In Greece, I’ve made three VERY important discoveries:
1. The temperature threshold for eating porridge is around 25 degrees celsius. After that? Nah. It’s just wrong.
2. Don’t believe the hype….and try to pay for things in US dollars on the assumption that the Greeks have lost so much confidence in their banks that they’ve gone the way of the South Americans. You look - and feel - like a bit of a **** when you do so.
3. Greek hospitality is still alive and well - and at it’s very best in NW Corfu and a place called Hotel Nafsika, Agios Stefanos, where I vegged out for 2 days and ate some amazing food, thanks to old family friend and hotel owner Spiros. If you’re interested, you should definitely look him up.
It’s now 4 weeks since I left the UK. It’s been a stonking start to the trip and a reminder that Europe is great place to ride a motorbike, because you can see so much in such a small distance.
Today I’ll leave the EU behind and go into Turkey - a pretty important moment in the trip. From here, things will get more challenging but hopefully even more rewarding.
To use what’s quite possibly my most favourite quote of all time, from Demon Headmaster lookalike and former US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld:
“There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know.”
In Europe, it’s a piece of cake - this the third time I’ve crossed it by motorbike in 3 years, so I know the drill. The known knowns are plentiful. So are the known unknowns. There aren’t many unknown unknowns - that’s the point of the EU, something that strikes you as soon as you leave it.
Obviously if you know the unknowns, you can always try and find out more so that they are not unknown, if you see what I mean - English is widely spoken, you know what you’re getting when dealing with the police, decent maps are available, camp sites are everywhere, t’internet is easily and often freely available, mobile signal is rarely below a few bars, even in places like Albania where Vodafone seem to have some kind of weird-ass monopoly on the place that delivers better coverage than in London.
But once I’m through Turkey into the Caucasus countries and beyond, I’m expecting the number of unknown unknowns to ramp up - whether it be dealing with troublesome coppers, variable roads, paperwork, getting visas, sorting replacement parts or dodging crazy drivers.
Travelling solo, working out all the little day to day stuff can quickly add up to be a PITA too - whether it be finding somewhere to sleep each night, washing clothes, getting enough of the right currency or being able to keep in touch with the UK.
You realise how convenient everything is closer to home - and how it’s in our nature to take that for granted.
Now this might all sound a bit negative - it’s not meant to. For me, this risk/reward mix is what this trip is all about. Being able to look after yourself, your bike and get them both to a place by overcoming whatever challenges come your way - and learning something from that is a hugely rewarding experience and one which led me to doing this trip.
And most importantly in taking these risks, you create opportunities to see more things that are real, genuine and authentic, before commerce inevitably takes over and the opportunity to do so, at least in some small way, is lost.