Would the dog pissing on Pete’s shoe be an omen for the
day?
We had a great sleep after our long day yesterday and even
the trains couldn’t keep Pete awake – and they were very loud and very frequent
before we went to sleep. Who in the hell
thought it would be a good idea to put a campground next to a railway line I’ve
no idea, but it sure has caught on.
Whenever we look for campgrounds now, we always orientate ourselves off
the train tracks as you’re bound to find one nearby.
The sun was streaming into the tent when we woke at 7am and
it felt like it was going to be a scorcher.
As we packed up the tent, our neighbour came and asked if he could sit
at the table by us as his tent was still in the shade and he wanted some sun
while he sipped his morning coffee. I
think really he just wanted to chat as he was on his own and he soon regretted
sitting in the sun. Dressed in his dark
sweatshirt and sweatpants, he soon had beads of perspiration forming on his
upper lip and forehead and as we talked he gradually stood up and adjourned to
the shade of a nearby tree while carrying on the conversation as we packed
up. We shared similar views on a lot of
things but it was comforting to hear him say not to worry too much if people
warned us off visiting Checkia and Slovakia and Hungary (because they
have). He had been travelling to all of
those places (he was from Denmark) for the last thirty years and had never had
any problems. He said that in his
experience the Austrians would warn you about the Hungarians and the Hungarians
would warn you about the Romanians and the Romanians would warn you about the
Ukrainians and so on.
Pete and I continued packing up while we talked as Pete
hadn’t had his toasted muesli yet, so there was no time to waste. We said goodbye to our Danish friend about
8.15am and stopped by the owner’s office to drop his books back and thank
him. It was here that his dog decided to
use Pete’s foot and his wheel as a fire hydrant, unbeknownst to his owner. When we got out of the camp Pete said “Pull
over” and proceeded to douse his foot with his open water bottle – luckily it
was hot and sunny and his foot would soon dry out.
Pete here: Yes it could only happen to me, another Victor
Meldrew moment ‘I don’t believe it’!
We followed the signs on a busy road to the town of Komarom
and there’s another thing. The names of these places are unbelievable…for
example Getchalegover…..Imwelloverit…..Whatsthisshit….Howthehellareya…..what
happened to English?
At Komarom we found a Tesco’s where we made use of their
handy WC and got our breakfast supplies.
Unfortunately while we were in there a huge dark cloud came over and it
started to rain. We wanted to have our
breakfast as Pete was getting tetchy now, but right outside the supermarket
doors didn’t seem quite the place. So I
went into the supermarket foyer and bought a machine made coffee for $1 each
and it was actually very tasty and along with a pastry each, it was enough to tide
us over until the rain stopped about twenty minutes later. Then we rode across a bridge across the
Danube, out of Hungary and into Slovakia and the nice little town of
Komarno. Here we found free wifi in the
town square so after uploading the blog, we moved to a sheltered quiet little
place to have our long-awaited breakfast, although at 11.30am I think we can
call it brunch.
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| the town square of Komarno |
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| Ju uploading the blog in the town square using the free wifi. |
There were a lot of school groups of all ages being taken
around Komarno today and I think every single one of them came past us in our
quiet, little sheltered spot. However,
we didn’t let that distract us and at midday we left and found the nice, quiet
bike path alongside the Danube. It had a
nice surface so we were able to cruise along at a good speed and keep cool in
the ever-increasing heat.
We had been advised by Attila’s friend yesterday that we
should cross to Slovakia and use the cycle track on this side and he was bang
on. It was a lovely ride and even though
we had to go on the road from time to time, it was quiet and not a
problem.
As we passed through a village we spied another stork’s nest
and we could see her feeding her young.
Not sure if you can make them out in the photograph but we saw three and
we could hear them chirping. You’ll
notice that this nest is much taller than yesterday’s and I think it was Stefan
who told us that the stork’s add to their nest every year, making them higher
and higher.
It was getting quite hot riding the canal road and we were
the only ones on it so we took off our helmets and shirts and swapped shoes for
jandals.
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| Pete decided to take things one step further......well, when in Rome and all that! |
I cooled my legs down in the
Danube but Pete warned me against swimming in it saying I’d probably pick up a
disease. Must admit, I haven’t seen one
other person swimming in it.
We were still ten kms away from Sturovo when we had our
first sight of the Esztergom basilica.
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| Esztergom, Hungary |
It was magnificent, especially with the late afternoon light shining on
it. When we finally got to Sturovo, we
stopped at a gas station for a Magnum as they had a nice little shaded picnic
table and then continued to the bridge to Esztergom. What a magnificent sight. Talked to a lady there who told us Sturovo used to be part of Hungary - if I was Hungary I wouldn't shed too many tears about losing Sturovo. Talk about from one extreme to the other. Loads of worn out, decrepit looking buildings on one side of the river and this amazing basilica on the other, with a lovely village surrounding it.
Took several photos and from the bridge we
spotted the campground so headed there and were delighted to discover they had
a swimming pool. So as soon as the tent
was up, we were in the pool and it was a good one….and we were the only people
using it! It was 20C and fantastic! Felt good to moving some other muscles as
well.
The thunderclouds had started moving in again so we jumped
on the bikes in search of a supermarket.
We came across a mini-market and with the weather threatening, decided
this would do. Had some lovely people
try to help me with my non-existent Hungarian but eventually they helped me get
everything I needed after enlisting a bit of help from their other customers.
Hungary is definitely the cheapest country so far so we
decided to treat ourselves for a meal at the camp restaurant. Pete had Spaghetti Bolognese and I had
Fettucini and it was lovely. As we ate,
the thunderstorm hit so we were glad to be in a nice dry restaurant. We dragged out our meal with a couple of
latte macchiatos afterwards and by then the stormcloud had passed and a
beautiful evening was beckoning.
So we
grabbed the camera and went for a walk in the small village and also across the
bridge, halfway back to Slovakia to get a photo of the Basilica which was now
lit up and looked stunning. The whole
time we had the receding thunderclouds as a backdrop to this magnificent sight
with flashes of lightning every minute or so – but do you think we could catch
one on camera?
Then it was back to the tent to get the photos on the
computer and back them up before hitting the hay about 11.30pm.
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