Bologna

🚐🇪🇺 NIX EUROPEAN DRIFT | Italy → Croatia Planning Edition 🇮🇹➡️🇭🇷

Tonight’s office is a campsite somewhere near Bologna with Underworld playing softly inside Vanilla while campervans from half of Europe surround me.

Swiss behind me.
German to the left.
Belgian to the right.
Dutch in front.

It feels less like a campsite and more like a NATO summit for people who own levelling ramps.

The trip keeps evolving daily. What started as a simple solo drive across Europe has now somehow turned into a strategic mission to get myself into Croatia in time for the Europa League Final. ⚽🍺

Current route planning looks something like:

Tuscany 🌲
Florence 🏛️
Bologna 🍝
Trieste 🌊
Croatia 🇭🇷
Bosnia 🇧🇦
Serbia 🇷🇸
Austria 🇦🇹
Germany 🇩🇪
Belgium 🇧🇪

I’ve spent the last few days drifting through Tuscany which honestly feels too beautiful to be real at times. Long cypress tree roads, hilltop towns, medieval streets, old stone buildings and scenery that looks like somebody turned the saturation up on real life.

Siena was superb.
Pisa was packed with tourists all pretending to hold the tower up.
Lucca was lovely even though I skipped climbing Guinigi Tower because it didn’t open until 10am and the road was calling.

The Swiss Alps at Lauterbrunnen still remain one of the biggest highlights so far. Absolutely staggering scenery. One of those places where you just stand there quietly for a minute taking it all in.

Meanwhile Vanilla continues to be brilliant. 🚐
Not a single complaint from the old girl. She just keeps carrying me further south one motorway, mountain pass and espresso stop at a time.

Still haven’t properly flown the drone yet either which feels slightly ridiculous considering the scenery I’ve seen so far.

I’m also becoming strangely experienced in:

* European beer price mathematics 🍺
* Campervan water strategy 🚿
* Italian toll roads 💸
* Service station survival 🛣️
* And trying to remember which country I’m actually waking up in each morning.

This whole adventure already feels like one of the best things I’ve ever done.

Just me, Vanilla, Europe, football, mountain roads and complete freedom.

More drifting still come… 🚐🔥
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