Intro about Turkey, Greece and more

Why Greece and others?

Greece has been on my list for a long time. Before visiting Greece, I had visited 10 European countries across the north, south, west and east, but not including Italy and Greece, which got me interested because they carry the genes of European civilization. Italy seems fun but Greece for me is more mysterious. Probably because I heard less people traveling to Greece compared to Italy. (And maybe I now know why? ha)

Anyway, Greece is the initial goal. But when I looked at the places marked on my “want to go” list on Google map and did more flight research, I realized it’s good to include other countries as well - Turkey, Bulgaria, Croatia and Bosnia Herzegovina. Reasons?

1. About Turkey, traveling from Taiwan to Greece requires to transfer in Turkey anyway. And my partner and I had both never visited.

2. About Bulgaria, the previous Soviet Union country / ross nation Bulgaria always interests me a lot. In 2024, Bulgaria and Romania joined the Schengen Area, which means easier travel since there are no passport checks when moving between Schengen countries. Plus, it’s so close to Turkey!

3. About Croatia, I marked Dubrovnik at least 7 years ago because of a travel show. It seemed to mention Game of Thrones then but I didn’t care much. I just had an impression that it’s beautiful.

4. About Bosnia Herzegovina, I discovered a 1-day tour from Dubrovnik to Bosnia on Klook, and thought it’s a good chance to visit a mysterious Balkan country which is a trigger of World War I.

About the trip

Yep after confirming the destinations and checking the flight routes, we finalized the itinerary as follows:

• Turkey: September 1 - 9, 2025

• Bulgaria: September 10 - 12, 2025

• Greece: September 12 - 18, 2025

• Croatia: September 18 - 21, 2025

• Bosnia: September 20, 2025

There were so many fun moment during the trip! Turkish driver forcedly drove on a divisional island to turn around (that was so funny 😂); my boyfriend blended well in Turkey and people spoke Turkish to him (he’s from the US) 😂; I wasn’t expected my french would come in handy in Turkey when a lady kindly helped me out.

On the other hand, I also realize that I’m definitely getting old! When I was 22 traveling in Europe, I always felt excited to move on to the next destination. Even taking a 7-hour bus from Warsaw to Krakow wasn’t a big deal for me. But now, I feel obviously tired when we have to travel to other places. I was even satisfied and ready to go home when we went through half of the journey lol. I guess c’est la vie.

Stay tuned! I’ll share more about the tips and fun stories the next week!