Here I was thinking it'd be tough to trump Poland for the twists and turns it provided.
Well I was very wrong, for two reasons. Two very different reasons..
The first - how incredibly beautiful the Northern part of Slovakia is.
Driving into the Tatra Mountain Range just before sunset and finding our favourite ‘free camp spot’ to date, Jake and I were speechless, both quietly satisfied with our decision to beeline here.
The second - the fact that Rosanna is no longer with us.
Yes it was unexpected, but we are surprisingly appreciative for the challenges it has provided, and before you get too concerned - we will be reunited with the old girl. Her current whereabouts - Central Slovakia, in a repair shop, awaiting a new clutch and flywheel.
Our current wherabouts - en route to Romania after 48 hours in Budapest. It has simply been a strange 4-5 days, which begun with the realisation that she wasn't in a good way. After spending two incredible days in the Northern part of the country, hiking the Tatra Mountains, we begun heading toward Hungary, which sits below Slovakia.
Unfortunately, we were forced into spending a night parked up at a gas station - neither of us comfortbale with driving to where we'd hoped to make it to. This is when the challenges began to stack up. Too late to find a local mechanic, no Wi-Fi, and no authorised repair shops anywhere nearby.
What to do? How about hiking to that castle over there? (Which actually happened to be Central Europe’s largest castle, ‘Spiš Castle’)
En route to the castle, we noticed a local bar in an otherwise ghostlike town. Not only did they have Wi-Fi, they also offered shisha & toasted panini's. Well, there's Dinner sorted, and an evening that helped us realise things could be much worse.
Ironically we had an empty water tank and couldn't seem to find a tap anywhere, meaning that the following morning started with a face wash and brush of the bones from water bottle remains. We then attempted the drive to Presov, but only managed 10km's before Rosanna decided to throw the towel in.
Stuck in an even smaller town, we were forced to go door knocking.. After a few failed attempts, we met a man who didn't speak a word of English, but kindly put me on the phone to his son (working at the time) - who organised a tow truck for us.
Finally in Presov, we were taken to a family run auto shop, which would apparently be our accomodation until hearing the van's diagnosis. Of all the overseas adventure's I've been lucky enough to go on, this scenario was beginning to develop into one of the larger pickles I've found myself in. Little did I know, it would only continue to develop.
There's been a number of testing moments, but fortunately the sarcastic laughter has outweighed those. A strong example of this ratio was the night that followed our vehicle dilemmas. Deciding to go for 'one' beer at a local pub, we left having sampled the majority of 'Kelt's' Slovakian spirit list, and with what will probably be some questionable film photo's.
Stay posted for the next update, in which we make our way towards Romania with a new (temporary) set of wheels. Thanks for reading!