Regarding Eagles, i had a chat with a Turkish driver one day in one of the interminable queues that you encounter all over the place and he said that he thought all countries who use the Eagle are warlike people and those who use (ahem) the star and crescent are more peacefull nations, it certainly made me think again about flags and emblems. Not that i give his idea much credence but i gave it a thought. His prime reason for thinking this way so he told me was the German Imperial Eagle !
Hi Ron, you would have passed The Eagle, it is on the left side on top off a bluff.
Now then, how many of you can remember The Aero Hotel, & that wonderfull scenery viewed from the parking, especially in summer. 
Dave.
as a new member to the web my first trip was in a daf 2600 unit with a fridge trailer with aload of gripe water to bagdad all i can say was thank god for the advice of the real drivers who had done that route pass port to cy elliot for visas now this along time ago so correct me if you think im wrong but the main things i remember of that first trip was of arriving at dover doing the paper work and then being asked which border crossing i no idea what he was on about lucky the driver behind had i had to use the corridor from france to belgium told to fill up in on crossing the boarder started to relax a little .The german boarder welcome i dont think papers ,tank shine whats a tank shine i asked my self soon found out fine for bring to much derv in now heading for a place called philiproute to cross into my next country the boarder crossing was a very small and cover in snow welcome to the commie world next problern low bridge at prauge sat trying to find away at 2am when a old man came to explain how to get a round i must have looked a complete idiot as he went of and cme back with a plastic car that smoked more than my truck he then show me the way thanks would never be enough but thats all he would take i found a big truck stop and on seeing some blue painted mac trucks on british plates parked up next morning found the trucks were being drivern by turks the next thing that sticks out was crossing the kalfat ferry and driving up towards the mountains and then it started snowing do i stop and put chains on on hine sight i should have done as on one of the bends i lost all traction and started slide towards the crash barrier with my foot on brake it would only slide very slowly with the hand brake on it just slide i ran round and put the trailer brake on as it slide towards the barrier very slowly and stopped on it then started to slide very slowly down hill i chain the front to the rails and spent a very lonely night on my own a bang on the door in the morning i was greeted by the army with machine guns wanting to no why had stop here near a miltary base yet again i must have looked like the village idiot 200 malbour cigs and im hooked up to a tank and being towed up the mountain at the top i really did not want to go down it was then i met a truck driver and mate who i later found out was f troop we put chains on the trailer and put the trailer brake a bit and decended .Next the turkish boarder what a shock holes big enough to loose a truck in paper work by young turk and along time later and one fight with a british driver who try rob me i headed into turkey i remember stopping on the left before the londa camp to have some repairs done my first phone call home i was very lucky to meet up with a yorkshire driver driving a black volvo called harry gil who took me under his wing i all so rember the stop down the mountains before adanerwhere we stopped let the brakes call of cup of tea and filed upwith water that water was bloody cold we stopped at a petrol station for the night and a meal, i remember a lot of yanks from some military base there one more stop for the night and we crossed a bridge into irak paper done just down the road was a truck park where we stopped for the night on starting next morning we were held up as they were blasting the road filled up at mousal and then onto bagdad where i handed the paper work in and was told i had to tip in basra i was not happy as there was a war going on down there with iran what war i was told i next lesson dont no anything yes i made it back and went to work for taytran run by a gent called ken taylor one of the best gent s i have ever worked for i do have some photos i will try to put on i drove volvos and dorfs to iran also the ferry trip to egypt then went to greece takeing cheese and beef to yank bases and yes i still have my old passports with the visas and stamps and the back page the numbers off all the trucks entered please remember this was the seventys names might be missed spelt and yes i have a lot more storys some funny some sad to finnish i can remember sitting on the ferry six weeks later yes it take that time lot more story i have not told feeling smug asking a t form driver how long he had been away only aweek yes i did brag to start with and was put in my place but the more trips i did and then years i stopped being concern about what i had done and just thought was i really like that at the start Yes i was as you did not want to look first time rooky
davemackie:
Hi Ron, you would have passed The Eagle, it is on the left side on top off a bluff.
Now then, how many of you can remember The Aero Hotel, & that wonderfull scenery viewed from the parking, especially in summer.Dave.
Now the Aero was something else. I can remember the little kiosks opposite and the queues of scantily clad ladies queuing for orange juice and sweets. Just along the road was a Hungarian Chinese Restaurant which really did test your language skills 
The hotels in those days were so welcoming to lorry drivers. I cannot imagine the London Hilton or Crowne Plaza being so accommodating
Hiall.I used to like stopping at the Aero so we could jump in a taxi and go to one of the many excellent restuarants in the city.
On the Euro truck forum there is a piece about favourite eating places.We should have one here.We have eaten from London to Lahore and from Manchester to Muscat.Whatâs your favourite place or meal.Weâve got millions of sq kms to choose from and 50 yrs of stuffing our faces.
My personal favourite[apart from all the wonderful backstreet gems]has to be the 2 Gelik restuarants in Istanbul.Gelik et[meat] and balik[fish]That was one of the favourites for my wife and me.Mike
Hi Volvo 303, welcome to the thread. A great story, keep them comingâŚAll the best RDF
volvo303:
as a new member to the web my first trip was in a daf 2600 unit with a fridge trailer with aload of gripe water to bagdad all i can say was thank god for the advice of the real drivers who had done that route pass port to cy elliot for visas now this along time ago so correct me if you think im wrong but the main things i remember of that first trip was of arriving at dover doing the paper work and then being asked which border crossing i no idea what he was on about lucky the driver behind had i had to use the corridor from france to belgium told to fill up in on crossing the boarder started to relax a little .The german boarder welcome i dont think papers ,tank shine whats a tank shine i asked my self soon found out fine for bring to much derv in now heading for a place called philiproute to cross into my next country the boarder crossing was a very small and cover in snow welcome to the commie world next problern low bridge at prauge sat trying to find away at 2am when a old man came to explain how to get a round i must have looked a complete idiot as he went of and cme back with a plastic car that smoked more than my truck he then show me the way thanks would never be enough but thats all he would take i found a big truck stop and on seeing some blue painted mac trucks on british plates parked up next morning found the trucks were being drivern by turks the next thing that sticks out was crossing the kalfat ferry and driving up towards the mountains and then it started snowing do i stop and put chains on on hine sight i should have done as on one of the bends i lost all traction and started slide towards the crash barrier with my foot on brake it would only slide very slowly with the hand brake on it just slide i ran round and put the trailer brake on as it slide towards the barrier very slowly and stopped on it then started to slide very slowly down hill i chain the front to the rails and spent a very lonely night on my own a bang on the door in the morning i was greeted by the army with machine guns wanting to no why had stop here near a miltary base yet again i must have looked like the village idiot 200 malbour cigs and im hooked up to a tank and being towed up the mountain at the top i really did not want to go down it was then i met a truck driver and mate who i later found out was f troop we put chains on the trailer and put the trailer brake a bit and decended .Next the turkish boarder what a shock holes big enough to loose a truck in paper work by young turk and along time later and one fight with a british driver who try rob me i headed into turkey i remember stopping on the left before the londa camp to have some repairs done my first phone call home i was very lucky to meet up with a yorkshire driver driving a black volvo called harry gil who took me under his wing i all so rember the stop down the mountains before adanerwhere we stopped let the brakes call of cup of tea and filed upwith water that water was bloody cold we stopped at a petrol station for the night and a meal, i remember a lot of yanks from some military base there one more stop for the night and we crossed a bridge into irak paper done just down the road was a truck park where we stopped for the night on starting next morning we were held up as they were blasting the road filled up at mousal and then onto bagdad where i handed the paper work in and was told i had to tip in basra i was not happy as there was a war going on down there with iran what war i was told i next lesson dont no anything yes i made it back and went to work for taytran run by a gent called ken taylor one of the best gent s i have ever worked for i do have some photos i will try to put on i drove volvos and dorfs to iran also the ferry trip to egypt then went to greece takeing cheese and beef to yank bases and yes i still have my old passports with the visas and stamps and the back page the numbers off all the trucks entered please remember this was the seventys names might be missed spelt and yes i have a lot more storys some funny some sad to finnish i can remember sitting on the ferry six weeks later yes it take that time lot more story i have not told feeling smug asking a t form driver how long he had been away only aweek yes i did brag to start with and was put in my place but the more trips i did and then years i stopped being concern about what i had done and just thought was i really like that at the start Yes i was as you did not want to look first time rooky
hutpik:
Hiall.I used to like stopping at the Aero so we could jump in a taxi and go to one of the many excellent restuarants in the city.
On the Euro truck forum there is a piece about favourite eating places.We should have one here.We have eaten from London to Lahore and from Manchester to Muscat.Whatâs your favourite place or meal.Weâve got millions of sq kms to choose from and 50 yrs of stuffing our faces.
My personal favourite[apart from all the wonderful backstreet gems]has to be the 2 Gelik restuarants in Istanbul.Gelik et[meat] and balik[fish]That was one of the favourites for my wife and me.Mike
Heh Hutpik !!
Now yourâe talking. I used to plan my route by places to stop and eat !!
On the way out I used to like stop at the Wallystop for Mussels and Frites, especially if it was Thursday, Mussels special. Geiselwind for Schweinshaxe and a few Weitzen Bier. Then I didnât really bother eating out in Czech on the way down, just a bite to eat from the trailer box on the airstrip. In Hungary I would usually have breakfast at the restaurant on the left just through Rajka and fill up with cheap squirt, normally 300 litres for 100 DM. and then depending on how long it had taken to get through Rajka, it would either be lunch or park up for the night at the little place on the left as you leave Kiskunhallas where they served a mean Schnitzel filled with Liver and some Hungarian Red Wine. Bearing in mind that we were sitting in queues at all the Eastern-Bloc borders for what seemed like ever !! sometimes it would only be possible to do a few hours until the next watering hole so you either stopped everywhere and took forever or missed some out and go straight by. If I was to get my Iraqi Double Transit Visa en-Route then that would mean stopping at the National Belgrade to submit the passport. This in turn meant the obligatory Mixed Grill George was order of the day plus a few Pivos !! 
Otherwise I would stop at one of the Service areas just past Belgrade for a freshly grilled Cevabcici and Cleb from one of the vendors. I cant really remember any good places in Bulgy except for a little place up in the mountains somewhere between Vratsa and Sofia, where you could get wild boar steaks,thats if I had come through the tiny border at Bregovo. Then. once in Turkey there were the usual haunts, but that didnt mean the best food. I used to sometimes stop at a fish restaurant on the salt flats before Aksaray where they served fresh trout.
Another favorite of mine was at a small restaurant at the top of Tarsus where they served freshly grilled mountain sheep or goat by the Kilo and Half Kilo, accompanied by fresh seasonal salad and a jug of Ayran.
After those places it was mostly trailer box
apart from a meal at the Thai restaurant at Ar Ar on the Tapline. and ofcourse the obligatory all you can eat trough at the Karavan in Doha⌠So theres 8000 Kmâs of my food. What are yours guys.
Not only the places you ve just mentioned GS but surely you can remember the smell of roasting pig as you drove down from Subotica towards the Nacional, absolutely mouth watering and did nt cost you apenny, lovely long ago days, don t you wish you could do it again. Crow
GS OVERLAND:
Another favorite of mine was at a small restaurant at the top of Tarsus where they served freshly grilled mountain sheep or goat by the Kilo and Half Kilo, accompanied by fresh seasonal salad and a jug of Ayran.
Hiya Gavin, could that be the one on the right hand side as you were travelling east, I.I.R.C. there was a small white wall which had a tap and you were able to have a wash and fill up your water containers. If it is then the first time that I stopped there they were barbecuing a sheep and as we sat there eating our sheep and salad and drinking a warm coke I remember seeing a Turk clutching a huge knife. He walked over to where a couple of goats were foraging near a wire fence not far from where we were sat. He held out a carrot or something and as one of the goats started to eat it he grabbed one of itâs ears, he pushed it to the floor and slit itâs throat. I shall never forget that horrible choking gurguling sound and any one else who has ever witnessed something like this probably wonât either 
.
Hi all.I remember the same sort of thing in Tehran.We were 6 of us in a tractor unit going shopping.Jeff Ruggins was driving.we had been to a supermarket and were on the way back to the customs when Jeff said ââanyone fancy a kebab tonightââ.This seemed like a good idea so we agreed.Immediately he pulled over and stopped.There was an old guy with a sheep on a rope and about 10\12 people standing around.We all piled out wondering.The old guy looked at Jeff and Jeff said ââ6 kebabââ.The old boy beamed at him,looked around at the group of people,done a quick head count then straightaway grabbed hold of the sheep,cut itâs throat and started to dismember it.We all looked on in horror but Jeff said ''thatâs the way its done here,they canât keep it fresh so they wait until they can sell it all.After we got over the shock it was the freshest kebab we ever had.Mike
I wonder if anyone remembers this incident which happened at Oktayâs in Istanbul.Oktay had just taken delivery of about 15 new Volvos,the drivers had driven them down from Sweden unit only,and on a Sunday morning they were all parked in the yard in a kind of semi circle.All the Turkish drivers were stood to attention beside their trucks,when into the centre of yard comes some sort of immam or mullah or whatever,another guy leads 3 sheep into the centre.The holy man chanted some prayers and waved his arms about for a while, and then the guy with the sheep grabbed the first one, pulled its head back and slit its throat.As the blood gushed out all the Turkish drivers rushed from their trucks,dipped their hands in the blood,then ran back and smeared the blood all over their cabs,then the other sheep were killed.One of the Turkish drivers told me it was some sort of initiation ceremony for the trucks and to ward off evil spirits and bring good luck.It wasnât very lucky for the sheep was it, 'cos we ate them later in the evening.
Is that big key on the top your trailer for winding up the elastic band Geoff??
Tony Taylor:
Hiya Steve,the windmill was great place to stop,good food etc.The only thing was, if youâd had a load of beer on a Saturday night,Sunday morning was terrible,not only did you have a little hangover,but those pesky Turks WOULD insist on changing tyres with accompanying hammering, banging and clanging.It did nothing to improve ones disposition,the only remedy was to go back inside for a hair of the dog.
Hiya Tony, you have just reminded me of when I spent most of a Saturday afternoon and Saturday night waiting to get out of Rumania into Hungary at Nadlac. The plan was to get to The Windmill for the night but as it was 2 a.m. by the time that I got to Szeged and I was about to fall off my perch I decided to park next to one of F.Troops finest in that big layby across the road from the garage and have a bit of a lie in on the Sunday morning. No such luck, the two Romtrans men started to change a clutch at 5 a.m. as soon as the sun came up 
.
Regards Steve.
On the theme of eagles, monuments etc. Any idea where this is?
Oldtimer Trucker:
Trawling throgh the web i came across these Astran trucks (4).Gert, like this wan?
Volvo F88
Volvo F88Salut,Oldtimer Trucker
was this BUNS motor
I see you got down to Pinar Basi GTPaul!
Well spotted Jazzandy that was OHS s depot just outside Pinar Basi, and it was nt son of Crow it was me his dad ,with his mam. It was 1977 and waqs the second time I had been there that year, the first time being with our Tony about a month earlier. We were pulling for John Bull Shipping from Coventry taking Coventry Climax fork trucks CKD from Livingstone Allpack at watford gap to Izmir. The key Tony is some sort of electricity pylon but it makes agood pic do nt it. Crow.
Did they service the truck for you. They had a crack team there under an ex army colonel who was super efficient and always insisted the trucks were thoroughly steam cleaned. In the village was a Pida parlour with the best pizza Iâve ever tasted!