Where Have You Been In Your Van Today?

Just spending three nights at

Camping Merry-sur-Yonne​

Small site with not much to do around it but some wonderful bike rides down the canals. The restaurant and shop on site are excellent. Some pitches close together but you can choose. All in worth a short stop over but nothing too long IMG_0090.jpeg
 
@True Romance. Thanks for that (I think!). For better or worse, we've booked our tickets on the Igoumenitsa to Bari ferry and will have to see how it goes - I'll report back in a couple of weeks but, in the meantime, fingers and toes crossed. That said, although there's a couple of useful tips in the video, I suspect there's also a dose of drama queenery in there as well and one of their W3W addresses seems to be in Australia rather than Greece (and I also don't think I'll be subscribing to the channel anytime soon!). The tip about printing tickets is good but I had already decided that I would be asking someone to print ours at the first opportunity anyway - even though the email clearly says that you can just show it on your mobile devices at check-in mainly because we've spent a lot of time in Greece over the years and know how bad the bureaucratic systems can be. As i indicated in my previous post, the ferry experience would have to be seriously bad to offset the disadvantages of travelling through Albania. The last time that I was on the road this far south in Europe was in 2010 when a mate and I drove from Toulouse to Dubai in the UAE - at the time, we made a conscious decision to avoid Albania and IMHO, that choice was well and truly vindicated - it's either not advanced much since 2010 or it would have been truly horrendous then in comparison to 'modern' Albania. Saying all that everybody that we interacted with were extremely nice and friendly and as I mentioned above, it' seriously cheap to live there.
 
With a later start than usual, we've only managed to reach about 25Km inside The Peloponnese before stopping for the night. ACSI led us to Camping Kato Allisos which is another nice but basic site on a shingle beach or at least it would have been had the wind not picked up enough to make the waves cover it almost completely meaning the arrival swim was out. For €21 there's basic but very clean facilities and a reastaurant but not much else other than 4 small tents and 6 campers / motorhomes none of whom are Brits (same last night as well). The pitch is nicely shaded by ancient olive trees but I've not bothered with a photo as it would look very similar to all the others of the van shaded by trees! Due to the wind, an aerial shot from the drone is probably out as well.
 
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@True Romance. PS - I forgot to say that the email that I got with our booking confirmation states quite clearly that travellers on international routes must collect their tickets at least 3 hours before departure (but doesnt say it's a different part of the port). Greek functionaries do like to make things complicated - I suspect because it keeps them in a job.
 
nowhere its in the garage having failed the MOT on front shocks and suspension arms, i blame the condition of the roads around here :)
 
Yesterday I drove from Edinburgh to Arbroath and camped on the sea front. Was hemmed in by motor homers, most with a small car parked behind! Guessing they motor home round Scotland whilst the hubby still drives to work.
But today I met up with ten other sea kayakers and we paddled the Arbroath Caves. Spectacular paddling and spectacular weather too!

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We made it to Greece and am now camped about 25Km over the border at Camping Drepano (near Igoumentsia). This sit is excellent with, I'm guessing, fairly modern facilities, a taverna and the Ionian Sea on each side, but only one of them has direct access. We couldn't get a pitch right on the water but we can see it from either side - the sea is also much warmer than anything we've encountered thus far and Corfu can be seen in the distance. Although I was complimentary about our site last yesterday in Albania (Legjenda), I'm afraid that I can't say the same for the rest of the country (or, at least, the bits that we saw). The whole place seems to be very untidy and dirty with seriously crappy roads in places and even crappier driving standards everywhere (so much so that my wife suggested exploring options for a ferry to Italy for the return journey!). That said, I had heard previously that it was a really cheap place to live and that was borne out by the excellent on-site restaurant last night with two large beers, two bottles of water, a greek salad for two and two really nice spaghetti bolognaises for the princely sum of €15 (the rest of the €20 note that I gave them went into the tip).
This is Camping Drepano and their beach - try hard and you can see the Ionian in the first two..
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Loving this travelogue, keep it coming. This is on our trip list.
 
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