UK - Romania - Bulgaria/Black Sea ?
 

I'm hoping to set off around Easter on an XTZ750 solo as above. I guess I'll go southish via Italy but I'd like any tips re Romania and/or Bulgaria. I'm assuming that once they're in the EU from January the paperwork will be reasonably straightforward and I'm even thinking my Carol Nash insurance and roadside assistance will apply. Am I being over optimistic? I haven't found out about currency i.e. will it be euros by then?
I'm thinking I'll go open ended and see how it goes - up to 3 months ish. I'm a bit of a beginner outside the usual trips into France, Spain, Germany, Italy etc. I presume lots of you have done this trip but I can't find anything.

Just a few points:

• In my experience, road conditions can be pretty bad especially in Bulgaria (potholed and rutted)
• Take it easy on the roads. There are a lot of slow moving vehicles including horse-drawn especially in Romania. Be extra careful going around bends and expect something to be in the road.
• Don’t speed either, you’ll give the local police a reason to pull you over.

Have fun. Stephan

These are good points!

We found the road in Bulgaria to be a lot better than in Romania (especially in the north east)
Policeman were very nice in both countries, but I think we were lucky.

LEARN how to read cyrillic, 'cos off the beaten track you WILL need it!

Enjoy, both are nice countries!

UK - Romania - Bulgaria/Black Sea
 

HI Mickba...
Stephano is right about that. Go slow, keep you eyes open :biggrin3:

I found a lot of info recently as I too am planning to do Romania in 2007
out of Austria...

Perhaps these couple of Links/Urls will help you.
All in English...good pictures too (for an idea of the Areas).


If I remember correctly, there are good maps in this Page too. :thumbup1:
1.www.romaniatravel.com


This is a possible contact and overnight there...right at the Carpathian
Mountains...Rodger from England and his wife Lili from Romania have a
nice B&B there in Campulung...in the middle south area.
They love guests and have a lot of infos too...just contact them if you
like.
2.www.visionsofromania.co.uk/


This next Website is not necessarily what you might be interested in, but
info anyway...pictures are interesting tho...is an enduro page...

On the Website, in the Navigation on the left side...find 'Arrivals'.
Check that out...will give you good entrance and driving infos.
3.www.xventure.net/en/anreise.php

Currency...Romania & Bugaria 2007...there will probably be, as of
January 1, 2007, a currency transition period there. maybe a year or two.
This simply means the currencies of both countries will still be valid...as will also the Euro there, which means two valid currencies :w00t: .

...In Slovenia it was so...during the transition period, everything will be adjusted into Euros. That does take time...
Collecting and gathering in the old currency and rearranging all the other stuff. :eek3:

I hope this helps a little. If your german is ok, I have more infos for Romania and Bulgaria too...motorcycle tours and travel stories, perhaps accomodations. :innocent:

At any rate enjoy working your trip out. That's half the fun. :biggrin3: :scooter:

...keep the wheels down. Greetings from Vienna.
Richard aka silverwolf

Went through both countries at the end of May. My impressions ;

Romania : Roads between Buch.-Const. and black coast is ok. But North and North-east sections are quite bad. Do expect every thing at the corners you cannot see. There can be anything there including biig bumps or potholes. US dollar is excepted and prefered ( as to Euro)

Bulgaria : Coast line is slow pace trafic since its only one line in each direction but beatiful scenery. Roads are ok.

In believe in both countries fuel is diluted. So carrying octane booster might be a good idea.

Cheers,

Wow!!
 

Thanks everyone for such quick and useful replies - plenty to go at already. I've already started preparing the bike. I have two XTZ750s and the one I'm planning to go on has only done 4k miles but there's still lots to do to make sure everythings OK and there's luggage system, crash bars, electrical mods etc etc to sort. I bought a third bike with fairly good plastic so i'll probably t/f that for the trip so that I don't have to worry too much if I have the odd scrape. Looks like I have plenty to do this winter planning the route etc..
Thanks.
Mick

Mick,

I did a similar jaunt this summer on a TDM (with a friend also on a TDM). But ferried from Venice to Igoumenitsa in Greece and then bimbled back up through Bulgaria and Romania. Really enjoyed biking in Northern Greece. some great areas, like the Pindos mountains.

In the unlikely event that either Bulgaria or Romania don't get into the EU before you travel: Carole Nash are not always right in the advice they give about Romania and Bulgaria. They may well tell you that you are covered for Bulgaria and Romania and that you don't need a green card. "Just use the back of the insurance document". You will need Bulgaria and Romania mentioned by name somewhere on your insurance documentation, unless you intend to buy Ins. at the borders.

In Bulgaria there is a small village called Melnik (off the E79) by the Greek border. We found it by mistake after getting lost on a variety of dirt tracks. Was a really pleasant place.

I particularly enjoyed the Trojan area. The #35 road off main road #6 was a belter.

In romania. think easter is going to be too early in the year for you to go over the Tranfagarasan Highway, which is a shame.

As already mentioned, the roads are a crazy mixture of horse and cart and arcticulated lorries! With lots of potential road kill thrown in for good measure.

Hope you arent too scared of dogs....you will get chased.....ALOT. And get your waving arm in practice.....we did only back roads and spent lots of time waving and stopping to chat with people....including being stopped by workers in the middle of roadworks!

We had no problem with police. Without fail we were flashed by oncoming traffic miles before seeing police.

If you go back via Hungary, there is good camping/bunks here: www.magyarroute66.hu with a bike workshop.

Sure you will have a blast. Its also worth contacting the HU communities for these areas. I got LOADS of very useful info from Andrei about romania before travelling.

Boop
dapleb

thanks some more...............
 

.........forgot to ask - is satnav any use out there and if so which one - garmin or which?
Thanks
Mick

I used a Quest 2 in both countries, and it was great...It's even better if you play with google earth and find the lat/longs of the place you want and transfer to the gps!

As for Romania and Bulgaria becoming part of Euro...that will take another TEN years at least...

Melnik is lovely, but TAKE bulgarian leva with you as there is NO ATM in the village (And we found that out the hard way)!

satnav
 

Hello again...

For your Satnav:
Garmin would be fine.
The Garmin Model GPS map276c is a good one for example.
I looked into this too...seems more in the middle, upper middle price class to me. Has some good features...Motorcycle and Nautical use possible...
seems to be an allrounder...is a personal preference I guess...they have other good models too, as you surely know. :biggrin3: .

Don't know if you know this either, but will post it anyway...:confused1:
Touratec has Garmin products and other goodies too.
Their Website has a Country and Language search function...
...meaning it is in English too...
you might want to check it out...they also have an On-line shop.
www.touratec.de

Further, if you like to check out Romanian Maps, the are two relatively new ones out. :clap:

This one is from a Hungarian Company...Dimaps. Good Maps.
Transylvania/Romania...1:250,000. Euro 30.
They have an On-line shop too...
www.map.hu/

The second one is from Freytag & Berndt.
Romanian Superatlas....1:250,000...also good. Euro 22.95
They too have an On-line shop.
www.freytagberndt.at/

Seems you got a lot to check thru for your venture! Enjoy, and :scooter: .

Greetings and regards from Vienna.
Richard aka silverwolf.

Forget about the EU - that will take its time, esp regarding any change in currency.

For Romania, May will most certainly be too early to travel the beautiful mountain roads in higher altitudes, but the north (Maramures) has lots to offer. Monastries, chapels, beautiful villages, but as said before, take the secondary roads. Very friendly people. And don't forget your puncture repair kit. You'll need it!

ATMs are only in the towns, at petrol stations when paying with a credit card you need to know your pin.

May too early?
 

Well the timing of the trip isn't carved in stone - if it would make a lot of difference I could maybe reorganise and go in July following on from the Stella run - might be a lot more logical actually.
As someone said, I have a lot to do to get this organised. If I don't go until July there will be less time pressure on when to get back.
Re satnav I'm waiting for the launch of the Garmin Zumo (soon I think) - it's looking expensive at present but I reckon it will tumble after xmas - looks good.
It seems an awful long time before I go but I'm hoping to be away jan-march so i want to get as much as possible done before the end of the year.
Thanks again for a brilliant response and I'll do my profile when I get back from the pub.

Romania
 

Look, here you'll find a lot of FAQ and answers about Romania:

http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub.../romania-19360

Anyway if you are in RO, contact me, OK?


Szabi

Mickba,
You’re planning an interesting trip. We just returned from a similar six week trip, our route was east from Dunkirk in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, North western Greece, Albania, Montenegro, Croatia, Slovakia, Austria, Germany, Luxembourg and France.
Great trip we never had any deadlines apart from catching the ferries. We took camping equipment but only used it a few times; we spent most of our time in Romania, Bulgaria, and NW Greece.
We used two bikes (Transalps) and the total costs including ferries but not bike consumables (tyres oil etc.) came to £47 a day. We covered 6000 miles. The Transalps were brilliant and the only thing needed apart from petrol was a chain adjustment on one. I used a Pirelli MT90 AT the rear has still got some wear in it after 7000 miles. We used a Donlop 607s on the other bike.
Get the cheapest convenient ferry crossing (I used Norfolk lines) one way outward bound and on the way back find an internet café and book a ticket with Speed ferries from Boulogne, this is the only company I could find which offers a one-way price from France (£17) without playing games with one way trip prices from France.
You can get a green card on the boarders, but I did not bother for Romania and Albania (I am not recommending this) Bulgaria was 30 Euro for 30 days; Montenegro was 10 Euro for 30 days. Albania has a tourist tax and the daily rate is 5 Euro and they have a bike tax 2 Euro a day which you may or may not have to pay.
It is a great trip, May is a little early for the southern mountains of Romania. Northwestern Greece is an adventure rider’s paradise, bigger than the Alps, more rugged than the Pyrenees more dirt roads than the Picos and it’s not busy. The coast road through Albania, Montenegro, and Croatia is one of the top coast road drives in the world, but you need the right conditions. In summer (July August) it becomes a nightmare with very heavy traffic conditions, miss these two months and is great. I have ridden it both in May and October and it has had light traffic.
In Romania, NW Greece and Croatia it is common to get accommodation with a little kitchen.
One word of warning a lot of the roads in Greece and the Balkans’ have very low levels of grip and I mean low, try to avoid riding in the wet and if you have to ride take a lot of care. YOU WILL NOT HAVE EXPERIENCED ROADS AS SLIPERY AS THESE. Police presence is high everywhere and speeding is thier priority, we only got stopped once (Bulgaria) and they where just curious and friendly.
I like Romania and Albania, Bulgaria is good, it's ex Soviet history is very much in evidence, Albania can be very dirty but the people are very friendly, accommodation can be scarce.
Petrol when we traveled cost generally around the 1 Euro a liter, and we did change some money for day to day stuff but the Euro is king if you get stuck, we usually paid for accommodation in Euro everywhere. In Dubrovnik we were given the choice of which currency we used to pay for the apartment, we used the local currency because it was cheaper because of the exchange rate.
Do your country research and take good maps and try to stay off the main roads. I used a Garmin 2610 with World Map, it's not necessary but very handy getting in and out of towns and cities as sign posts are non existent. GPS needs some investment in time to get the best from it, if you going to use a GPS get plenty of practice in before you go.
Get some Health insurance I use Direct Travel Ins. they cover motorcycle travel and you can get cover for 3 months plus. Also check you bike insurance European cover, some won't cover a 90 day per trip, some insurance companies are as low as 30 day per year. A lot of these countries are changing fast Albania never used to have duel carriageway or Armco. The Balkans, Romania and Bulgaria are just sucking up loads of used cars from Western Europe.

See you on the road.

Steve

Hi Mickba

These replies say all that I was going to tell you. You'll have a great trip. There is more info on this topic on the HUBB from previous years -check it out.

Good luck
good roads

thanks to everyone............
 

........such a brilliant response - i never expected so much help - just to let you know i'm soaking it all up, as no doubt others are - i'll get back to some of you later if i may, as the trip gets more detailed
thanks again
Mick

Hi Mick,

I don't know much about Bulgaria, but I was in Romania two times. First by bike and second by car. It's a great country, with very good hospitality, people are very helpful,...

Check my website : www.motodiary.info I tink you will find some info for your trip.

Good road !!!

I`m from Serbia and I`ve been in Bulgaria last year on the road from Turkey, and my friends from my club were in Romania two years ago. Romania have a good landskapes but roads are so,so, very cheap country, friendly people. Bulgarian roads are better every year, either cheap, better landskapes are on the north of the country. On Bulgarian seaside you can have good time, good food, accomodation, every for a little money. Don`t worry about safety anywhere. Sorry for my not so good enlish.

I did that with Carole Nash too. Romania, at least for me, was much MUCH more interesting than Bulgaria. No police issues there, but Bulgaria is crawling with them. Check out my blog 'Kevin Payne' for more detailed info. Happy to answer specific questions once u have looked at that.

Hi mickba,

I am planning a similar solo trip, starting (hopefully) with LeMans 24 in April, then heading East, no timescale or ties, only timeframe is the International Transalp rally in Austria, May 15th for a few day's.

If you fancy meeting up for a while, feel free to contact me.

Phil

Welcome to Romania!!!!

As a romanian I will recomend you to stay in the north and west region of Romania, roads are more suitable to enduro than to street bikes. In north regions you can enjoy beautifull lanscape, virgin nature, monuments, nice people. In south and eastern romania you should be aware of gypsies - take care of your pockets :(. people are still nice but not like in north.

Also keep your eyes open on the roads .... drivers don't often respect bikers and don't respect driving rules so you can see a driver turning in the middle of the street even if he has a continuous line, road signs for priority are not respected and treated as they should ... slow down before cross-roads.

If you are in rural zone and is almost night take care and look for cows and horses because is "coming home hour".

Truk drivers are crazy and especially look out for cars with foreign numbers from Spain and Italy ..... 90% of them are romanians .... and they have to prove what car they bought from their work abroad ... so they are driving like sh**.

Don't expect to meet ATM's allover or exchange houses - allways change your money on city at a bank or at a trusty exchange office ... not on street.
Also be aware on small motells or hotels that accept credit cards but they don't require pin authorisation for tranzactions .... allways look at the person who handels your card.


Maybe I scared you .... but is better to know.

It worth to visit Romania, and you will see that you will wish to come again.
:welcome:

Not so true ....... Euro is not a valid curency in Romania .... it will be in 2008-2009 .... but now you still have to change in Lei

People accept euros ... but they trick you ....:rolleyes2: YOU CAN'T PAY IN EURO!!!!

I visited Romania in the summer of 2006 on a Honda ST 1100 and thought the whole country was just delightful. Nice people, good food, very low cost compared to western Europe. What Kumuya said in post #21 about roads and driving is very true. You have to slow down, you will be sharing the road with horses, horses and carts (in rural areas), and the big truck drivers really are jerks. Passenger cars that have Romanian plates on them are fine, no worries. Passenger cars (especially larger ones) with Western European plates on them are the big problem - they are being driven by expat Romanians who are home for a visit.

Motorcycles (other than scooters in the city) are uncommon in Romania, so, I don't think drivers are really used to looking for motos... that's the heart of the problem. Keep your headlight on and wear an orange or yellow safety vest when you ride.

Roads themselves fall into three main categories: Brand new and as good as you will find in Switzerland, kind of old and not really the best, but fine nonetheless, or (more commonly) being dug up to make the transition between the two states mentioned first.

Keep your wits about you, don't rush into anything you can't see, and you will be just fine.

Hi Kumuya,

Do you know about road conditions in east Romania, especially in Galati area.
I'm travelling in Odessa next April and one plan is to continue route Odessa-Galati-Bucharest-Brasov. On that route I have to ride through Moldova. We as EU citizens dont need a visa anymore, but is the border crossing working nevertheless ?

Moldavian roads are 90% good on major route - like Suceava to Bucharest, Galati - Bucharest is not bad but I don't know how are secondary roads.
Now depend from Galati what route you choose to Bucharest, If you take Galati - Braila - Slobozia - Bucharest ... Is a good road at least Slobozia Bucharest is ok.

Or if you take Galati-Focsani- Bucharest ..... also Focsani - Bucharest is a very good road ... but in Galati area depend if it will be again a flood ... roads will be affected

Bucharest - Brasov is a good road only if you will go on week-end you should expect many cars

ALSO many roads will have radar systems - Bucharest - Brasov already has, but if you go along many cars you will notice where are radars because all are slowing down :cool4:
On moldavian roads last summer were a lot of police cars with radar or "our favorite" unmarked police cars with radar. Luckily car drivers signals a radar so if you see some cars flashing their lights you should verify your speed.

Also romanian road legislation says that motorcycles must always have lights on, and cars only outside cities.

I don't know about border crossing from Ukraine to Romania ... but you shouldn't have problems on romanian border.

As I wrote on previous post take care of your pockets in Galati area or if you stop at a gas station don't loose sight of your luggage - is valable for Bucharest too - especially when you see gypsies.

I crossed from Ukraine into Romania in July of 2006. No problems of any kind, the Romanian customs officials were friendly, very courteous and helpful, and several of them spoke English. They checked to make sure that I actually owned the motorcycle I was riding, but I very much got the impression that they were doing this in an effort to reduce importation of stolen vehicles, not to give me any kind of hassle at all. Total time at the border crossing: about 10 minutes.

I entered Ukraine from the Czech Republic about a week earlier. That was a totally different experience. Although the Ukrainian customs officials were very courteous, they were not at all efficient, and they looked at all sorts of documents 'by rote' - ownership, insurance, passport, my visa, everything. Total time at the actual crossing point (interacting with officials) - about 90 minutes. There was at least a 4 hour lineup to enter Ukraine, but all of the local people at the back of the lineup kept telling me to just go ahead to the front of the line. I'm not sure if this was because I was obviously a visitor, or because I was on a motorcycle. Anyway, after a lot of prompting, I did that (jumped the queue), the folks at the front of the queue let me in as if it was normal, and I then started the customs formalities.

No-one at either crossing point ever raised the slightest suggestion of baksheesh, bribes, anything like that. All the extortion began once I entered Ukraine - every 50 kms, I was shaken down for about USD $10 or so in local currency by traffic cops running roadside shakedown stations.

Hope that helps.

Are you still going?
 

Hi Mickba

I wondered whether you are still planning to make this trip? If so how is the planning going, as I am contemplating riding to Bulgaria via France, Italy, Greece, in May.

Romania won`t adopt euro curency until 2014 ... Bulgaria maybe in 2009-2010. The exchange rates for Euro->Ron you can find here : Info financiar . Alsa 1 leva is about 0.5 euro.
The major roads in Romania are decent, but they pass through every village posible with speed limit of 50 kmh ... There are many radars in towns/villages so speeding would not be a good idea :) Outside town there are usualy no radars.
Be carefoul to secondary roads as they are very bad ... Potholes everywhere ... But for a XTZ 750 i think would be ok :) I would recomand you Transalpina (links Sebes to Targu Jiu), it`s an unpaved road that goes over 2000m in altitude. Also, Transfagarasean is ok (links Curtea de Arges to Fagaras).
In Bulgaria the roads are ok, maybe a little worse than in Romania, but again, for an enduro-touring bike they are ok. The police in Bulgaria is a little less opresive from my experience :), less radars ... A problem in bulgaria is also the cyrilic alphabet ... But on major roads they have signs in latin alphabet so it`s ok. With a gps won`t be any problem ...
As for clearing customs, now with the entry in european union it goes quite fast ... The only check your passport ... From my experince the crossing from Romania to Bulgaria didn`t took more than ... 30 secons ? :)

Just to share my recent experience in Romania (11 days) and Bulgaria(only 2 days):
Border Crossings - no problem, only needed ID (german)
Police - no problem in Romania, have rarely seen any, was never stopped. In Bulgaria I've seen lots and was once pulled over, obviously because I'm on a bike. But when they saw I'm german they laugh and wave me on. From Romanians I've heard there's a lot less hassle with Police in Bulgaria since it's EU now.
Roads Romania - bad to very bad in the north (still lots of fun!). OK to excellent in Transylvania and somewhat inbetween in the south.
Roads Bulgaria - were all OK, but I'v been only on major roads travelling through.


cheers Andi

Hi ptr10001,

When exactly are you going? I'm planning to ride via Romania/Moldova to Odessa at the very end of May/beginning of June. I'd be pleased to meet up with someone.

Hi All
We are travelling down to Romania in a few weeks time, does anyone know what the campsites are like down that way? Is it better to look for sites or is wild camping ok? Any info would be great.

Debz

Debz
 

We are considering the same thing.. How long are you going for and when? And what ferry are you thinking about taking? And will you ride directly to Romania or are there stops planned? Sorry for all the questions, but we have left the planning a bit late and are trying to see if it is worth it /possible on a two week trip.
cheers

Hi Xander, we are sailing from North Shields to Amsterdam on Sat 26 May and returning Sat 16 June, so we have 3 weeks. Originally we only had 2 weeks but were still looking at same trip but spend less time in Romania. Our plan (I use that word loosely) is to ride through Germany into Poland, have a day or 2 around Krakow then down towards Romania. We'll spend 4 or 5 days down there and then travel back up perhaps through Hungary/Austria/Germany. When are you travelling? We are planning to camp all the way.

Debz

Hey Debz,
The exact dates are still to be confirmed.. but we have about two weeks holiday to take in a three week period (25th June i.e directly after the HU meet to 12th of July).. or we might push it to the end of july which would give us much more time..... almost 3 weeks..maybe that would be a better idea come to think of it..:thumbup1:

We would also be camping.. but want to spend as much time as possible in Romania (big place and never been there before).
If it turn out that we are in the same place at the same time we should meet up for a beer!

Bulgaria.
 

hi, I am going to do the same thing. Did you get any replies fro your question? If so could you pass the information on to me?

My email is martinblizard@btinterent.com Thanks Martin.

Hi Martin

I am setting off on Sunday for a trip to Romania via Greece & Bulgaria, so if you want I can check it out as we will be mixing camping & B&B's.

Cheers
Martyn

:welcome: to ROMANIA.If you want to know something write here,and if i konw the answer i'll help you.RIDE SAFE !

Hello Martin and Martyn,
I'm another Martin, and I run a small camping and caravan park in southern Bulgaria. See Sakar Hills Camping
If you are traveling through Greece to get to Bulgaria, I would recommend two campsites in Greece, one at Kavala and the other in Alexandroupoli. Both are right by the sea, and are clean. The one at Kavala is signposted from the motorway and for the one at Alexandroupoli just take the first turn off signed for Alexandroupoli, drop down onto the old coast road heading east and you will find it in some trees on the right side of the road, on the edge of Alexandroupoli town, at some traffic lights.
From there if you head north you will reach the bulgarian border in about 3 hours. To get to us turn west towards Lubimetz and from Lubimetz continue west on the E80 for about 8 km until you see our signs.
If I can be of any more practical help, e-mail me through our website, or on martinjeffes@yahoo.co.uk
Good luck with the trip.
Martin T. Jeffes
Sakar Hills Camping
Biser, Near Harmanli, Bulgaria.

Thanks for the info Martin, I have sent you an email
Regards
Martyn