Will I be Arrested???

13/11/2025

A loooong driving day. Over 11 hours with a shop stop, lunch and the border back into Turkey. Sim replenished and cash obtained. 560km, most of it in driving rain.

J, as passenger had to walk through the border. I nearly got arrested for smuggling. Stupidly I hadn’t checked the regs for importing wine from Georgia. Only 1ltr pp!!! After an hour, I was allowed to keep 10 bottles. 9 were confiscated. I hadn’t tried to conceal the other 4 boxes in the door well. But once I realised, they’d not been spotted, my fleece was flung over them. I also stashed another bottle in the fridge! I can collect the confiscated wines within 3 months, on re entry to Georgia 😂. I nearly suggested the border guards might drink it, but remembered this may be insulting to Muslims!

We finally parked up at a place we stayed at before. It’s so much easier going somewhere you know after a long day. A takeaway in the van so we could have a glass of the contraband!

And Repeat

14/11/2025

9 hr driving day. Another 590 km. Stopped for lunch and diesel/LPG. My neck and shoulders are suffering.

Çorum our overnight stop, is modern with a lovely park, where we spent a super quiet night.m. With doing all this driving, I’m refusing to cook. And J can’t / won’t cook. So supper was in a pretentious restaurant called The Suits 😂. Food good though.

Ankara: Ada Karavans

15/11/3025

Only 233km today to our lovely repair chaps. We went shopping and for some lunch. Sat inside whilst a man on the roof. Another in the shower. And the little one said Roll Over.

We spent a good hour with them trying to work out why the heating works on electric but not gas. Erfan phoned a friend. Eventually they said we would have to go to an Alde dealer in Istanbul. We didn’t really want to mess with Istanbul traffic. I put a post on wildcamping.co.uk. Woke in the night and checked for answers. One suggested a tick box under installed settings on the control panel. At 0400 I did this. By 0500 we were warm, too toasty! I can only think it had been fiddled with on the last service.

Airbag repair 1

16/11/3025

A wasted day really. I imparted the good news about the heating. We had to wait for the son to return to pay up. £265 for new shower drain, resealed skylight, a window frame turned the correct way and gas investigation. Again, very happy to pay for quality workmanship at such a good price.

ADA Karavans had rung the airbag people so they were expecting us. After a few checks, it is a new problem. A relief that the airbag glue from our last visit held up. But he needed to order parts and to return tomorrow morning.

We looked on P4N, but the nearest was the lake campsite 65k north. So we returned to this peaceful sanctuary. Ducks, geese and a strange looking rabbit. £13.34 with all services and free to use the washing machine. A needed relaxing afternoon.

Airbag Repair 2

17/11/2025

Up early, walk around the lake and services done. The 65k back south to Ankara. We were 6 hours at the air suspension place. But they had to identify the problem and buy parts. Fortunately not the same air bag leaking. It was the inlet to the bellows (Google translate). We walked to the nearby shops. Had coffee. Walked Corrie around a park. Took out another wedge of cash not knowing what the bill would be. Paying 20% extra is a plastic card deterrent. I knitted and caught up on Strictly. J napped and read. It was a long 6 hours. We had thought we would need to go to Zampatas Brothers in Thessaloniki, as they are a Goldschmidt agent, but now we need not.
The bill was only £123. We’ve a lot of Turkish cash to spend in the next two days. Maddy, my daughter, suggested it has become free money!!!

We drove 2 hours to a lake side picnic area. Supper out was only £10.67 for fried carp and koftes. Not made much of a dent in our wedge of cash.