Bongo Fury

This meeting will be held from Thursday 28 July to Monday 1 August 2011 at Camping Veliko, Vasil Levski Street, Number 70, Dragizhevo, Lyaskovets, Bulgaria 5145. You can find the campsite details here: http://www.campingvelikotarnovo.com/index.html

This meeting will only go ahead if we have a minimum of 6 Bongos from the UK.

This is a joint meeting between the UK and the Russian Bongo owners clubs, but you do not need to be a member of the club to attend.

If you are interested in attending then please post a reply to this discussion no later than 31 January 2011.

Once we know how many people are likely to attend we can discuss the practicalities.

Hi Helen,
We have had a look at the campsite website and want to go on the Bongo Bash visit to Bulgaria. This year we drove our Freda from Cumbria to Portugal Algave Coast and back, so we are not worried about the distance. We spent one week in Portugal, but our total trip lasted 5 weeks camping in the Freda.
We would like to spend more than 2 or 3 days getting to Bulgaria. We intend to spend some days in Germany and Austria on the way out and would like to meet up with other Bongos for the final part of the trip from Austria to Bulgaria.
My AA route planner shows a prefered route through Serbia, but I would prefer to travel through Roumania, as Serbia is not in the EU. On a previous trip to Bulgaria, I visited Vidin, where it was proposed to build a bridge over the Danube to Roumania. I expect this has not been completed yet, but there is a ferry across the river.
I will do some research to find some campsites en route, since we do not fancy more than an odd night on Aires style sites and do not fancy wild camping.
So put us down for the trip. One Bongo with two adults.
Regards,
Hilary & Phil

Excellent! Any others?

please add me

Hi
There are a couple of others on another thread, I'll PM you and ask you to show interest on this thread please (easier to count numbers.)
Cheers
Helen

We are still interested in this. We'll need to sit down and work out what leave we can get and how many days we will take to drive down. Currently we're in the middle of a house move so we aren't really thinking about anything else.

We are still interested as well, but may drop out if no other children are going.

2 adults , one child and one Bongo

Hi Greenman
Some of the Russians will bring their children, and there will be other campers, and I think Bongonauts plus "Minnies" ...plus the pool will be finished...there will be a children's play area, but I'll confirm that with the owners in spring
Cheers
Helen

thegreenman wrote:We are still interested as well, but may drop out if no other children are going.

2 adults , one child and one Bongo

I'm quite immature at times, does that count?

helen&tony wrote:..
Some of the Russians will bring their children...

Hi all. My 7 year old daughter will go with us. She try to learn some English words.

We are interested. Not even met another Bongo owner yet!

Mike & Anita

we are interested too, but also need to sit down and work out annual leave and how long the drive is to get there etc and the route we could take. Count us in for now

CumbriaBongoBulls wrote:Hi Helen,
We have had a look at the campsite website and want to go on the Bongo Bash visit to Bulgaria. This year we drove our Freda from Cumbria to Portugal Algave Coast and back, so we are not worried about the distance. We spent one week in Portugal, but our total trip lasted 5 weeks camping in the Freda.
We would like to spend more than 2 or 3 days getting to Bulgaria. We intend to spend some days in Germany and Austria on the way out and would like to meet up with other Bongos for the final part of the trip from Austria to Bulgaria.
My AA route planner shows a prefered route through Serbia, but I would prefer to travel through Roumania, as Serbia is not in the EU. On a previous trip to Bulgaria, I visited Vidin, where it was proposed to build a bridge over the Danube to Roumania. I expect this has not been completed yet, but there is a ferry across the river.
I will do some research to find some campsites en route, since we do not fancy more than an odd night on Aires style sites and do not fancy wild camping.
So put us down for the trip. One Bongo with two adults.
Regards,
Hilary & Phil

I did the reverse route by motorbike 4 years ago - I agree with you about missing out Serbia for insurance purposes only, its a nice place.................
Szeged in Hungary to Arad in Romania on routes 7 and 1 to Sibiu and then over the 7C, the Transfagarasan Pass to Curtea de Arges is a stunning route - climbs to around 7000 ft. Head down towards Bucarest by the A1 but take the route 61 south towards Ruse and cross the river Danube there. It's a bit less direct (130 km more) than Serbia but a stunning road over the mountains as you can see

Transfagarasan north side towards Sibiu



Transfagarasan summit






Transfagarasan south side towards Curtea de Arges

Hi
Umbongocat
You did ask tentatively before how far, etc. so for the benefit of those interested, the journey length quoted in the AA atlases is around 2000 Km from London to Sofia. 4000 return. Add another 1000 for discrepancies and a bit of touring, and that's 5000, or one service interval...although on modern oils and the fact that it's not stop-start motoring, and you can stretch an oil/ filter change to 6000 Km
Translate the above figures to miles, and 5000Km is around 3000Miles. As you have a load on the Bongo, the best MPG figure will be 25 MPG on a run, which gives 120 gallons...at 5 quid a gallon , that's 600 GBP for diesel. Ferry costs...take your pick, but I like the Chunnel...normal ferries can be booked for 100 quid or less return, I expect. Journey times...I would say that it would take 3 days, as that's what couriers take to get here. If you want to dawdle and take in some scenery, make it 4 days. I prefer a longer and more round-about route, as I like France, Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, Romania , Bulgaria.
Cheers
Helen

Hello all

We fancy joining the trip too (2 adults)

from Nobbysnuts ... now Grahame (he's Green!)