As you can see on my live map, I have been travelling from Germany and Austria to Czech Republic on my way to Greece.
There is a vignette system in Czech Republic if you are using the highways, so let me explain to you how this works.
Author: Frederike Page 4 of 6
As you can see on my live map, I have been travelling from Germany to Austria, Czech Republic and Slovenia over to the Croatian coast on my way to Greece.
Let me tell you more about the toll system in Austria, as I have done some research here. It is really complicated and constantly confuses campers from all around the world, specifically when it comes to differences for trucks and caravans below and above 3.5 tons gross vehicle weight. So let me try to add some clarity here just for caravans and motorhomes up to 3.5 tons.
Shit happens…
Did you ever have to replace your RV mirror?! Well, I had to a couple of times already. Shit happens. And if it does you just have to deal with it.
To be exact, I had the pleasure with it three times in my camper life so far. One time I entirely lost my driver’s side mirror as another camper cut my lane on a narrow coastal street in Croatia.
Broken mirror in Croatia
I cannot even exactly replicate the other two incidences as I seemed to be hitting an overhanging street sign or tree on small streets and then damaged my passenger side mirrors. Scratches and lost turn signals were the result.
Route & Highlights
It was the beginning of March 2018, and you can possibly imagine how much I was looking forward to get out of the cold in Germany, Czech Republic and Austria. My route took me from Graz over to Zagreb – Hello Croatia! Wait a second – snow?! Yep, that was pretty much of a surprise. The inland of Croatia just got hit by a winter storm with over 1 meter of new, fresh bright white snow. And I was right in the middle of it – on Summer tires.
Snow in Croatia – what a surprise!
So I decided to quickly drive over to the coastal line, where the weather got much milder with temperatures between 10 and even 18 degrees Celsius. Istria and the islands Cres and Krk were definitely my route highlights followed by Plitvice Lakes and further along the beautiful coastal route with my final destination Dubrovnik.
Overall, I spent three weeks in Croatia with almost 15 hours on the road making distance on my way to Greece with over 1.000 kilometers.
Here is my super scenic route in detail:
First foreign country stop on this trip
After starting our trip through Europe, we have only discovered cities such as Leipzig and Dresden in Germany so far. We were therefore super excited to explore Prague, the capital city of the Czech Republic. Different culture, different language, different currency – this is what it feels like visiting a foreign country. For the first time on this 2018 trip. Unfortunately, I was very disappointed and my pleasant anticipations for this city have overall not been met. But let me tell you more about it.
From Leipzig to Prague
After our first destination Leipzig, we travelled further to Prague on our way to the South of Europe. In the middle of the route, we had to stop in Dresden to check off our travel bucket list and use the day for some sightseeing. What a great decision! I did not expect such a pretty city and could have stayed a full day or more. But one after the other…
Fiete doing sightseeing in Dresden
We are on the Road
Wow – this is actually happening! We started our Route 2018 today. After months of planning and pure excitement we are finally on the road on our trip through Europe.
Only two more days!
Today is Sunday, March 4th 2018 and we have only two more days until we will leave on our Europe Trip. Two more days! Time has been running lately the closer we come to our leaving date, and I just realized how much there is still to organize and prepare. Here is the final countdown, so I am happy to share our latest checklists, new vehicle updates and also challenges over the last couple of days.
German Planning and Greek Coolness
Even though I am not on the road yet, I just wanted to leave a short review on Greece as there will be more to come over the next couple of months. What I noticed is that – even right in the middle of planning my Route 2018 – Greek people seem to be extraordinarily friendly and helpful that it is worth a separate post:
How it started…
My and Fiete’s paths crossed in 2013. It really wasn’t a good timing as I just started a new executive job at an American tech company. I worked at least 10 hours a day plus four or more business travel days per week. But I adopted Fiete anyway because even though the timing couldn’t have been more worse, I strongly felt this was the right thing to do. And he was so cute coming as a puppy from a shelter on Cyprus, so I simply couldn’t resist. Today, I know that this was not just a co-incidence or simply a rash act. It was meant to be.