Watch out for the mouflon!

Quote from Körkortsboken, (drivers licence theory book): "Mark the place and contact police if you hit: bear, wolf, moose, deer, lynx, wild boar, eagle or mouflon"! What the hell is a mouflon? How do I know if I hit a mouflon? Is this knowledge really neccesary for my driving licence?

(I found an explanation here)

Dreaming of Damascus

Peter and I both read the book "From the Holy Mountain" by William Dalrymple, a travel diary from a trip around the christian monasterys in the middle east, some of them still operating since byzantine times. Inspired by this I want to go here! And I will, if we make it that far. The monastery stores an icon with the image of the virgin Mary, said to have been painted by the evangelist St Luke. What I find most fantastic is that both Muslims and Christians seem to believe in the power of this icon, they go there to ask for protection and help form Mary.

Syria is tempting in many ways but the very early development of the civilization seems to unfortunately have slowed down lately. Even if they were building temples when we were still trying to find out how to make up fire the way the society is organized is rather primitive nowadays in my opinion. Or what do you think about imprisoning people for three years claiming that they spread "false and exaggerated information", torturing some prisoners to death or introducing a law that frees a rapist from punishment if he offers to marry his victim.

Be Ready!

I was never a scout.

Might have been good to practise some wild life for this travel. I found a site on scout-cooking, it´s in swedish but I´ll give you a translation of one of the recipies:

Chicken in the ground:
Make a fire, put 10-15 stones in it and burn for a few hours. Take a chicken, stuff it with one stone, wrap it in an old newspaper, cover with clay and bury it in a hole together with the hot stones. Cook for some hours.

Godness! I hope we don´t need to get down to this kind of basics, but all you scouts who tried it: Way to go!

On Food and Cooking on the Road*

Planning what to bring is half the fun and even material for classic literature, (were do you stuff the butter?) Lisa provided the link for this, it´s well worth spending some time on reading it, hilarious.

I´m thinking about how to equip the kitchen for out door cooking. In order to keep the costs down and my spirits up we´ll have to do a lot of the cooking ourselves. Besides I long to be able to actually shop in those food markets you always see abroad with fresh, unidentifiable foods.

You can´t take everything though so here is a list of tools I think are indispensable in a primitive kitchen:
Gas-stove, small + big pot, small + big frying pan with lid, big knife, small knife, bread knife, cutting board, grater, mortar, whisk, wooden spoon, plastic bowl, spatula, scissors, wine opener, potato peeler, mocca boiler, and then of course things you need for eating like plates, cutlery and cups. I could make the list much longer but we really need to keep it basic.

If something crusial in your opinion is forgotten, please comment.

*Peter gave me this book, I will bring it on the road to dream about advanced cooking.

Testing testing

So, I bought tickets from Stockholm to Trieste for the 15th of May, Peter will pick me up in Shlakiya and then we go for the first longer drive with her. Test drive will go to Tuscany and more specifically Florence were and around we will spend a few days. Hopefully Peter will have completed the bed inside Shlakiya and we´ll be able to sleep and cook in the car.

The aim of the test drive is to see if the car is working to our satisfaction and what we might need in terms of equipment. Well: Italy's mayor characteristics are wine and good food, things that we will probably miss during parts of the trip, so the drive is not only to practice.

Another thing, I hope eventually I will have a driving licence so I can actually drive a bit.

Preparation

Ea preparation.

I beg you don't gaze with an evil eye, work and you will get one as well.