Chernobyl Children's Lifeline - Mid Surrey Link

The hospitality by everyone was overwhelming and it was sad to say goodbye. We drove back to Brest for our last night in Belarus and wondered how long it would take to get through the border control in the morning. Lesley had told us that it took her 10 hours and that there were 100 cars in the queue on her return.

We had breakfast and drove to the border. We counted 175 cars in line. We decided to drive 25 miles south to the other border crossing that we hoped would be a little quieter. Here we counted 125 cars. It had to be better and there was no other reasonable choice, so we were given a ticket and joined the queue. We sat for 1 1/2 hours and nothing moved. I took a walk down to the front of the queue. Here I found an official who spoke a little English. I asked if there was a faster way of getting into Poland. He suggested that a hundred dollar bill would do the trick. I was taken into his hut and in front of three officials, placed the money in a drawer as requested. Within 10 minutes we had cleared customs and were in Poland. We drove through the Polish countryside, it was a glorious day, we both knew it was money well spent.

We travelled home via Warsaw and stayed in a beautiful chalet styled village on a lake named Lagow. Next day we drove via Berlin and found a charmingly quaint small town named Gardelegen. We stayed in a hotel opposite the Rat House (town hall). In the morning we drove to Bruges,a beautiful medieval town, but the heavens opened and we carried on to Dunkerque and caught the ferry to Dover. 3200 brilliant miles and lots of happy memories.