The big road trip to Milan revealed :D

Yes, I didn't have the time to do the final update before we left. But... we left :D. And we arrived... alive.
But if you ask me if I will ever do this trip again, I would tell you that I would rather sell my car than return with it from Italy. Ok, kidding, it wasn't so bad. Actually, it wasn't bad at all, but I like to play the little princess and complain.
So to start with the beginning, on Wednesday night we had a nice fare-well moment with some of my best friends gathered at my place around a pot of sarmale, some ciorba, and, of course, wine and champagne. Then we realized we hadn't made the music CDs for the trip. Made the CDs (him, not me). Realized that one very important friend was about to come. Spent some time with her. Finished the CDs. Went to bed at around midnight (now that my mom knows that we arrived alive, I can publicly say that we only slept for 5 hours before departure).
The initial plan was to depart at 06:00 a.m. on Thursday, but, when we made this plan, we didn't realize that loading the car would take us more than one hour. So after making all the luggage fit in (him, not me) like a well thought puzzle, after many double-triple-quadruple checks of documents, keys and stuff, we finally kick-started the engine (me, not him). At 07:30. So more than one hour of delay. The plan was that I drive through most of Romania, and that we will alternate driving through Hungary and Slovenia, and that he will drive in Italy. Wrong. I ended up driving only for the first 4 hours in Romania. Then, after stopping for lunch near Sibiu, the manly man he board in front of the restaurant proudly said “menu of the day = 11 lei”. We get in and sit. We ask for a menu, to choose what to eat. Shock. They only have one thing: “menu of the day”. Chicken ciorba and mashed beans with sausages. Ok, bring’em on, we’re starving.
Then, we hit the road again. Of course, no driving for me ever since. Not to mention that I got to drive in the most difficult, crowded, and breathtakingly landscaped part of the way, and he got all the boring rest.
As we had left Bucharest with a full gas tank, we dind’t expect to have any gas concerns any time soon. Wrong, again. Driving a car that is loaded with 200 kg of luggage, at 130 km/h on a highway, proved to be a not such gas-saving thing. So gas went significantly down on the first portion of the road (which was a highway). Then, it got better as we drove on normal national roads, and we totally forgot the gas issue until close to Arad. It was only there when we realized that we are already on the red light, and started praying for a gas station, which we luckily found just in time.
Crossing the border to Hungary through Nadlac was the easiest thing ever, I was expecting huge lines of cars before us, but fortunately there was only one (car, not line), and 2 very nice custom people controlling our documents which were of course more than was needed J. The best thing was the fact that, before the border, there was a booth where we bought the road vignette for Hungary, and also the one for Slovenia (they also had vignettes for Croatia, Austria, and other neighboring countries, which is pretty cool if you’re on a tour or something like this). Anyway, the cherry on the cake was that there was no border police on the Hungarian side (but there is some, probably, on the opposite way, when you cross from Hungary to Romania).
The whole way until Budapest is a highway. A highway with perfect asphalt, but a totally DARK highway. Then Budapest appears like an oasis of lights. We reached our dear friend’s place at 19:00 (Hungarian time), after 13 hours of driving. After a wonderful dinner, she showed us the entire Budapest in less than an hour, in a fast tour by car. I knew Budapest was amazing, but I hadn’t imagined that it’s THIS amazing. The bridges, the monuments, the statues, the palaces, castles and all the historical buildings, were covered in lights and we saw all that, like in a fairy tale, from the hill going to the Statue of Liberty (that of course has nothing to do with the Statue of Liberty in the States). Then, after all this, we went to bed, to wake up yesterday at 07:00 a.m. Which we did, and, after a delicious breakfast prepared by our friend, we headed again to the city. First to the internet point, to download the Hungarian and Slovenian map on the GPS (this way we didn’t use Internet in roaming which would have cost a lot), then to the gas station to fill the tank, and then off we went to Ljubljana.
Driving to Ljubljana meant another highway and almost 5 hours. With all my sympathy to Hungary, I have to say that the Hungarian part of the road was the most boring ever. Slovenia, though, looks like a little land of fantasy, with picturesque landscapes, little villages with nice houses, mountains, rivers and all. Ljubljana as a city is romantic and nostalgic and… empty J. At least it was like this 2 days before the New Year’s Eve. In Ljubljana we met another friend of mine to have lunch in a traditional restaurant, where I particularly liked the pancakes with Nutella and nuts (ok this was not so traditional but whatever).
After the good time, the laughter, the joy of lunch, we were on the road again. We had some trouble figuring out through where we will exit Slovenia and enter Italy (we knew we will enter Italy through Trieste but we didn’t know the Slovenian correspondent of Trieste, and no, we couldn’t put Trieste on the GPS because we hadn’t downloaded the map of Italy). But the day was saved by all the miraculous indicators all over the highway saying… hmm…. Guess what: TRIESTE!! (lol this is to make fun of my best-ever-hero-prince who is totally ADDICTED to the GPS and wouldn’t look at an indicator on the road not even if you force him).
Of course, we forgot about the gas… again! 40 km before Trieste, we had the red light (…again!) and started looking worriedly for gas stations. At some point, the familiar OMV lights started showing like a sign of salvation. I start saying “OMV, OMV!!!! Come on!” But….nope! We pass. Why? The manly man (who HAD to drive, because I am totally unable, he says) FORGOT about the gas, just like that. He wasn’t even realizing that OMV was a gas station. Then followed some kilometers that we made at 80/h, to save the gas, while praying to see another station soon. Those were the hardest kilometers, as the highway was passing through endless mountains, and, of course, no gas stations. I was already planning for the methods of torture I would use for the manly man in case we run out of gas (including, of course, making him walk to the next station to get a bottle of gas), when, finally, we see the salvation. A Petrol gas station, that we gladly ran into, just in time before using our last 500 ml of gas that we had left in the tank. So, after a well deserved full tank, off we went.
After a little while from this, we entered Italy! So there we were on the A4 highway taking us straight from Trieste to Milan. We made it (ok, HE made it) in almost 4 hours, and before I knew it, I was in bed sleeping, with the car unloaded and sleeping nicely in the parking lot, a well deserved sleep after taking us 4 countries away, straight to the Bel Paese.
Now we’re heading to the New Year’s Eve dinner and then party. The fireworks have already started around, so AUGURI EVERYONE!!! See you next year with more stories.

Love,
La Reina Rana