12th May - we set off from our beautiful seaside hotel and cross the border to Bulgaria - fortunately relatively pain free. Martin & I pull into little town to get money & petrol - the bikes attract a group of elderly locals. As we pull out one says to martin " Your friend's bike is leaking oil!" - Martin shrugs and indicates that's normal for a Dnepr.
Fun ride through city of Varna but navigation help from young student hitchhiker we pick up on the road. The group destination is the resort area of Nesebar on the Bulgarian coast. Martin is keen to push on to Istabul to meet Catherine, his wife, so we push on leaving the group. A few km soth of Burgas my bike has the steel retaining ring on the rubber cushion section of the drive shaft fall apart. We ring Lang & decide to return to Nesebar. So, we backtrack about 40km.
Nice hotel on waterfront at Nesebar but the whole place reeks of the Gold Coast in Queensland.
13 th May
Martin leaves by himself at 0630 that morning to push for istanbul.
I try for 4-5 hrs to get someone to weld up my broken part - no luck.
Beautiful Bulgarian meal in local restaurant.
14th May
The group leaves and heads south through the city of Burgas with a view to reaching the Turkish border by noon. Last 48km of road from the coast to the border is very rough - my bike dies suddenly - to me something electrical has happened. Jim Campbell & I check fuses, wiring. Brian arrives & we take the front housing off motor to check engine electrics. Loose connection found by Brian on ignition switch, fixes same & bike runs. I was ready to push the thing over the side of the road!
We all reach Turkish border around 1-2.00pm and then experience the streamlined Turkish system for processing vehicles - one clerk handling a queue of 30-40 people.
Slowly we all get through and then head for the town of Kirklarelli.
Lang's bike is being towed for most of the day. Myles & Lee's bikes have to be tandem towed for some distance into Kirllarelli. At least the Turkish roads are wide & smooth - Jim speculates that it's so they can mobilise military machinery to the border quickly.
No hotel booked in Kirklarelli so we all struggle to find a hotel & book for 20 odd people +bikes. Eventually the group splits between 2 hotels. Sean shares with me - his bag is in Bev's truck because he has a car battery in his sidecar to start his bike.
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