2 days of driving through 9 countries and passing signposts that bring back memories of news reports during the Balkan troubles " Kate Adie reporting from ...  Mostar, Kosovo, Sarajevo, Pristina..." these places never before had any real geographical significance to me.
At first I was a little bit nervous of the prospect of driving through Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia etc but in reality it was like driving anywhere in Europe just with a few more border controls to pass through.
It surprised me that Kruševo is only a few kilometers from the Greek border. Previously I had never considered driving 'so far' but now my whole perception of the size of Europe has changed. OK, its still a 12 hour drive from Austria to Macedonia but 12 hours doesn't even get you from one end of Spain to the other!

Kruševo in the very early morning

... And now a week has passed, World Cup is finished, new work contacts and friendships are made, SuSi has been to cloudbase, and I am totally loving being able to fly again! :)
I had so many great times with fab people last week.
And even though I always hate leaving, the return journey was quicker & less eventful than the drive down and accompanied by a 1200km cloudstreet that had a dreaming of really BIG distance flying. :)
Now I'm back in sunny Zillertal and starting the next life-adventure in this green and grassy place... and to start it all really well the first thing I got to do this morning was FLYYYYYYYY! :)