Wednesday 14th April

Wednesday 14th April........Slept well--on road for 9, it's just stopped raining.....We decided to head south for Arad in Romania---9,02 into Hungary---9.06 back in Slovakia, tallking in car the question arose as to how many countries we had visited so far--it seems to be 9....Holland-Belgium-Germany-Croatia-Italy, Hungary-Austria-Slovak rep. and Slovenia-------11.30 just leaving Budapest, another busy city, dreadful place, although mostly interesting.--11.40 stopped raining!!!!! 12.20 Sun--wow--first for days.......We will remember Hungary for rain - Tescos and lots of ladies with bright red hair..(.I'm sure it is lovely in the summer).----2pm ,,,looking a lot better--we are half way to Arad...sun shining, seem to keep seeing dogs in the middle of nowhere 4 or 5 just alone.------Stopped to buy bread at a tiny co-op in Szentey - very freindly, we bought 6 rolls and a big loaf it cost us 369 florints about £1.50---It's still dry with tiny patches of blue sky and sun......Having fun trying to pronounce the place names---the land is very flat and open----roads are boneshakers, so many potholes I'm gald we are in the Landy!! Everywhere we look we see machines called donkeys digging for oil......3.20 leaving Hungary everyone stopped for a police check --ok--then 3.30 (the time changed to 4.30) entered Romania stopped by customs who checked our passports ect.--ok---drove straight to garage to buy vignette-in Romainian Rovineta---road tax about £3 per week....Land is very flat, there are no fences and sheep everywhere looks very bleak--more oil donkeys----then within minutes we come to a large shopping complex with a Carrefore--Bricostore--Intersport, the same as in France---stopped to get some cash, me and Beverley stay with the car....Lee says it is the largest shopping complex he has ever seen--you can buy anything and half of it is English----not been expecting that!!!A few minutes later we arrived in Arad, it is easily as busy as London with crazy drivers and trams and horns and hundreds of people-----makes my toes curl with all this traffic---Lee says "Like driving in Paris" nothing bothers him, this is really not how we imagined Romania to be!! More and more shopping complexs--see advert it says 'house and land 50,000 euro' ooh no thanks---it's absolute chaos---i think there must be loads of money around-------pouring with rain again!!! The signs have a lot of French and Italian....6.15pm raining, road still very busy but getting a bit better......spotted camp site.......