A red hot dilemma

It wasn't until we'd had as much heat as we could handle and had to leave Paradise that we eventually got onto the internet to discover that what we had foolishly assumed to be typical July conditions in this part of the world was actually a heat wave.

We had managed four days on the beach, either submerged in the Ionian Sea or cowering under our awning (superb purchase that!). Sleeping wasn't much fun either with the mercury barely dropping below 31 throughout the wee small hours. So we decided to push on and into Macedonia. In preparation for this next mission into the unknown there we were online, reading about how while Britain was experiencing torrential rain and heavy flooding, a heatwave was scorching south Eastern Europe, causing many heat related deaths and triggering massive forest fires. Most shocking for us was to read that the government had declared a state of emergency in Macedonia as fires were totally encircling the southern town of Bitola - our supposed destination for that very night! With expected temperatures of high 30s to early 40s predicted for the week ahead and the Macedonian army out in force it didn't sound like the picture was going to get any better.

We sat and debated our options. We had just under 2 weeks to reach Brindisi to meet up with our great friend Natalie, who is flying all the way out from NZ to join us for the Southern Italy leg. That meant we could either stick with our plan, ride out the heat and push on through Macedonia, Albania and on to the ferry from Montenegro, or head due west to Corfu and spend the rest of the time on the beach before ferrying direct to Brindisi. What were we to do?


SJ