August 2015 - London to Cape Town

Cycling Through Serbia and Romania

August 30, 2015/in Danube, London to Cape Town/by Emily Conrad-Pickles

After the rugged roads of Hungary, we enjoyed two fantastic days cycling through the north of Croatia where we were treated to beautiful smooth tarmac roads, vineyard, pretty towns and a few hills. It was a welcome break and we wished we could have stayed longer. We then arrived in Serbia with quite a welcome.

We crossed the border into a town called Backa Palanka where we were due to make our first stay a host from Warm Showers, an online community of cycle tourers who are willing to offer a bed, sofa or space to pitch a tent in a garden to passing cyclists. We were a little apprehensive as this was our first experience staying with ‘strangers’ so we thought it might be an idea to get a little Dutch courage in a local bar serving a bottle of beer for 73p (well, it would be rude not to). What a error in judgement that turned out to be.

Staying with Zoran and his guests in Backa Palanka, Serbia

On arrival at our host Zoran’s house, we were welcomed into what he called his “little piece of paradise” with not one but two shots of Rakia as this is, apparently, the typical way to welcome a guest to your home in Serbia. Thank goodness we had that beer…We then discovered that we were not Zoran’s only guests that night as two Spanish girls and a German guy who were touring Serbia on bikes were also guests, they’d just popped out to buy some beer. Excellent. So, feeling that we needed to get into the swing of things, we duly popped out to get a few beers and on our return we found that Zoran’s mum was also staying and had cooked us all dinner; a traditional Serbian pastry based meal with tomatoes from the garden. A couple of beers, some food and good conversation with our new friends learning more about our fellow guests. Zoran told us how he had spent much of his childhood refugee camps during the Kosovo crisis, however we did subsequently learn that he now had a successful career in the construction business and had traveled around Europe working on some great projects. That was until he quit a few days before as he’d fallen out with his boss.

Around 9.30pm I was thinking, what a great evening, I’m looking forward to a shower and a good night’s sleep, when Zoran stood up and said, “Emily, James…quick shower and we get ready to go to out” [sic]. Panic set in. We had 150km the next day planned into Belgrade, and had already had a few beers, and that Rakia. But, what can you do? Your host wants to party, and is allowing you to stay in his home for free, along with some peer pressure from the Spanish girls, (OK we didn’t need that much convincing) we duly showered and headed out to the local night spot, a small bar in town. What a fun time. Turns out that all the people in the bar where a similar age to us, and all grew up watching Only Fools and Horses and ‘Allo ‘Allo (a little awkward when explaining to the German member of our group) so many jokes were shared and appreciated.

Around 12.30, a few more compulsory Rakias later (it is rude to say no to a host after all…..) we headed home. We could not wait to get to sleep but it turns out that Zoran on the other hand had other ideas. On arrival back home he turned up the drum and base, stripped down to his shorts and started prancing around the house. Evidently he had been on the Rakia all day. Excellent. After a while, we were starting to contemplate finding somewhere to camp when he realised that we might actually need to sleep so showed us to a room on the other side of his house that we could sleep in and within minutes we were asleep.

The 7am alarm the next day was not remotely fun, nor was the cycle along the flooded cycle paths into Novi Sad, around 40km away. Here we had some food, drank a lot of coke and water and continued towards Belgrade.

With about 50km to go, and heads still pounding, we stopped for another Coke at a small shop and got chatting to an old guy with broken English. When he discovered where we were from and how far we were cycling, he put his arm around James and started a rendition of ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary”. James joined in the best he could whilst two other men, sipping their beers on a nearby bench, looked on with a look on bemusement.

We continued our ride into Belgrade where, thankfully, we had booked into a cheap guesthouse on the outskirts of the city.

Belgrade is not a beautiful place. The city felt the full impact of the 78 day sustained bombings in 1999 during the Kosovo War as part of the NATO attempt to stop human rights abuses. The country as a whole has struggled to re-build the infrastructure and as a result the city is still under repair. One building has been left in its bombed state as a memorial and a reminder of the past.

Ministry of defense building in Belgrade damaged during the 1999 NATO bombing.

One day in Belgrade gave us a good flavour of the city and the underlying history however it was tricky be feel anything other that underwhelmed after all of the beautiful cities that we have been lucky enough to travel through. Apparently the night life in Belgrade is some of the best in Europe and therefore it is possibly worth a visit for the party animals out there.

President of the Republic of Serbia Building

The next day saw our departure from Belgrade and a shorter ride to a small Serbian town called Kovin. Although short, it was certainly not without its excitement. Belgrade is the steepest city I have ever visited, it baffles me why such a big city has developed on quite such steep slopes – all very well for the views and defensive position, but not so good for cyclist. A long ride uphill out of the city on a pretty main road which kept us on our our toes.

Once we were out of the city, we were greeted by our first set of unfriendly dogs. In this part of the world the dogs are real pests and we are expecting them to get worse. Dogs don’t like bicycles very much and so often they will chase you as you pass. When you struggle to reach 20km/hr on the flat, that can pose a problem, especially on hills as the dogs are faster than you. We’ve been told that if you stop and get off the bikes, then they realise that you are humans and tend to back off. So far, this has worked out fine. With no owners, and no birth control, these dogs have freedom of the streets and breed like crazy, feeding off whatever they can get hold of. On this occasion, we were greeted with around 7 dogs who all appeared out of the bushes barking furiously at us and chasing us up the road. With a deep breath, we stopped and got off the bikes and thankfully they ran off. But my goodness, I was happy to have passed them. Luck however was not on our side as we descended a relatively steep hill to be greeted by a security guard. Oh no…..what had we done? Apparently we were about to cycle through a huge nuclear facility. Not so good. So we turned around and of course, the only road out was up the steep hill past the dogs…..well, we are still here to tell the tale.

Cycling past Serbia’s aggressive dogs

Just outside Kovin while we were looking for a spot to camp, we chanced upon a small guesthouse on the banks of the Danube run by a charming couple called Draga and Ale who allowed us to camp in their garden. I was particularly amused by the photo of us they put onto their blog – which I believe to be a conversation as to whether we should have our helmets on or off for the photo but looks like we’re having an argument!

The next day we entered Romania, our 8th country and a country I had been really excited to visit.

Romania border crossing

Soon after crossing the border we were greeted by a 6km climb over a large hill which was by far the longest climb for a while and with a 12% gradient it definitely got the heart pumping again. Actually it felt good to be back on the hills as we have a lot coming up so it was good to start to get some climbing again. A descent into a town called Moldova Veche and we promptly looked for somewhere to stay. The town is right alongside the Danube and a lady in the town told us that around 6km further along is a great place to camp. We were not disappointed and so we dipped down off the road to set up camp on the side of the river just in time for a beautiful sunset.

Wild camping by the Danube in Romania

The next day we were up early and continued our journey along the river. The next 100kms were the most beautiful yet and a day’s cycling that I will never forget. A national park runs either side of the river – Romania on one side, Serbia on the other as the river travels through a giant gorge. It meant is was pretty hilly but with long winding switch backs and the views that we experienced as we meandered up tree lined roads overlooking the river, we were happy to climb all day long. It was breath taking. It is clear that Romania is investing in the area as we saw a number of new hotels, even water villas, being built along the river. I hope it does not become too developed as it is such a beautiful, peaceful place to come to escape the outside world. At the end of the day came a big climb to cross over where the river narrows from nearly 1000 to 150m at at area known as the Gates of Trojan. We had been recommended to pause at the summit and walk up to the very top of the cliffs so we stopped at a local shop for a cold drink, left our bikes with them and made our way up the very steep slope on foot to the view point. I’m not too keen on heights so the experience at the top was a little hair raising for me, especially as I watched James clamber on the rocks to get “the shot”!
Beautiful Danube gorge in Romania

Beautiful Danube gorge in Romania

A lovely descent ended the day where we stayed alongside the river.

From our best day on the road, to the worst. James wrote a blog about this already.

I’ve loved Romania – the people have been incredibly friendly wherever we have been. The older population tend to stare quite but they will wave and the children shout out Hello! Hello! Welcome! in every village, it’s been really good fun. It would not be Romania landscape without the traditional horse and carts flying past delivering farm goods and people around. It seems however that when driving a cart, it is compulsory to do so while drinking a 2 litre bottle of beer. Perhaps that is why everyone here is so friendly.

Our last day in Romania brought with it our first real mechanical issue with the bikes as I broke two spokes on my rear wheel. Having never fixed a spoke ourselves, we were bracing ourselves to work out the hard way, when a man approached us to see if we needed some help. Before we knew it, we had been whisked off to a back street bike shop where my wheel was taken away for repair. While we waited, the man who brought us there, Cezar, decided to stay with us and even bought us a drink and some local food. He was a sports massage student with a brother who was a doctor in London so he was happy to practice his English while telling us that the Romanians like to travel to England and the women are so nice. Hmmmm….

Beautiful sunset as we cross the Danube for the last time from Turnu Măgurele Romania to Nikopol, Bulgaria

We managed to catch the last ferry across to Bulgaria where we managed to pitch the tent on the banks of the river Danube for one last time before we said goodbye to the river the next morning. It was a poignant moment for us both as we have been following the river for over 5 weeks now.

If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post, please donate to World Bicycle Relief. Every penny goes to the great work the charity does in Africa – not to fund our expedition in any way.

Inside Buzludzha: The derelict monument to Bulgaria’s Communist past

August 29, 2015/in London to Cape Town/by James Davis

Today we took time off the bikes to visit Buzludzha; the former home of Bulgaria’s Communist Party.

Built in 1981 at a cost of over £5m, the building has fallen into disrepair since the fall of the iron curtain in 1989.

The Bulgarian government do not have the funds to either restore or demolish the eerie building, so it lies in its derelict state as a monument to the country’s troubled past.

If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post, please donate to World Bicycle Relief. Every penny goes to the great work the charity does in Africa – not to fund our expedition in any way.

A day I’d rather forget

August 26, 2015/in London to Cape Town/by James Davis

It had to happen to one of us sooner or later. It just happened to be me that was first. What started as a good day, later descended into one I’d rather forget.

The day started well; we woke to beautiful misty views across the Danube and, after a quick bowl of cereal, we were on the road by 08:30.

Misty morning on the Danube near Eşelniţa, Romania

There was sharp climb out of the village then, a few KMs into the ride, we joined the E70: a main trunk road adjacent to the Danube. After cycling on the Euro Velo 6 path and quiet country roads, it was a shock to the system to have countless lorries thunder past us. To be fair, there was a reasonable hard shoulder and the majority of the trucks gave us gave us plenty of room; but it was a bit hairy when we had to cycle through a tunnel with a juggernaut bearing down on us from behind.

The traffic eased off but the terrain didn’t. We started ascending the day’s main climb, which was about 6km long at 8%-10% gradient. It was now midday and we felt the full force of the sun on our faces. Sweat dripped from my forehead and pooled on the inner rims of my sunglasses until it poured, in one go, onto my shorts, mixing with the salt patterns that had already formed on my thighs from the previous days’ cycling.

At the summit, I spied a patch of shade by a layby and called for a quick time out out to get my breath back. As soon as I stopped the bike I didn’t feel well, but I couldn’t quite place why.

I managed to prop my bike up and leant against a concrete buttress at the side of the layby. Suddenly, a huge wave of dizziness hit me. The world in front of me rotated but I couldn’t focus on it. My legs went weak and, had I not had my back against the wall, I’d have fallen to the ground in the litter-strewn ditch.

I took a step forward and lay down on the filthy floor. A mangy mutt approached and licked its lips as If I were to be his first and only meal for the month.

At this point, Emily took over. She mixed a High5 energy drink and commanded me to drink it whilst force-feeding me sugary sweets.

Once I felt a little better, we decided to find somewhere more comfortable to rest so crossed the road towards a small stand where two kids were selling honey. Beside their stand was a large metal box, which was in the shade, so I motioned to them that I wanted to sit on it. They agreed that I could, but without looking me in the eye.

I sat on the box, tilted my head back and closed my eyes. I could hear buzzing. Was this a symptom of the dizziness? I opened my eyes and saw a cloud of bees buzzing by my head. It was only then that I released that the metal box I was sat on was one of the many mobile bee-hives we’ve seen in the fields throughout Serbia and Romania. I had sat on a beehive! The kids selling the honey looked on blankly, possibly wondering why anyone would do such a thing.

Emily got the stools out and, after another High5 and sugary sweets we moved on and tentatively took on the descent.

Emily decided it was time to eat, so a few KMs further on, we found a grassy spot under a big tree outside a police station. Sandwiches were consumed slowly; with every mouthful I had the overarching desire to fall asleep.

We discussed weather we should continue or find somewhere to rest up. I wanted to continue but, every time I got to my feet, I immediately had to lie down again. Emily was clearly concerned as to whether we should continue. I wanted to give it one last go because we still had over 80km to do so, after my 5^th attempt, I made it onto the bike and back on to the road.

With about 75km on the clock, and the same distance again to go, we stopped at a petrol station to stock up on water. Sadly, with my first sip of water, my sandwiches reappeared in a somewhat more diluted form as a puddle by my feet.

However, I almost instantly felt better.

I got back on the bike and I plodded on, keeping on Emily’s back wheel for a further 25km along the trunk road. (No change there, some might say!).

We stopped at another fuel station and, as Emily went in to buy more water, I lay on my back on the paving at the side of the kiosk. This, apparently, caused a scene and, as Emily emerged from the shop, a couple of motorists asked her if I was OK. Right on cue, I scurried to the grass verge to be ill again. My body simply wasn’t taking in all the liquid I’d consumed.

Emily had a quick conference with a motorist who’d stopped and asked about accommodation nearby. The closest being 25km away. Our intended destination was still 40km away.

Again, I felt marginally better after being ill, so we got back on the bikes to see how further we could get. By this time, I’d lost all strength and if was an effort just to look at Emily’s back wheel let alone keep up with it.

It was a touh decision to make but, in the state I was, It would not have been possible to complete the 40km to our intended destination, Calafat.

We plugged the nearest accommodation into the sat nav and made our way towards that, 2km as the crow flies, but an agonizing 7km by road. All I wanted to do was lie down and go to sleep but Emily was really keen that we slept near to civilization and not in a field (just for peace of mind).

With 5km to go, the final hurdle was a short and steep hill; which I simply didn’t have the energy to climb. I looked at the map and thought I could see an off-road route that would bypass the hill so we pulled onto a track, where two farmers watched as I was ill again at the side of the road.

I was wrong about the shortcut so, we had to take on the hill. However, I simply didn’t have the energy. About a quarter of the way up I had stopped and Emily put her bike to one side, ascended on my bike and left it at the top, then ran down to walk with me and her bike up the hill. I simply couldn’t ride or push the bike up to the top, I cannot remember ever feeling this weak. I knew in my head it was only about 5km more to go, now downhill but it took every once of energy, and a lot of gentle encouragement to get me to the hotel on the banks of the Danube, some 30km short of our intended destination.

Emily was told that ‘they were full as they were holding s festival’ but after a bit of pleading and pointing in my direction (I was now a familiar position lying on my back at the side of the road) the hotelier miraculously found us a room.

I was ill once more en route to the bedroom, to the surprise of the hotel workers but once I was inside, it was a quick shower then a power nap.

We put the day’s episode down to dehydration. And it’s no surprise really. We’ve been cycling in temperatures in the late 30s and, foolishly, we haven’t been stopping for enough water since we have been in Romania – I think this is because there has not been a water pump in every village we pass through. Foolish in hindsight. I remembered that I hadn’t really drunk anything the night before whereas, normally, we’d drink at least a litre of water in the evenings.

Emily mixed up two rehydration sachets during the evening and, although I wasn’t able to eat anything, I spent the evening sipping salty drinks whilst listening to the sounds of the music and film festival outside.

The hotel itself was wonderful. It’s owned by a poet and they have various cultural events throughout the year. It was very tempting to stay another night there but, after a good breakfast, I managed to find a 30km shortcut meaning we didn’t have to add on yesterday’s missed mileage to reach tonight’s destination, Bechet where, I’m writing this sipping a water and feeling, thankfully better.

A lesson was learnt the hard way but we are both glad we have some decent first aid knowledge that allowed us to monitor our situation and stay safe.

If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post, please donate to World Bicycle Relief. Every penny goes to the great work the charity does in Africa – not to fund our expedition in any way.

Serbia border crossing

August 21, 2015/in Danube, London to Cape Town/by James Davis

Crossing the border from Croatia into our 8th country, Serbia.

If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post, please donate to World Bicycle Relief. Every penny goes to the great work the charity does in Africa – not to fund our expedition in any way.

From Passau to Budapest

August 15, 2015/in London to Cape Town/by Emily Conrad-Pickles

Since we last blogged, we’ve travelled around 700kms and have been followed by what seems to be an ever increasing army of ants and other insects; and they are growing! Now don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t expecting the insects of Europe and Africa to lay down the red carpet for us but they do seem to be getting more and more tenacious as we venture further from home. Take this morning when I went to brush my teeth; I opened the toothpaste to find not one, but around 50 ants who had made home for the night in the lid of the brush, it bemused me how on earth they all got in there! Then there was the giant wasp. I know I can potentially, from time to time, be prone to exaggerating a little but it was seriously big – at least the size of my little finger and it had its eyes on our breakfast yesterday morning which meant James sat down and ignored it and I pranced around like I was dancing on hot coals for the next 15 minutes.

Oh, and it has been HOT. The thermometer has been averaging over 40 degrees Celsius in the sun most days – today we left the bikes in the sunshine for 10 minutes while we stopped for an ice cream which was half melted because even the freezers can’t cope with the heat and it had reach 48.9 Celsius.

Heat aside, what a week we have had! This was always going to be the fun 10 days with the Danube flowing through Vienna, Bratislava and Budapest – and only around 400km between them all, you can’t go too far wrong!

The road through Austria took us from Passau (and the drunk students) to a city called Linz, which boasts a big church and lots of pretty cobbled streets, not so fun on a really heavy bike. Actually, if you speak to those who have stayed longer, it is packed full of cool stuff and some great museums. It was Sunday when we arrived and in Europe this means that everything is closed, apparently that also means that campsite staff can’t be bothered to work so we enjoyed a free night at a small campsite just outside the town. Here we bumped into an Italian family from Trento we have seen at a few campsites now. They were travelling for two weeks as a family across Germany and Austria on their bikes and having a fantastic time. The father came and spoke to us telling us how much they had been enjoying their trip and how close they had all become, it was rather lovely until he insisted on taking our photo so that he could show all his friends in Italy the crazy English people who are cycling to Africa!

That’s the thing with travelling in the slower lane, you get some time to meet some new and interesting people along the way and share in a little segment of each other’s lives. We’ve met some great people along the way so far, but I know we’ll get to meet even more when the road becomes more remote and people more willing to chat.

From Linz, it was onto Melk, which boasts an even bigger cathedral and is a stop off on the Danube river cruise tour. Luckily (well not really) the ships docked outside our campsite so we were able to use their free wifi to check up on the world. Again, we were treated to another free night due to a lack of staff at campsites, but we weren’t complaining and we made our way to Vienna.

Melk Abbey

The road to Vienna was another scorcher and a longer cycle with around 130kms on the clock but it was more than worthwhile. On our approach to Vienna we passed by what seemed more like the Costa Brava then Austria. In the summer, the Austrians turn the riverbanks into their own beach resort complete with beach bars, shisha, Greek taverns and lines of cocktail bars each with their own happy hour to shout about. As much as we were gasping for a cool drink we carried onto the city campsite. A thoroughly miserable experience that was. A campsite made for caravans, all the tents were shoved at the back where there is limited space so meant that we were all camped like sardines in the heat. We had hoped to stay with my good friend George and his wife Charlotte however timing was against us and they were out of town.

Thankfully, we were rescued the next morning with the offer to stay with the lovely Wendy, a friend of my friend Catherine who, until recently, lived in Vienna. Wendy took us under her wing for a couple of days and we were treated like royalty and we are extremely thankful.

It was fantastic to meet Wendy, who looked after us so well!

Vienna is a must see, I can’t go into detail here about what to see and why, perhaps I’ll write a separate blog at some point but it really is quite magnificent. If you’ve not been before, go visit – but a word of advice, don’t book the Spanish Riding School practice, it is horses practicing how to trot and not much more and if you are into Opera or music, book before you go and don’t get conned into the tourist traps (thankfully we didn’t).

The Spanish Riding School in Vienna. Don’t bother paying to watch the ‘practice’!

From Vienna, onto Bratislava, the home of the stag and hen parties. I am pretty sure that isn’t how they market themselves, but it is a sad reality. The cheap hotels and beer drive them in in their hoards and we were to arrive on a Saturday night. We went to check into our hotel first – welcome to Slovakia. Wow. We decided to stay in a hotel as it would allow us a couple of nights in a bed and for less than a tenner each, it seemed good value in comparison to city camping. Actually, the hotel wasn’t all that bad, it seemed like an old communist army block so was very functional and lacked any soft touches and was on 4 floors, which when you are on the third floor and you have so much heavy kit, not so ideal. I think it was at this point where James decided to fall out with reception. I’m going to leave that story for him to tell, as I can’t see I will do it justice and I wouldn’t want to misinterpret what happened…

Emily’s verdict on hotel Turist, Bratislava

A day to catch up on admin and then we headed into town to see the sites – the old town of Bratislava is beautiful but outside that there is not much so we pedaled 20km out of town to spend the afternoon by a lake. I swam and read a book and James was instantly transformed into a 10 year old as he spent the majority of the afternoon armed with the Go Pro trying to find a snake that had swam across the section of the lake we were sitting at into a pile of reeds. Most amusing to watch.

And then it was into Hungary, our 6^th country. We knew pretty much as soon as we had crossed the border as the fantastic Eurovelo 6 bike path that we have been following since the Black Forest in Germany disappeared almost instantly. The signs were there but our managed paths had now become main roads or dirt tracks through forest and woodlands – all good and well on a full suspension mountain bike, not so much on ours. I kept telling myself it was great training for Africa…. but our bikes have taken a battering.

The beautifully-surfaced Euro Velo 6 comes to an abrupt and bumpy end in Hungary!

We’re back into camping after a few nights in a bed and are back into a good routine. We’ve got a good system going on now and have even managed to get “our” morning admin down from 2 hours to under an hour. Quite miraculous. We feel incredibly lucky to be experiencing so many fantastic sites, many of which we would never usually have chosen to visit, it really is worth going off the beaten track and move outside the tourist traps from time to time and experience life in different countries and cultures. We are still enjoying every moment. It was not an easy decision to come and do this, but I am so glad that we’ve taken the plunge and cannot wait for the next stage where we get more remote and the campsites disappear and we start to fend for ourselves.

Back to Hungary, and we’ve enjoyed our three days cycling through the country so far. We’ve broken the our stay with stopovers in some prominent towns on the Danube (Györ and Esztergom) both with beautiful main squares and Esztergom has an incredible Basilica and castle with original Michelangelo artwork.

About 40km outside Budapest we stopped in a small village to get a drink when we were approached by a man, Peter who had seen the London2CapeTown logos on our cycling Shirts and wanted to find out more about our trip. It wasn’t before long that we were whisked off to his family home where we were treated to some watermelon and home made lemonade with Peter and his family. Such kindness is rare in this world, just imagine someone in London stopping a stranger on the street and offering them a cup of tea. It’s how life used to be and should be – Peter, thank you for your hospitality and we hope we can welcome your family in London one day in the future.

Meeting Peter and family near Tahitótfalu, Hungary

We finally made it to Budapest around 5pm and it was well worth a long few days in the heat to get here. The view of the Parliament building on arrival is truly exquisite and quite frankly jaw dropping. We’d been weaving in and out of industrial roads with no views and suddenly we turned a corner and could see the view of the city from the corner of our eyes. Wow. Not often a view will take your breath away but this one did.

Beautiful views as we arrived in Budapest!

As soon as we arrived we managed to check our bikes into a shop for a quick service to check nothing major was wrong – the wheels were a bit wonky so we gathered into the poor mechanic’s workshop to try to watch what he was doing to straighten them up. Not sure they appreciated us hovering over them while they serviced our bikes, but I think we picked up a few new tricks! Other than being a bit wonky, they seemed ok and have been checked over and tightened up and good to go on to Istanbul.

For now, we have two days in Budapest and cannot wait to get exploring.

If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post, please donate to World Bicycle Relief. Every penny goes to the great work the charity does in Africa – not to fund our expedition in any way.

Austria

August 15, 2015/in Danube, London to Cape Town/by James Davis

A taste of Hungary

August 15, 2015/in Danube, London to Cape Town/by James Davis

Hungary-2 — The beautifully-surfaced Euro Velo 6 comes to an abrupt and bumpy end in Hungary!

Hungary-8 — The altarpiece (depicting the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, by Girolamo Michelangelo Grigoletti) is the largest painting in the world painted on a single piece of canvas.

Hungary-6 — Fantastic views on arrival into Budapest!

Hungary-17 — Széchenyi Square in Győr, Hungary

Hungary-18 — Széchenyi Square in Győr, Hungary

Hungary-16 — Cycling in temperatures above 40 degrees is thirsty work!

Hungary-15 — A lunch spot beside the road in Hungary

Hungary-12 — A quick bike adjustment on the Euro Velo 6 in Hungary

Hungary-5 — Meeting Peter and family near Tahitótfalu, Hungary

Budapest-3 — Budapest Parliament building

If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post, please donate to World Bicycle Relief. Every penny goes to the great work the charity does in Africa – not to fund our expedition in any way.

Too old to party in Passau

August 3, 2015/in Danube, London to Cape Town/by James Davis

I was looking forward to Passau. A beautiful Bavarian town steeped in history and, importantly for us after staying in some horrible caravan parks, the chance to stay in a beautiful riverside campsite where only tents were allowed.

We arrived mid afternoon and chose a fantastic position just by the waters edge and read our books in the last of the day’s sun as the river gently bubbled below the bank.

In high spirits we headed into town in search for a place that would serve a traditional stein and for a cheap meal. Hunger overtook before we could find anywhere that sold one litre lagers. Nevertheless, we’d given ourselves a rest day in Passau, so there’d always be the next night to find one.

Beautiful Passau

We returned to the campsite after our meal to find that it had been overrun by ‘youths’. Tents were crammed everywhere and they continued to arrive.

We learned from a Dutch couple we’ve been meeting along the Danube that they’d been warned when checking in that tonight was likely to be noisy as there was a festival going on nearby.

In fact, there were about 4 lacrosse teams there. And, all of the blokes had a resemblance to the character Stiffler from American Pie. They were all pissed and, as we tried to sleep, more and more people arrived and the noisier it got.

Now, in years gone by, I may well have been tempted to join in and swig vodka from a 2-litre bottle and snort tequila through my eyeballs (or whatever they were doing) but, now that I’m an endurance athlete(!), a good night’s sleep was the order of the day and that’s not what I got.

The low point was probably around 3am when a further group arrived and decided it was a great idea to put up their tent less than a metre from ours, tripping over our guy ropes and singing as they put thier tent up.

The morning after the night before (our tent is in the background)

The next morning, having barely slept a wink, Emily and I decided that, as last night’s antics were just the warm up to the next night’s proper party, we should reluctantly ask for a refund of our second night’s camping fees and find somewhere else to stay.

The trouble was, the campsite office only opened at 6pm so there was no clear way of getting a refund. That was until I spied a member of staff and asked her how I could get a refund. “Not possible” and “Come back when the office is open” were the replies to my request. Then I suggested either she or the café gave me a refund and when the man from the office returned that night she could get the money from him. A simple bookkeeping process one would think. However, my suggestion was met with (literal) shouts and screams of “This is not normal” before she finally stomped off, slamming the door in my face.

I returned to help Emily pack up the tent, asking her if she might be able to go and reason with the woman however before she had the chance (I think to Emily’s relief) the lady came bounding out of the office and, with tears in her eyes, threw (yes threw!) the 18 Euros at my feet shouting “this is my money! I work hard for my money!” before storming off.

Maybe we caught her on a bad day. Or, quite possibly, she hadn’t had any sleep either. Either way, we finished packing our tent and headed into town with an audience of bewildered campers wondering what on earth I could have done to provoke such a reaction.

The cathedral in Passau is claimed to house the ‘world’s biggest organ’. Now, there’s a confident boast for you. Realising the only real way to measure organs is with a tape measure, we sat on a bench outside eating our packed lunch and could only imagine the size of said organ as we heard a man playing furiously with it behind the cathedral’s closed doors.

We decided the best way to get a good night’s sleep was to cycle 20km downstream to a campsite that was marked on the map at Pyrawang, just over the border in Austria. As we passed the Austria sign, I released I’d not managed to have a Bavarian Stein, so it’ll have to wait until a visit to Katzenjammers upon my return to London next year.

Crossing into our fourth country: Austria.

We arrived at the Pyrawang campsite at a time when they were setting up for an Ibiza-style ‘Danube beach party’ so we continued another 10km to find a nice little campsite alongside a marina at Hütt-Siedlung.

Here we met a lovely Austrian couple, Ilse and Manfred, who’d canoed all the way from Innsbruck and plan to navigate the majority of the Danube then pick up bikes and continue their journey into Georgia and on to Iran. They’re both teachers and we learnt that teachers in Austria can opt to receive only 80% of their pay for 4 years then take a year’s sabbatical in the 5^th year receiving 80% pay. There’s no limit to the number of sabbaticals they can take. So, in effect, every 5 years you get a year off. This is a concept I may suggest to my boss when I’m back.

Just as we’d erected our tent the ‘youths’ in the caravan immediately adjacent to our pitch turned on their own Ibiza-style music to number 11 and started to get stuck into their Vodka Red Bulls and Jeagermeisters. Again, a (very) small part of me wanted to dust off my copy of Ministry of Sound’s Clubbers’ Annual 1996, get a 6-pack and pull some big-box-little-box shapes with them. But, as we’d left Passau a day early and continued an extra 10km to avoid noise, that thought was short-lived and I was, in fact, a miserable old git so went to get ‘someone in charge’ to tell them to shut up. Fortunately, the lady at this campsite was helpful and she told them to keep it down. The kids dutifully turned the music down but, as is the tactic for any party host when they’ve been told to keep the noise down, they gradually turned the volume up by one notch at a time until it was soon back up to 11 again.

We went to sleep with earplugs in. It then pissed it down so, for once, we were glad for the rain as they retreated inside.

Today (Sunday 2nd August) was soggy. We packed up our soaking tent in the rain. We cycled in the rain. And we passed through one of the highlights of the Danube (the river does a series of hairpins in a beautiful gorge) in the rain and sadly with clouds at tree height restricting our views.

Nevertheless, it was a mostly tranquil day by the grey Danube aside from an insect that collided with my face at speed and managed to sting me on impact.

After a day worrying that we’d be sleeping in a soggy tent, we arrived in Linz and I was astonished that Emily opted to camp rather than stay in a cheapish city-centre hotel room I’d found online. Exactly three weeks in and I think we’re getting the hang of this!

If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post, please donate to World Bicycle Relief. Every penny goes to the great work the charity does in Africa – not to fund our expedition in any way.

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