Once again we woke up and realized we were nearly halfway thru our trip and had not reached the country we had picked as the country we were going to visit on this trip. We have gotten very comfortable with Greece, and Nikos had recommended several other places we should visit, but we decided we needed to get to Bulgaria as that was the country we had intended to visit and time was running out.
So we woke up a little early, checked out of the hotel and headed out to the motorhome dealer we had left François at. There was a little drama when we learned from the dealer last night that the warranty against leaks we thought lasted 10 years had expired and they could not do the test. After a quick email with a representative from Knaus we learned that the 10 year warranty started in 2017 and François is a 2016 with a 5 year warranty that had expired last year.
We headed out towards the Bulgarian border for a very quick and relaxing drive on the Greek toll ways. The border was uneventful, except while I was dealing with the Greek passport control guy, there was a knock on Tons door. The guy was not in uniform but announced he was Police and we needed to open the door and let him inspect the interior. I looked at the passport guy and asked him police? When he looked up quizzically the guy not in uniform had been replaced with a guy in uniform so he said yes let them inspect, but I could tell by his face this was unusual.
After I let them in the policeman in uniform told me to open all of the doors and cupboards, but the guy not in uniform said something to him in Greek and asked me to show him the bathroom. While he was looking in the bathroom he asked me where we bought it. He then asked where the kitchen was so I pointed at the stove top and refrigerator. He then asked me how much we paid for it and did we like it. I told him how much and yes we loved it. He then asked if we had enjoyed Greece and I told him Greece was awesome and we would be back soon. He said great and thanked us.
I think the guy might be in the market for a camper van and saw us in line and decided to get a tour of the inside of ours. This explains the confused look from the passport guy, and the other policeman being confused that he did not want to see all of the nooks and crannies of François. The good news was while I was dealing with our “police inspection” the Greek passport guy had handed our passports to the Bulgarian passport guy who he shared an office with and we were welcome to enter Bulgaria.
After weeks of beach front living we are parked in an Aire next to the second busiest road in Sofia and across from a very busy self serve car wash, by the way self serve car washes do not exist in Greece for some reason, so we will be giving François a good bath in the next couple of days. The owner of the Aire lived in Massachusetts for 6 years and said we were his first American customers. He gave us some recommendations for places to visit in Bulgaria and Sofia and we talked about life in the US and Bulgaria for a while.
We started out on a short walk, but it was cold and Ton decided I could finish the walk without her. I went down the road to find a grocery and take the bad pictures for todays blog. Tomorrow we are heading downtown to check out Sofia.