This is going to be a long one. But first things first.

We were gently woken in Malta to the sound of a marching band, at 6:30 h in the morning. I was not amused and Daniel recalls some complaints coming out of my tent. Additionally, Malta turned out to be rather cold with around 4°C in the morning. But at least no rain anymore.

The cold was forgotten as the thermometer climbed to 35°C in the Karawangen Tunnel. We blasted within 3 h through Slovenia along the great country side and on the perfect highway. We entered Croatia and got some good distance on the infamous Autoput done. This transit highway from Turkey to western Europe was known for the many deadly car crashes by drivers falling asleep. Falling asleep comes easy on this monotonous and strait road.

Our boredom was soon over when Daniels engine stopped running in the middle of nowhere. We parked the bikes on the side way, put on the signal wests and looked what we can do. There was enough fuel in the tank and the electric was working. We could not find an apparent reason why the bike would not fire up anymore.

Within minutes a guy stopped on the other side of the highway, came over and offered to call the service which would bring Daniel and his bike to a workshop. They were working with the ADAC, so we accepted. A few minutes later a tow truck stopped again on the other side. The guy come over. Language barrier apart, he seemed to be the right guy. We loaded the bike on the truck and were ready to go when two cars with a trailer stopped on our side. They turned out to be the guys we called. Some loud words in Croatian were exchanged and the bike unloaded again… We are still on the autoput with no shades and a scorching sun. Fair enough, load the bike on the trailer. Wasn’t easy since it was only designed to carry cars but it worked out. Probably not approved by German TÜV standard.

Daniel drove with them to the workshop in Slavonski Brod and I followed on my bike. Arriving there the bike was disassembled with in no time and they looked for the fault. In the end it turned out to be a rotten pressure tube from the fuel pump which lead to not enough fuel pressure with an almost empty tank. Easy fix and the bike was running again J At this point we were super tiered and were offered to spent the night in an empty apartment they had in that workshop. Great! The guys were nice and friendly, all in all a surprising pleasant experience, apart from the money, of course… Nice side story. At the same workshop a Slovenian family was waiting for their VW Golf to be fixed. The Croatian guys organized an entire replacement engine that night, installed it and got the car running, it was Sunday. Imagine this in Germany!