Greece 1983

In 1983 Gil and I were living in Hamburg, Germany, working at the DESY physics laboratory. We had a car for a while, but then sold it and purchased a used VW camper van. In March of 1983 we left Hamburg for Greece. We traveled through Austria to Yugoslavia, went around Albania, returned to the coast in Yugoslavia, drove through Greece to the Peloponnese, then took a ferry to Italy and traveled through Italy and France to Switzerland, then back to Germany. We did not visit the Athens area on this trip because we had done that on a Med cruise the previous year.

I found very few notes about this trip so in some cases I don't know where we were. Even the borders between, for example, Yugoslavia and Greece, are not clear to me now. In most cases I think I found out pretty much where we had been. We were members of the German auto club (ADAC) which provided us with not only important insurance for traveling to foreign countries but also maps and the like. I had a book about the Peloponnese in English and a more general book in German. Then there is the challenge of scanning old slides and turning them into something usable... Slides fade and get moldy and change color... Gil is the slide scanner, Judy processes the slides. We have a good slide scanner, no longer manufactured, a Nikon Coolscan, that detects the side with the emulsion and attempts to subtract dirt and mold on the other side. The scanning software is the wonderful vuescan which not only still works with your scanner no matter how old (thank you, Ed Hamrick!) but attempts to get a good color balance despite strange fading, making the post processing much easier.

If you look at the larger pictures rather than the thumbs, you can see some comments about the photos as well as the location when I knew it.
  • I had been to Yugoslavia in the mid 60s with a Swiss friend but this was the first visit by Gil and we took a different route. It is so sad that Yugoslavia…

    Yugoslavia

    I had been to Yugoslavia in the mid 60s with a Swiss friend but this was the first visit by Gil and we took a different route. It is so sad that Yugoslavia…
  • We entered Greece near the Mediterranean and traveled south to the Peloponnese, then took a ferry to Bari, Italy.

    Greece

    We entered Greece near the Mediterranean and traveled south to the Peloponnese, then took a ferry to Bari, Italy.
  • I remember Italy being hot and dry, so we went pretty fast north from Bari, and I don't know about what we did visit in the south. Then we went to more…

    Italy

    I remember Italy being hot and dry, so we went pretty fast north from Bari, and I don't know about what we did visit in the south. Then we went to more…
  • We found some nice places in France as well. Some of our favorites were Pont du Gard and Les Baux (bauxite is named after this town). We went into Switzerland…

    France

    We found some nice places in France as well. Some of our favorites were Pont du Gard and Les Baux (bauxite is named after this town). We went into Switzerland…