Living the Job - Travelling whilst working on HU

I kind of had a plan; to visit the Horizons Unlimited HUBBUK in Wales and then to ride down through Europe to visit two Drupal web developer meetings in Italy and Hungary. I made a mention of this plan via a tweet way back in May and that started off a relationship and project on improving HU...

As far as actually planning, though  pah - I has a ferry booked. That’s it.

I knew I wanted to ride down through France & Italy and then cross across to Greece to try and make a break for Turkey. The idea being to “leave Europe”, even if only for one night.

The Horizons Unlimited HUBBUK was a new experience to me. Travelling down there was a bit of a case of ignoring the satnav (more on this later) and knowing my way across the UK and combining that with watching the weather to pick my way to Hay-on-wye avoiding the showers. I nearly made it, too! 

Oh the HUBBUK was fabulous - so many amazing people who all seemed to be prepared to spend time chatting with idiot, newbie me and pass on their wealth of experience. As soon as I explained my trip they were more than happy add add places to visit and ways to get there. I’m so thankful! It reminded me so much of the web development community around Drupal that I am involved with.

After HUBBUK, I was supposed to be attending a web developer conference in Milan (yeah, I know, hard life) and really had little time to get there.

Leaving HUBBUK, I went straight down to Portsmouth for my fast ferry to Cherbourg and on to a friend’s house near Caen. They have just bought a lovely place they are doing up and would love to have stopped and helped but the weather was not looking good for the next day so tried to make an early start.

Drupal Dev Days is a week where many of the web developers who help to improve Drupal (one on the tools we use to make HU work) get together to work on the next version.

We worked on many things that are now forming the backbone of this new website - we benefit from the collective good will of so many. I have a particular interest in making things “make sense” and being self-explanatory so some of were working on reorganising admin menus amongst other things.

Keeps me out of trouble, anyway.

Oh what a place to spend time!

I took the minor roads north out of Milan, avoiding the Autostrada, to get a bit of a feel of suburban Milan. Mainly, I learned it was hot. I also learned that my bike was really dirty so had to find an autolavage (sp?) and get it cleaned.  Much better.

I spent the day working with possibly the most amazing office view ever. Genuinely stunning, as you can see:

In the evening, I found an equally stunning campsite and needed up spending a few days there. It was going to be really hard to move on south...

Heading south meant finding various places to stay over that were comfortable but cheap. Campsites were the option in Italy and I did find some good ones. 

Rome is hot! Really hot. I think I had to come here but also realised that I'll probably spend the rest of the trip avoiding big cities where I can. The mountains and villages are where I am happiest.

Whist Italy was fabulous, I had to keep moving and the ferry to Greece would definitely mark the point I had travelled by motorbike further than ever before.

My plan was to board a ferry from Bari, having visited the Trulli houses at Alberobello. Oh yes - and they were amazing! I stayed in one and it was tiny. Makes me want a tiny house, to be honest!

I stayed in some tiny village in northern Greece and wandered down into the village square to see about some food to find people putting out hundreds of tables and chairs. Turns out a local was getting married - and I was invited, if I'd like to come along - oh yes!!

Fab night.

My goal this year was to "make it out of Europe on my bike". So, the idea was to ride down through Greece, over the border into Turkey, Gallipolli and back over the Bosphorous.

When I left my digs in Greece word was coming through on Twitter about a coup in Turkey. The little TV images I had seen simply seemed to be a few jets flying over that still had their navigation lights on. If the coup was serious, there's no way the jets would still be lit up...

But, the closer I got to the border, the more and more messages I received via Twitter advising me not to enter Turkey.

I went up to a place that I had been told about, Buzludzha, and it was way, way more than I expected. Wonderful to have something like this that isn't surrounded by people trying to sell you things. I climbed in a bit and had a wander round but was very aware I was alone and didn't want to have a fall so came out pretty quick.

I've added it to the list of places to visit - have a read!

First impressions of Bulgaria: they like their planes!

First thing I came across was a MiG 17 (I think? Happy to be corrected) on a stand in the middle of some village. Was in really good nick so someone there certainly cared for it.

Oh wow - what a place. At the start of this trip, I wasn't really "aware" of all the amazing places that seem well known to the biking community. I just kind of stumbled across this place and checked in. I'm glad I did!

Motocamp Bulgaria just seems to really understand people biking across Europe so well - and because of that attracts all the right people. Met some great people here and managed to do a good bit of work in their clubhouse. Perfect place to spend a few days!

Leaving Motocamp was hard - such a fab place! Leave it I must, though, and start heading north, through Romania. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about with the Transfăgărășan Highway and another, called the Transalpina, I only heard about for the first time at Motocamp.

I took a backroads route up to a ferry to cross into Romania and could hardly believe quite how much triplicate paperwork was involved in crossing the 200 centre wide Danube. And this was inside the EU - what "real" border crossings are like, I guess I'll find out one day...

The mountain ranges in Transylvania are amazing! I stayed in a mountain hut (with a really noisily snoring guy) and then got on to the ridge the next day - amazing views!