After a brief stop in a Serbian hypermarket for some non-essentials I took over the driving for a brief non-motorway section in to Bulgaria. It turned out to be an incredibly intense session, leaving me frazzled.

The road started off flat but then cut through hills and then steep sided cliffs. There were tunnels aplenty 4.5 metres high, allowing only 30cm clearance. That had the top deck passengers ducking. A narrow road, steep drops and a safety barrier 18 inches high was raising the heart rate. We then met a bridge 4.2 metres high. With Bill hanging out of the door we limboed under with an inch or two to spare.

Finally the Bulgarian border arrived and we had a cup of tea and cake in the drizzle, watched by the surly border guards as we waited to leave Serbia.

The Bulgarian side was a beaurocratic nightmare too with checkpoint after checkpoint to negotiate. We smoothed the way by offering fruitcake and tea.

It was dark before we entered Sofia. Cobbled streets, debris, no street lights, unmarked roadworks and few signs and I was already shattered. Concentrating hard on avoiding some piles of rubble on the right, I couldn't avoid a road sign that had fallen over in to my path. There was a loud thump and we had another chunk taken out of the bus. With huge relief I pulled over just past Sofia to let Kev take over.

Even the motorways are rough and bumpy in Bulgaria. The effect upstairs on a double decker is magnified. This meant that the contents of the beer fridge were frequently scattered over the floor and it also meant that a game of hopscotch on the top deck was more challenging than usual. Tibbs won but I was playing with a slight alcohol disadvantage. This wasn't just normal hopscotch, this was extreme hopscotch. We have also discovered extreme washing up and extreme tea making.

I awoke later at the Turkish border of which I had heard bad reports. They were justified. After the paperwork we joined a queue of about 15 buses. Each one was emptied of passengers and luggage and thoroughly searched. This could take a while, we're loaded to the gunnels with all sorts of stuff. I tried to explain why we were carrying medical equipment and so much sports gear but they couldn't work out the reason of the trip. After 3 hours of queuing one of the officials came on board. I showed him some of our cupboards and drawers. He said "I have seen nothing" and stamped my passport. We were through in under 5 hours!

I awoke again just after sunrise to watch us cross the Bosphorus at Istanbul. We were out of Europe and in to Asia ! And, as if by magic, it had stopped raining and the sun was out. T-shirts, shorts and sandals on and the beer terrace was in full use !