Travelling is easy breezy until decisions have to be made. We’d hoped to drive through Macedonia, Albania and Kosovo but since looking into our insurance it turned out we weren’t covered. I’ve read you can buy it at the border which were we thinking about doing but couldn’t find out how much it would all add up to. Plus there’s the thought of what would happen if we crashed and tried to claim on a Macedonian insurer for example. Then there’s the fact that gun ownership is widespread in Albania, I’d hate to piss someone off there. Their bad enough in Greece; some idiot totally pulled across our side of the road so I gave him an angry face and mouthed ‘what the fuck?!’ He didn’t like that. He honked, and jumped out of his car to have a face off with me…we drove off like Bonnie and Clyde.

I’m not too bothered about missing those countries, but it turns out we can’t go to Montenegro either which sounded amazing. A tiny country with canyons nearly as deep as Colorado’s, mountains as dramatic as Switzerland and Palazzi’s as elegant as Venice’s. It sounded incredible, but I guess it gives us the excuse to travel there on another trip.

So, much to my families delight we are now getting a ferry to Italy – the safer but much more pricey option. From there we’ll have to decide if we want to drive the whole stretch of the country and down to Slovenia and Croatia, then all the way back towards France, or get a ferry straight across to Croatia. At least we could eat lots of pizza in Italy.

Pablo had to visit the mechanic again, she was making an awful racket with clanky metal and we thought it could be the end of her. We drove to the nearest Nissan garage which was really quiet so no problem fitting us in. We asked the mechanic to sit in Pablo with Craig while he drove and showed him the noise. He was the only one that spoke English and was a lovely, bubbly chappy. As he stepped in, he asked Craig if he was from Africa and when Craig looked confused and said ‘no, England’, the mechanic turned around to all the other mechanics and shouted ‘IT’S OK HE DOESN’T HAVE EBOLA!!’ and cracked up in hysterics.

Our driveshaft was on the verge of breaking, it would cost €500 for a new one. He offered us a refurbished one though for €200, and explained that we should leave our van there and it will be done by tomorrow. We told him it was our home and we had to sleep in it. He was very impressed with the interior and said we could stay in the parking lot. Then he told us he could get a 2nd hand one for €150 and it could be done in a few hours. Pablo couldn’t of picked a better country to break in as these Nissan vans are all over Greece. We walked to an ikea and had a greasy lunch and returned to a fixed Pablo, fingers crossed it lasts.