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During October I traveled by train and bus around Europe, mostly in Balkan countries. The excuse for the trip was a mid-month Democrats Abroad (DA) regional meeting in Athens. I decided – mostly on the way back – to visit as many Balkan countries as I could, but I wanted to be home by Ellinor’s Halloween birthday, so time in each country would be strictly limited.

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I also realized that I could visit an old Zen teacher in southern Germany on the way down. Other than in Germany, I had lovely mildly-warm weather until the last two days, and I had a wonderful trip overall, a fantastic time. I enjoyed all the countries very much.

 

I also had some adventures (and disasters), including: sleeping in an “abandoned” (empty, under remodeling) hostel in Bulgaria; being stranded at the Greek border for six hours in the middle of the night; an electrical fire in Albania; a couple of hitchhiking episodes in Romania (one successful, the other ending in an encounter with Hungarian border police and a €165 taxi ride to Budapest). Here’s what happened.