Nai-publish: 24.06.2023
Montenegro is just beautiful. Started right after breakfast. It quickly went onto a very narrow mountain road. Meeting traffic was mostly only possible at passing places. However, there was little traffic, there was nothing going on in my direction, a few locals came in the opposite direction, driving through the mountains as if there were no tomorrow. You have to be very careful. But the highlight was, of course, a German couple. They had to drive on this narrow road with their 8m motorhome. That was pretty tight, I was on the mountain side with my motorcycle, better not to look to the right. And mom in the motorhome was happy, I would have .........., he was also sweating, but more concerned about not getting any scratches on his great motorhome. We somehow managed to pass each other. It must have been fun for him, he had only done about 5 km, about 70 more to go, without the possibility to turn around, with partly extremely steep and narrow bends. I think his wife quickly stopped laughing.
Then we continued towards Croatia, through the city of Budva with a ferry across a sea inlet or fjord to the border. The border clearance was done in 10 minutes again, but the Macedonian and Croatian checkpoints are about 1km apart, I wasn't aware of that anymore, then another 20 km to my accommodation. A whole holiday apartment for a steal. The temperatures were again well above 30 degrees Celsius all day, the highest temperature in the mountains was 37 degrees Celsius. At that point, you don't feel like doing any sightseeing. Just driving and enjoying the wind.
Today I spent about 270 km on the D8, the so-called Adriatic Highway. A really beautiful route along the Adriatic Sea almost all the way. In the past, the road had a special feature, Croatia was divided by Bosnia and Herzegovina for about 10 km. In the past, there were two border crossings. With a huge effort, the Croats created a bypass road. The D8 now leads to a peninsula off the Bosnian coast, and a long bridge takes you back to Croatian mainland.
However, a downside is the crazy traffic, so at a moderate to slow pace, you at least have time to look around.
You can see Dubrovnik beautifully from above, but I also turned off, there is an Aprilia dealer in Dubrovnik, where I had to buy new brake pads. The ones on the rear wheel are worn out and need to be replaced.
I spared myself another visit to the old town. In the harbor, there were three large cruise ships that were about to unleash their passengers on the city. I don't know how many tour buses were ready to transport these masses of people to the old town.
I continued on my way. Around noon, I took a swimming break to cool down a bit. Then another two hours of driving until I reached my accommodation for today.
Then I tried to change the brake pads, no chance with the tools I have. The retaining pin is secured with a cotter pin, that's no problem, the bolt itself can also be easily turned, but it cannot be driven out. I guess I have to go to a workshop, earliest on Monday.
Let's see how it continues tomorrow. I only have 280 km left to our meeting point and Lenard is not coming until Tuesday.