I think the best road trip I have ever had the fortune to take was with my father, when I was about 12. We had just left Lagos (Nigeria) after my mother had died, and as my new boarding school would not accept me for 2 months, we took off round Europe. This was in 1972-ish and my father asked me where I would like to go en route to Istanbul, where his next contract lay. Given the map, it became my job to work out a route that took us via Sweden, where we had very dear friends. We stayed in Stockholm for about a week, recharging our batteries, then off we set for Istanbul...
In Germany we were arrested as we had eaten in the hotel restaurant, thinking that they would merely add the cost to the bill; they demanded immediate payment in Deutsche Marks,, about the only currency we didn't have, having crossed the border after all the banks shut! We offered Sterling, Franks, Guiders, Dollars; no good, off to the copshop went my father. Luckily the sargeant there was able to change some money and he was released. We continued through Switzerland, which was breathtakingly beautiful, Yugoslavia (as it then was) and wound up in Bulgaria. At the time, this was NOT a place to hang about, so we were speeding along the awful roads as best we could, when a Volkswagen Beetle overtook us...we were in a Porsche!!Of course, it was the police, demanding a fine for speeding and we didn't have any local currency - seems to be becoming a theme here - bu the cop just opened his wallet, which was about three inches thick with every currency you could imagine! We paid the fine in something or another and continued to Turkey, where in Edirne we stayed at a real Kervansary (a place for camel trains and other travelers to stop and about 700 years old. It was magnificent. Then on to Istanbul, my favourite place of all time. Back in the early 70's it was a ramshackle place with old American cars serving as communal taxis, but totally breathtaking. A journey I shall never forget, not least because I was trusted at age 12 to tell my father which road to take and where to stop at night. I also had to act as translator!