My "Saharagelber" 300TD

When the time was right we said goodbye to our friends and entered the ferry. This trip would take all night. I entered the deck on the back of the boat and saw Rhodes becoming smaller. Some strange line of smoke hang all over the horizon, I was wondering if that was the smoke from the boat or from Rhodes island perhaps. I stood there and thought about the time on Rhodes and what was to come.
We found ourselves a good place to sit on the couches. In the evening I laid myself on the couch with my head on Melissa’s lap, that felt so trustworthy. I fell asleep and Melissa stayed awake as she was not tired.

Today we started driving again, this time with Melissa. We drove between the tiny villages again and saw a lot of the rural part of Rhodes, where no tourists came.
We then tried a dirt road which was quite fun. I took a very small fork and a minture later we drove over the mountains of Rhodes over very stony small roads, but still okay enough to drive.
We then saw a skull of a goat which was in perfect condition. After that we went up and up and in a couple of minutes we were overlooking a big part of the island. The last part was very steep and small. After some fund driving here and enjoying the scenerey we went down again, and when we were on flat terrain we passed some military vehicles, big machines were parked on our left side, and in front of us a closed gate emerged, but the gatekeeper was on -our- side of the closed gate. The guy laughed friendly when he saw us coming and openend the gate for us.
Somehow we were driving on militairy ground for a long time. I guess we had missed something

We continued our trip and drove through some very small villages here, they all looked interested, obviously they don’t see too many tourists here.
Then we forked from the tarred roads again and took a dirt road. This was one pretty small and we were not sure if it was leading to something. I drove beween the bushes and then came on some grass land. I tried to see if it was leading to somewhere but that was hard to see. I just stepped in the car again and told the other we will have to see if it’s leading to somewhere.
So we drove further and then Melissa asked me to back a little bit. She didn’t want to tell us what she thought she’d seen. Because she said it was too weird to think about it.
I drove backwards and we were curious about what we were going to see, or not. “Yes!, there it is, I’m afraid I was right….” We were looking at a skull, lying in the grass.
We were all perplex. It was not a skull of an animal, it was a human skull which we had found here. As Melissa’s knowledge about skulls is pretty good (that’s why she saw this in a glimpse too) she could tell us it was lying here for only 1-2 years. We were stunned, “How the hell…..?” We didn’t know what to say, but it looked like a movie. The size of the skull was obviously from a child, so that made this situation even worse. This mean the child was probably murdered and was dumped over here. If a child was playing it would be more likeley she/he was found because the aread was known where the child usually plays. It was still guesswork, but it could be child murder. We all agreed to call the police and show them the way to the skull, because this had to be investigated. We were all feelling weird about this. We went back to the village and had to find out what the phone number of the police was. We called the police and waited for one hour before they got here. When they were there we drove back through the bushes and over the field and stopped. It had to be here somewhere. It took a while before we found it back again, because it was dark. We left our names and numbers and they asked if we some of us could come over to the police station tomorrow.

Today Henk and Esther and I took the car and planned to have a look how Rhodes looked like. Melissa decided to stay in the room. So we went for a nice tour and we decided to start with the inland in the southern part from Rhodes. Soon we forked from the main road and drove over smaller gravel and sandy roads. After a while we wanted to cross a bridge but this one was close, so we branched off again and came across a river. So we had to find out if the Benz was able to do this, after some investigation I thought I would be able to cross. Esther was curious and Henk thought it wasn’t too smart. But there we went and it all went fine! We were all proud on the Saharagelber. Then the road went through the hills and mountains and we got some great views. We were all alone over there and found out that the inland of southern Rhodes is very, very beautiful! Now and then we had some hard parts, with a lot of mud, and all the time the W123 managed to go through it. Henk and Esther were amazed, about what this car is able to go through, a lot of parts looked impossible but all the time we got through it.
We saw lots of butterflies, great mountain views, a wild river, nice birds and a beautiful green environment.
Then we came across a very muddy part, which was pretty long too. Henk and Esther knew it for sure, “This is way too tricky!” . This looked indeed a bit hard for the car, furthermore we had a problem if we got stock, because noone was driving here, we didn’t see a car around here. We stood there but I did not want to go back. I walked back and forth over the part and tried to think how I should go, via the left or right side, or even the middle. Adrenalin was running through my body, “I -think- it should be possible” I thought, but yeah, -wat if- I get stuck? What are my options then? Well, we’re in the woods, so in that case it will be a lot of work but it should be possible.
I told them I wanted to try, they were surprised and curious what would happen. It was time to give it a shot, and so I did. I drove a bit back and tried to drive exactly as I planned, because there were stones I had to be careful for these too. It went all okay, the Benz just kept going, the Saharagelber kept on slogging through the mud until she was on firmer ground again.
Henk and Esther roard enthusiastically. Happy and excited we got in the the car again and drove further. Sometimes we had some more difficult mud parts but it all went okay.
This was fun! As we continued we saw a snake crossing the dirt road. We stopped to try to find it but we didn’t see it anymore. Then we decided to continue to the south and sit somewhere and relax, having something to eat. We continued the path but our road let to an dead end, a steep slope of sand and stones made us stop. Again, I was thinking if it would be possible or not, Henk and Esther didn’t know but now trusted me that I probably know what’s possible or not. Together with Henk I removed some big stones because I thought it would be possible to drive over it, but at least we had to remove the nasty big stones. After that, I gave it a shot, it was quite spectacular, at least from the inside, the start on the hood had risen in the sky at the moment I took the slope, the Benz continued with enough grip on the rear tyres and pushed us up untill we were on the flat part again. Again we cheered, we did the trick again!
Then we were on a tarred road again and drove to the next little village where we parked the car and had something to eat. Henk and Esther loved the W123 from now on, the Mercedes gained a lot of respect from them today. They were even talking about getting one too
After that we drove a bit more around and then back. We had to pay a visit to the office for checking in on the boat on tuesday in Rhodes City. It was not easy to find and we drove a bit around, I dropped Melissa when we saw where it was and then I had to park the car somewhere. In Rhodes city there is a lot of traffic at the end of the day. When I finally was able and got back Melissa told me the boat broke down. We were not able to go back to Turkey, and the fun part was that they couldn’t tell us when it would be fixed again, it could take one day, but two weeks might also be possible they told us. Great, there we are, not able to continue our trip through Turkey. So we sat down on a terrace thinking about our options. Waiting was not a smart thing to do, it could take weeks… The travel agency offered us to go with their otherferry line, which goes to Athens. That option was probably the best one, but also meant we were not able to go back to Turkey. We thought about the option to spend some more time in Albania which made us very happy too, because we were so curious about Albania. We did not know about what we needed for Albania but then we will find out when we’re at the border. So, we agreed to go to Athens tomorrow night, that’s the first possibility we have. We didn’t have to pay anything extra because of the broken ferry, so that’s done properly.

Today we planned to work. So, we drove to the clinic and started to help. We started to clean the porch and paint the whole place.

We departed very early, the owner tried to rip us off by asking way too much and he put on his ‘I am very surprised’ face, but it didn’t help. The deal was made and I did not want to pay twice as much now. I ignored further arguments and stepped in the car. He waved goodbye and openend the gate, no further problems or whatsoever. We were bright on time for the ferry, it was a very small one where only four cars were able to enter. May this was why its so expensive. “Stop thinking about that!” I screamed to myself in my head.
After we had this relaxed sunny boat trip we disembarked in the port of Rhodes. When I drove the car from the ferry on the dock we were very surprised to see some of our dutch friends!
They wanted to surprise us, and succeeded! Such a surprise to see them in front of us here! They told us they planned to be here 2 weeks and this week they wanted to help at the clinic too.
So, first get through all the official stuff here and then we can start to enjoy Rhodes.

Then the disaster began. We had to take EVERYTHIING out of the car, which would be a hell of a job.
I never had to do this before and now we really had to do it, so it seemed. But the worst part was, we had to carry everything inside, we had to take everything out of the car and walk inside to the moving belt.
I tried to deal with one of the customhouse officials to just check the stuff by the car. This would take a very long time. This official was very mad, he started to scream at us and did not want to talk with us. Melissa got very mad at him but that didn’t help of course, there was no room for discussion or any deal, we had to take everything out.
Because of the medicine we were expecting problems and that they would take it. We had to cool down and just do it, otherwise we could not expect too much from them in a positive way anymore. But it did not matter, when we were waiting at the belt they were inspecting the medicines when they passed. ‘What’s this!?’ They asked.
We explained this were needles, tranquillizers, some sterile instruments, rubber handgloves and so on. We explained that this was for a animal clinic.
The sullen officials called another official and they told us we had to have paperwork for this and for that, otherwise they would destroy it. So, we started calling vets in Holland, we started callling the animal clinic in Rhodes, but it all didn’t help, when we we close to get what we needed they thought of more we had to arrange. This greek arrogance and hate towards people getting from Turkey (because that was mainly the problem we heard later) provided no room for us to arrange anything. It took us hours and we ended up with nothing. We had to leave the stuff here. This sucked big time, this was so valuable for the clinic, worth a couple of hundred dollars. DAPS told us already that the greek authorities were very much against their foundation, which was purely based on arrogance: People from western Europe who were trying to help the stray animals in -their- country. DAPS is trying to castrate all the stray animals on Rhodes, to stop the ever expanding amount of animals walking over the streets, which is very dangerous for them as many of the greek people over there are kicking and poisoning them or driving them over. This took us the whole afternoon and without any result. They at least gave us 8 days to arrange all the paperwork, but we more or less knew chances are that they would destroy it anyway. We left late in the afternoon and decided to enjoy the rest of the day. We drove via a Lidl (Yes, they have one at Rhodes too! ) to do some shopping and getting some fuel.
Some gypsies were hanging around at the parking lot of the Lidl, trying to get the coins of the shopping trollies when people brought them back, or just some food.
We decided to buy some stuff for them in the Lidl that they could eat.
Then we paid a visit to the DAPS clinic, where the vets were working hard at the moment we came in. They showed us their work and we talked about how we could help them the coming week. We then tried to find a place where we could stay. Some other volunteers who worked there knew a place and we managed to stay there for 10 Euros a day, quite a good price.
Our own one room appartment, and it looked very nice. Quite a luxury comparing to what we were used to.

Today we had a day of rest. In the afternoon we went to Marmaris, checking if boats were going to Rhodos which were able to take the car. In the centre of Marmaris we heard some strange things, at different places they told us it was not possible anymore to take your car on the boat to Rhodos, this ferry wasn’t going. I had to find a place where I could park the car and go without it. This was a very bad idea, we wouldn’t leave the car here with all the stuff in it, and also it is very impractical. We also brought a lot of medicine (three or four plastic bags) for DAPS, the foundation we were planning to help the coming week. We had to try other agencies, see if it was really true, we suspected them to just offer us what they could and desperately wanted to have customers even when they had to tell us we couldn’t bring our car. After a while we found an agency which told us that it was possible, although very expensive.
I had to pay 350 Euro’s only for the car, round-trip! For this very small distance! But, then, we were lucky because we could take the boat the next day. So we booked, bummer that it costed so much for an distance of practically nothing, but so be it. We went back to our private campsite and relaxed for the rest of the day. In the evening the owner gave us some fresh milk and salad. I think this man tried to live from all his own supply, gardening and the cow which was walking around here. This cow broke loose earlier today and walked over the campsite
Melissa was able to get enough rest now. We spend most of the time relaxing and reading.