see why you switched on the sat nav - that far to the next turn is not exactly motivating!

[Itchy]

Just the trip that me and Scruffy are looking at next sept so thanks for that, lots of info here