Ah rain, precipitation in fact... We are in Istanbul and it has been pissing down all day, much like it did in Bucharest but here they're not really prepared for it. We also stopped for a night in Veliko Tarnovo in Bulgaria and the only thing that changed was the rain turned into snow. In fact it stayed snowy into Greece and even Istanbul was under a layer when we arrived though it had gone by morning (yesterday was nice though if a little chilly...).

We left Bucharest in the rain which was appropriate as it's a pretty dreary place, not that much to see and particularly affected by wars, communism and the follies of despotic rule. During this trip we have learnt not to listen to any hype in lonely planet guides (which in spite of their editorial style are like the eponymous starbucks of the travel guide world). Anyway, south of the capital is much of a muchness, flat and monotonous until you get to the border. When we got there we couldn't find a single open lunch place so eventually stopped in a "Penny" supermarket which anyone who's been to eastern europe will know that it's the Aldi equivalent over here.

The border provided a few laughs. First we'd made an effort to spend all our Lei but then discovered there was a bridge toll, so back into town to find a cashpoint. When we got to the first checkpoint things become a little difficult to follow. The guy asks for our green card. Of course First Alternative Insurance (take note of the name!) has assured me that I don't need one for any European nation (thats European, not just EU) and I hand over my insurance certificate. The upshot is that we've been driving for over a week in Romania without any insurance whatsoever... I'm supposed to pay 150 Euros for the insurance I haven't got and a 30 Euro fine. After a little discussion he eventually agrees to waive the insurance on the basis that we don't come back and we slip the 30 Euros (actually 20GBP and 10 Euros cos we've run out of cash) into the passport and when its handed back the money has gone... A little shady but seems to work. At the next checkpoint we apparently have missed something (and I will never know what) and have to go back to the previous check with $45 for which there is no receipt. I think they're laughing at us now. Then there is the 66 Lei road tax that we apparently have to pay which we know nothing about, but they only take Lei so its off to the money changer to swap some more dollars at a laughable rate before we're finally allowed out of the country. The Bulgarian side seems more transparent - we're asked straight away if we have a green card which we don't so buy a weeks insurance for about $15. We then need a road tax sticker (4 Euros) and a "disinfection fee" of 2 Euros and we're through!

Going to have to find some time to write a letter to First Alternative! Twats.

Its about a 1.5 hour drive to Veliko Tarnovo which is Bulgaria's medieval capital, a pretty town crammed onto the top of a gorge around a tight S-bend of the river. When we arrive its snowing and dark which makes navigating the steep, narrow cobbled streets a bit tricky. Things are made trickier by the fact that Bulgaria uses the cyrillic alphabet and dual script signposts are still a rarity. Eventually we find the cheap hotel listed in the guide book and book ourselves in. Of course nothing's even that simple - the passport control forgot to stamp our passports so the hotel can't check us in until the police have come round to verify our authenticity. On top of that Bulgaria operates a state sanctioned foreigner pricing system where we get charged double what the locals do though to be fair its not exactly expensive even after that. Bulgarians clearly haven't thrown off the old communist system with the same gusto as the other nations we have visited.

We feel the need for a relaxing evening and thankfully get one. The restaurant downstairs is packed and we share a table with an unsmiling Bulgarian couple. The portions are huge, the pizza (chicken fried in brancy butter with wild muchrooms and rosemary) fantastic, lovely trout fillets in sesame seed and a rather good stuffed chicken breast with sweet pepper in sauce. Outside the snow is falling thickly and we go to prop up the bar in a busy pub - all very warm and christmassy.

Next day we decide that the town isn't too exciting so set off quite early for the Turkish border. We don't particularly fancy going through the police registration rigmarole again and in any case there's nothing really to see on the way. Unfortunately the first road we try is suddenly blocked, apparently by an accident and our non-cyrillic 1:800000 map is no help getting round. We head back to VT to try the other main road and are nearly over the mountains (some great overtaking on snowy hairpins etc) when suddenly everything stops again. After a 40 minute wait the word comes back that cars are to go through and we pass a queue of about 2 miles of lorries to the accident site where a lorry has left the road and a huge crane is lifting the wreckage out of the valley bottom.

The southern side of Bulgaria is almost as boring as southern Romania although the sun is now out and the scenery is getting more mediteranean. We hit the motorway and as we do see a sign saying "Greece, 8Km", which is too hard to resist so we turn the car round and head to Greece. As an EU country the borders should be less hassle and we can stock up on Euros and make a couple of cheap phone calls. In Greece there's a little snow araound and it's still bitterly cold so we head more of less straight to the Turkish border. This border crossing is quite a minor one but we're through the Greek side with no problems. The Turkish side is best described as a bit chaotic. We go to office 1 to show our passports. Then to office 4 to sort the car. Of course we don't have a green card and this is where things get interesting. There is nowhere at the border to buy insurance so eventually (no one speaks any English) a fixer/taxi driver offers to take us into town to buy it there. Back to office 3 to buy our visas (10GBP) and office 1 to get them stamped. Then we're free to enter the country so we take the taxi into town. The fixer finds us an open insurance broker (at 7 on saturday evening!) and we somehow end up with 3 months insurance for about 15GBP. After picking up his dinner we're back to the border - office 4 to show the car documents, office 3 to get the stamp for the car (the chappy can't find the UK in his country list for about 15 minutes!) and then office 1 for the last stamp and we're off! Never found out what office 2 did...

Had an excellent kebab in the city and then decided to press on to Istanbul with the idea of finding a cheap hotel on the outskirts and driving in the next morning. Of course the Turks haven't yet hit on the idea of scummy out of town hotels so Grapes spends several hours driving round the edges of Istanbul without a map gradually having a nervous breakdown as we're cut up and harrased by lunatic Turkish drivers driving through reds, the wrong way up one way streets, over kerbs all at great speed. At about 1am we have arrived at the airport and there are still no cheap hotels so we stop at one of the expensive ones. The cheapest room is 215 Euros so we use the toilets to show our disdain for the place before asking the concierge if he knows any cheap hotels nearby. Happily he turns out to be very helpful (doubt he could afford to stay here!) and finds us a decent room for $50. He gets us a taxi which we follow to the hotel as he doesn't have a map. Thank God for that. We have a well earned beer and pass out at about 2:30.

Next day (yesterday) we decide to drive as far into Istanbul as we can and get a hotel within strking distance of the centre. After a bit of aimless driving we eventually arrive about a mile from the historic centre in a cheap hotel with free parking. Even at the end of this trip I reckon navigating Istanbul without a map will be one of our greatest achievements!

In the afternoon we wandered round the city without any great purpose. Its lovely and bustling but very cold and quite expensive. I'm happy though as almost everywhere you go you can smell bbqing meat! As we'll be picking up some visas in Ankara we may be eating a lot of this over the next couple of weeks (and Turkey is a very big country...).