Milestones

Monday 3 June 2013

Today was a special day on our trip. In a way it is our turning point – from here we will start on our trip home winding our way back through a few more countries. We are loving our time here in Turkey rediscovering places we already knew and finding some idyllic new spots.

Deserted bay on Datca Peninsula

Beautiful bay south of Fethiye

We have arrived at our friends home in Mumcular, not far from Bodrum, which was always part of our big plan from the outset. In the 80’s when we lived in Turkey we shared many ‘Famous Five’ trips with them and their dog Brian. Today Jake is their little four legged friend and we will be out and about on day trips enjoying the early summer weather. 

Jake taking us for a walk this evening

Over the past couple of weeks we have reached a few milestones on our trip.

On the road today, not far from their house, we clocked up 10,000 miles since leaving Shrewsbury in November. We estimated we would do about 15,000 on our trip and, depending on how long we stay in Greece and how far we travel there, we probably wont be too far off that figure by the time we get home. I don’t like to tempt fate and say we’ve had no problems but we really haven’t so far. Dave certainly knew what we needed in a van when he spotted this one. It’s kept us warm at temperatures well below freezing in the Alps and now, as the temperatures climb into the 30’s, with the mozzie mesh up and the windows open we get a lovely breeze blowing through. The hard suspension and high ground clearance has meant we can explore places well off the beaten track without worrying about ‘bottoming out’. 

Trip planning - a year ago

The van, which is 13 years old, recently clocked up 40,000 miles - an average of about 3000 miles a year. That’s quite low overall but, perhaps not surprisingly, we have put about a third of those miles on it ourselves. We bought it in Abergavenny on a snowy day back in February 2012 – one of my first posts was about us buying the van

 

We left the UK on 22/11/2012 so we have been away for just over 6 months. We spent 3 months working in France and have been on the road for another 3 months since leaving the Alps. We’ve met some lovely people on our travels and have seen some fantastic sights. We’ve also met up with family and friends and hope to see a few more before we return to the UK in the autumn. When that will be depends on whether we pick up any more work and how long the funds last.

Evening in Fethiye with Mum & Greta

Not sure where we will be yet for the BIG milestone…...my (and twin sister Sue’s of course) 50^th birthday in October.