Another day, another walk to a waterfall. It was a busy tourist day yesterday with a public holiday (Assumption of Mary) so we were up early this morning to beat the crowds and had the place to ourselves.

Kozjak waterfall

Yesterday we drove up the Mangart Saddle. Highest road in Slovenia at just over 2000m. A popular destination for mountaineers, cyclists and motorcyclists. The reviews of the road suggested a campervan might be an unwise choice but it was fine as look as you didn't look down on some of the corners. Not as daunting as the road to the skywalk in Croatia. Unfortunately none of the photos did it justice.

On the way back down from the Mangart Saddle we found this little farm house off on a side road that sold sheep cheese so had to buy some.

The last couple of days we've been following the Soča river up into the Julian Alps. It's gorgeous.

The Soča river. Again. On an easy 6km walk from our campground near Trenta early this morning. We came across two non-touristy waterfalls along the way.

Today we drove up over the Vršič Pass and into Austria. This kind of squiggly shape on the nav means there's good driving to be had!

At the top of Vršič Pass. Very tame sheep. Had to drive around them lounging around in the middle of the roads and they seemed to enjoy scratching themselves against wheels and bumpers of parked cars.

On the pass is a Russian church/memorial built for the Russian POWs who died building the road.

Yesterday we drove the Grossglockner High Alpine Road which has been at the top of our list of things to do for a while now. At €37 for the toll it's not a cheap drive but definitely worth it if you like winding roads and alpine views. Which we do.

We parked up near the Kaiser Franz Josefs Höhe visitors' centre and did a loop walk down to the two lakes at the foot of the glacier and back up again. 8km with a climb/descent of 500m. 3 hours.

Lots of alpine flowers and butterflies as well as huge furry marmots. Very pleasant.

The glacier has retreated quite a bit in the last few decades.

Here's Sally standing on the bridge over the small cascade between the two lakes.

One of the dams on the lower lake. It curls over at the top.

Coming down the other side we tried to stay in a low gear to give the brakes a rest but after about half an hour we started to smell burning in the cabin and had to pull over for a while to let them cool off. Slowing down 3½ tonnes of wine, cheese and yoga mats is tough work. The hand brake didn't work so had to turn the wheels into the curb to stop from rolling down the hill.

Not pictured here are the clouds of smoke just after we stopped or the stinging nettles I got tangled in as I got out of the driver's side door.

We've been keeping a close eye on the 14-day cumulative number of COVID-19 cases per 100,000 in Europe as that's largely what's determining whether the UK decides you need to go into two week quarantine on return. It looks like Austria's numbers are creeping up so we're going to bail into Bavaria in Germany where the numbers are a bit lower. We'll spend our final two weeks there before driving directly from Aachen in Germany to the vehicle train (we've had to abandon our ferry tickets and re-book) in Calais where we won't have to get out of the van until we reach the UK and hence won't have to quarantine. Touch wood.

This time next month we will hopefully have shipped the van and be preparing for our flight home!

Two weeks ago we were in Austria watching their covid numbers rise and we decided to get out of there and into Germany just in time to avoid having to go into isolation on returning to the UK. We managed to get an early morning walk in at the Krimml waterfalls before leaving (pictured above).

We entered Germany at the very southeastern part in Bavaria which has beautiful mountains and lakes. Unfortunately it was heaving with tourists so we headed west below Munich stopping at a couple of places along the way. In both Austria and this bit of Germany we stayed on a couple of working dairy farms and filled up an empty 1.5L water bottle with milk fresh from the tank. Lots of cereal for lunch and dinner!

Things were quieter west of Munich and we drove north up the Romantic road over a couple of days stopping at small towns.

From there we kept heading west and stopped off at a winery in Diedesfeld where we had stayed last year on our way down the Rhine. Much quieter this year but just as lovely.

We moved on from there to the bottom of the Moselle Valley where we did a bit of cycling and drove up the river to Cochem and on to near Aachen on the border of Belgium and Germany to prepare for the dash across to Calais in France.

On Wednesday we got up at 2am and drove to Calais. Because the UK requires people from Belgium of France to isolate for two weeks we had had to throw away our ferry tickets and buy train tickets which allowed us to drive from safer Germany all the way through to the UK without having to get out of the van.

In the early hours of the morning it was slow driving through Belgium due to the occasional deer on the edge of the forest and thick fog. The last thing we needed was to have an accident. About four hours' drive but nice with less traffic, foggy little villages and wind turbines silhouetted by the full moon.

We were quite anxious as I'd become an over stayer in the Schengen area due our enforced 80 day lockdown in France and our plans to go to Romania and Bulgaria scuppered. I'd contacted the French embassy and the prefecture but not had a response. There are fairly large fines (or even imprisonment but unlikely) for overstayers and we were preparing for the the worst case scenario. On top of this we weren't sure how much evidence we'd have to provide UK border to prove we wouldn't need to isolate and whether they'd have an issue with me returning to the UK after my 2.5 year spousal visa had expired as a holidaymaker.

The French border police merely glanced at our passports and gave them back. The UK border had a few more questions but were happy with proof that we had our flights booked and let us through. High fives were had.

The train was only 35 minutes from Calais to Folkestone and a bizarre experience driving on and off.

We're now in St Agnes in Cornwall with Ally and John for four days. We drove 1000km in two days and looking forward to taking a break!