Getting ready for the trip

Our original plan was to go to Istanbul already in 2020, but Corona made us change our plans. Still we could not postpone it any longer and started preparing for the trip, making applications and preparing the Erasmus papers.

Due to Corona we did have to get tested to get to Turkey. The time frame for this is within 3 days of the trip and our flight was on Monday so this proved to be a slighly challenging task. What made it worse was that our trusted doc was away on friday forwards, so we needed to find something else. So we booked a Corona test at the Dusseldorf airport. On Saturday we headed to Dusseldorf and found the Covid 19 test place. There were some people in a line in front of us, but it went really fast. Inside there were several booths were test were performed in a factory line style. Soon after we were out and happy the test itself was not as we had previously experiended through the nose and all the way to your brain, but only from your mouth and back of your throat. Now tested we went home and waited the result to arrive the next day as they did. One less obstacle was removed

Before our trip we also arranged a place for my oldtimer car with help of my girlfriend. So on Sunday we headed again to Dusseldorf where the place for the car is. This project will wait me when we return. As we got the car to the basement garage we noticed the coolant liquid was leaking quite strongly so happy reunion with my project will most likely include some fixing before we can drive back to Bochum. 

My Camaro -72 just few days I got it in 2019

I got into oldtimers quite recently in 2019 and with help of the local American Car Club in Oulu I learned a lot and managed to get the car to such shape we have used it to travel several times between Finland and Germany. So big thanks and greetings to the ACC Oulu guys and see you in summer when we take a drive to Finland the next time. The car project is still unfinished and I have lot to do. One of our plans is to use the car later for travelling around Europe. In this plan it helps I managed to get a gas system installed to the car. This means the travels will be quite ecological as the car can run on biogas. You would not expect that from a such car, but it is not only green car by it's color. I am thinking this could be the topic for another blog later. The thought of leaving the car to a strangers garage worries me a little, but leaving such a car by the street for 5 Months sounded way worse. If the coolant liquid would not have leaked the return to Germany would have been easy as the garage is in Dusseldorf where we will land. I think now I need to visit home first before picking up the car and fixing it.

On Sunday we also moved last of our private stuff to our basement. Our apartment will be waiting for us when we arrive, we just rented it with the furniture for the duration of our trip. It is still interesting how much stuff I already had to carry there. I mean I did not bring that much to Germany less than 1 year ago when I moved there from Finland.

The apartment was cleaned, keys safe at the neighbour and we were ready for this adventure!