Fourteen days, twelve countries, one EV, and a gal who cannot be historically trusted to charge her own phone

As I write, my phone sits beside its charger at half battery. The charger is plugged in. The phone is not. I had ABSOLUTELY NO business driving an EV across Eastern Europe.

I did it anyway.

Copenhagen to Kosovo and back. One Samoyed operating in an advisory capacity. A back seat that, by the end, looked like a small artisan jam factory in transit. I worked remotely from Balkan lounges, a Serbian side street, and one bus that has not moved since 1974.

Apparently, when adventure relies on a charged battery, I become someone who plans. New personality trait unlocked.

Night one: a shed, as one does

We slept in a shed. In Saxony. On purpose. Magnus conducted a perimeter check, approved the premises, and went to bed after a long first day's drive, field runs, and ferry.

Czech Republic and Poland, in passing

Been there, done that, blinked across both borders. Turbines were spotted. Waved our passports at the unmanned border stops. Thanks, EU.

Slovakia, round one: Vila Kamila and the High Tatras

Tatranská Štrba. The beautiful High Tatras and glacial lakes rise out of the windshield. Vila Kamila is waiting at the end. This was the day I learned what it means to drive an EV up an actual mountain. Range goes down. The math gets dramatic. The car politely asks you to consider your decisions. Štrbské Pleso with Magnus made it worth every nervous glance at the battery icon. Recharge philosophy, established here: charge more, charge earlier, do not be brave. Or so she said.

Serbia, and the unlisted hotel charger

Belgrade welcomed us with the valet forgetting to turn off the car, followed by a non-functioning roadside charger at 11 kilometers to go, leaving us empty. Yeah, adventure, eeek! A Serbian guy noticed my Danish plate and gestured for me to follow. We did not share a language, but we shared understanding. I followed his car through a few streets, around a corner, into a hotel parking lot, where an unlisted charger for a few €s quietly waited. He pointed, nodded, and left. Western Europe, take notes, this is hospitality.

North Macedonia, the border

Belgrade to Ohrid was the plan. North Macedonia had other ideas. The border delayed me for paperwork I didn't know I needed, and yet somehow already had.

By day's end, I rerouted to Skopje and checked into a Marriott. The trip shifted here.

In Skopje, I discovered rose hip jam and ajvar over breakfast with new friends. The kind of discoveries that reorganize your pantry. It is now in the back seat. It is now in my future. It is, for the record, now a personality.

Magnus, true to his Brazilian half, got a coconut on our market adventure. He drank the water, ate the meat. Coconut is his favorite. We made many friends at the Marriott lounge over this performance; no one forgets seeing a landcloud eat a coconut.

Kosovo, da bears, and Magnus's adoring public

Kosovo hugs you on arrival and acts mildly offended that you did not come sooner. Reasonable.

Then, in the middle of the second night, I drove to Pristina International Airport to pick up a Danish flight carrying the most important passenger of the trip. Hello husband.

Pristina is where the trip stopped being a drive and started being a thing. Bardha (my awesome CPH friend in town visiting her local fam) and crew drove us to the Bear Sanctuary outside the city. The bears were formerly held in restaurant cages so customers could pose with them between courses (yes, really, it is sad), and now live their best retirement lives in a wooded enclosure. The bears now bounded and played, and with a moment of remarkable maturity, ignored the fluffy dog entirely. Magnus seemed confused, as he is often called a bear.

Kosovo also gave Magnus's most devoted human fan clubs yet: half a dozen young men at a gas station who saw the Samoyed and cleared their schedules, local kids who brought me treats in exchange for meeting the big pup. High fives were exchanged for a noticeable chunk of an hour. He met a local dog bestie, and his humans invited me over. Magnus ruled. I was a close second.

Soma Book Lounge in Pristina turned out to be the best bite and spot on the trip. Books on the walls. Old arcade games for the nostalgia tax. A risotto so good I briefly forgot I was on a deadline. Best café in Kosovo, hands down.

Albania, ajvar (now plural), a hundred-person serenade, and the "American" strip club

Jay entered the story at PRN, landing for his 43rd birthday after I convinced him this was a good idea. Brave. We drove to Albania for a weekend adventure.

Roadside Albania for your file: Swiss oil stations, a car repair shop called Viking, and the aforementioned American (the strip club, not the country), and pigs. Large sleeping roadside pigs.

We stayed in Shkodër at Hotel Tradita, where the evening featured a scrumptious dinner over hot coals, singing, and dancing, and a cupcake including an English-language tribute chorusing to the birthday boy.

The next morning, I dropped Jay off at Tirana and carried on.

Bulgaria, banitsa, and Magnus continuing his bread crimes

We woke up the next morning in Sofia. Piping banitsa for breakfast. Quiet morning walks with beautiful architecture. Magnus, on a routine sidewalk patrol, located a full baguette. I have no idea where these baguettes are coming from. Country after country, he has found one. Eastern Europe has an underground bread distribution problem.

Serbia, on the rebound

Belgrade Artist Hotel, a hard left turn on the map, and a unanimous decision (me, Magnus, the GPS) elected to book it to Budapest. The road is decided. We obeyed.

Hungary, a dog bakery, and Pacific Northwest pride

Budapest. Dinner on the Danube. A group of US Embassy folks at the next table were having a Wine Tasting because 'Murica, and that I respect deeply. We did not ask. We took it as a sign.

A Kutyasütis is, and I cannot stress this enough, an actual dog bakery. Magnus chose his own baked goods. Regretted nothing.

Also, there is one specific Budapest Starbucks where they make a pup-uccino with what I can only describe as commitment. Magnus and I went twice. I am from the Pacific Northwest. Loyalty to Starbucks is, for me, hometown business. I make no apologies.

Slovakia, round two: a bus in a field

We slept in a 1974 Karosa 735 city bus parked in a meadow of dandelions in Liptovský Mikuláš under the mountains.

It had deck chairs. A fire bowl. Curtains. A laminated sign taped to the inside of the door reads "TU páčkou otvor dvere," with an arrow pointing to the lever, in case I forget how doors work at any point in the night. (I did not. The sign was there anyway. Slovak hospitality is thorough.)

Magnus's nails tap-danced on the paneling all night.

In the morning, off-leash for a moment, Magnus stopped dead in the grass and made direct eye contact with a deer. The Samoyed in him, bred to herd reindeer, observed. The deer observed back. Two reasonable mammals, encountering each other, decided it was fine. I have seen less mature behavior at city council meetings.

That same evening, at Rodinné Bistro, we walked in for pizza and found ourselves in a narrative. The locals were watching their guy, Marián Bartánus, M2 -120kg European Equipped Powerlifting Champion 2026, receive his medal during the medal ceremony on the TV behind the counter. Marián was, simultaneously, standing three feet from the TV, ordering pizza. With three medals around his neck. Patting my back. Saying "EURO CHAMPION." Out loud. Repeatedly.

I said "congrats" like a human. There was no other available response. Magnus, regrettably, was outside. He has been told.

Austria, an OMV, and Mozart for the road

By the time I rolled into Austria, I was a charging guru. The Balkans turned me into a project manager. Austria handed me a fast charger and asked if I wanted a latte while I waited. A different vibe from the slow charges of the south.

At an OMV in St. Valentin, we met a Swiss couple with a little dog called Mochi, and a Slovenian couple with a small white dog whose name I missed. Both are driving black EVs. We compared notes on the side-quest era like trauma-bonded veterans.

Salzburg closed out the adventure. As Eine kleine Nachtmusik floated from a window in the Altstadt and Hohensalzburg glowed, we walked, ate, Magnus had a dog beer, and took in the final moments of the journey. The autobahn made for a fast push north for final puppy scritches on the ferry and our re-entry to DK.

A note on being American right now

It has been a complicated time to travel as an American. The accent gives you away before the passport does.

Eastern Europe has its own complicated relationship with the United States, and the texture of that relationship changes block by block. Kosovo and Albania have been grateful to the US military since 1999. Bill Clinton has statues; Hillary, I kid you not, used to have a pantsuit store; American flags fly alongside Albanian ones, and people light up at the mention of the States. Serbia remembers 1999 very differently; the NATO bombing of Belgrade is still a living memory. Every country has its own version. None of it was owed to me.

What I found, again and again, was that people made room for me anyway. They asked about Oregon (or "north of California," as I always explain). They asked about Magnus. They told me about their cousin in Chicago. They held their history and offered a welcome at the same time. I had forgotten what that felt like.

What I am taking home

Magnus tilting his head to sleep under the AC vent while never bothering to help with navigation. Magnus drinking his nostalgia coconut. Jay beaming with his cupcake in the Happy Birthday chorus of Albanians. A deer in a Slovak field. Landscaping views of the mountains, the hillsides, and the Adriatic Sea. A Serbian stranger who gestured 'follow me' and led me to a charger nobody on the internet had ever heard of. A powerlifter who decided I personally needed to hold his medals (won that day). Bardha's adorable family at a sanctuary full of bears that have been through more than most of us (and credit to Bardha for sharing her culture and her story, touched by an equally hard past). Six young men at a gas station in Kosovo, giving a big-fluff celebrity treatment.

Your road trip will look different. The joy is the same.