21 June 2016 (cloudy am, sunny pm, warm) 94km

So, back on the bikes again after three days off.  We had both really enjoyed our stay in Prague and not doing any pedalling, with no setting up or packing up the tent.  We were kind of looking forward to getting back on the road again but also in no hurry to leave this lovely little camp. 

Enjoyed one last shower and some breakfast before hitting the road about 9.30am, with all our clothes clean and the tent dry.  All our electronics were charged and we had googled directions out of town.  These worked perfectly and within 8km we were out in the countryside and loving life.  Beautiful weather and fields full of wheat and orange poppies led us around Prague airport through one little village after another.

Stopped at Stredokluky for a late morning tea which we enjoyed on a bench in the shade, looking out onto the old church.  It had been an excellent start to the second half of our three month journey, however, that was about to change.  The next town we wanted was Beloky and the road bent round to the North, downhill.  Now before you head downhill (or uphill for that matter), you want to be absolutely sure you are going in the right direction.  We were a bit unsure if this was the right way as I had googled the directions and we should be going West.  But there was a guy opening up a swimming pool for the summer who spoke English and he advised us we were going the right way to Beloky.  Either he has a very poor sense of direction or a really sick sense of humour, as the direction he pointed us in was taking us away from Beloky.  We had to take a long loop to get us back on track, adding about 3km to our journey – bastard!

Hills at least meant nice outlooks

Then it was smooth riding to Hostoun aiming for Pavlov. They seem to do an awful lot of road works  on small country roads over here, but the strange thing is, you never see the work, only the detour signs. We asked a couple of people where we should go and one lady pointed us down a road that said it was a no exit. What the hell we thought and hoped that she was right. A little later we came across a man and his son out bike riding, heading toward us. That seemed to be a good sign, they must have come from somewhere, hopefully it was Pavlov. Asked if it was possible to get through. “Of course” he replied in quite good English, so on we went and into town we rode.

After a head wind we were now looking at more undulating countryside. Up a hill to reach our perfect lunch stop, the local village football pitch. And as per usual, what a great set up. Some of their houses may be falling down, but their footy pitches are brilliant. 

Ju prepares lunch while Pete relives his glory days

Now the terrain began to get tough. Luckily we were refreshed and ready to take it on, however we did feel the need for an ice cream at Krivlokat, before walking down to see their castle. Unfortunately they had scaffolding all over the turret, but it will look great once it’s finished.

We took advantage of the free entry into Krivlokat Castle for a spell off the bikes

We had a campground picked out not too far from here as we’d already done 65km.  There were four of them in the direction we wanted, however, we didn’t have a map of this area and we weren’t about to shell out $5 for one only to have to throw it away tomorrow.  No worries, there were bound to be signs.  I asked at Tourist Info and they said the camp was just 3kms up the road.  Up is right – why are campgrounds always up bloody great hills.  We were halfway up this particular hill when the road branched off – one uphill, one downhill.  The downhill was the way to the campsite.  All good you may say, but from what we could remember of the map we’d looked at in Tourist Info, we would have to come back up that hill in the morning and we were sure there was another camp about 5km further down the river.  Except that the right hand uphill road we chose was a torturous 3km uphill climb and actually took us in the wrong direction!  So at the top of the hill when we realised our mistake, we couldn’t bear the thought of retracing our steps, so with the help of a handy mapboard, we figured out a new course being careful to evade any obviously hilly areas as by now we’d had enough of them!  Only thing is, we didn’t know where the next campground would be.  So we filled up our water bottles and kept our eyes open for a freecamp.

Thought about asking the owner of this lovely cottage if we could camp in her beautiful garden

After 84km at about 7pm, we found the perfect little freecamp.  Down a short drive from the road on a farmers track behind some bushes.  The sun was still hot so we didn’t set the tent up immediately, choosing to blog and eat cashews while sitting on the groundsheet.  We’re just about to start cooking dinner when along comes a man on a motorbike with a rifle slung over his shoulder.  He drove straight past us with a bit of a grunt and didn’t seem to mind us being there, so we cooked up our dinner.  However, we felt a bit nervous about a man with a gun knowing we were camped there, so decided to move.

It was now 8pm and we continued westward in search of a new freecamp, but as is often the case, none eventuated.  It was after 9pm and the sun was setting and we were running out of light when at the top of yet another hill we decided to chance our luck down a dirt track.  There were just a lot of crops being grown with no newly mown hay field to be seen.  So as it was nearly dark now and we were well back from the road, we set the tent up by a wheat field and stayed low to avoid detection.  We had a stunning view over the valley and then as Ju was cooking up a coffee outside, we had a red moon rise up in front of us – incredible!

A stunning end to a long, hilly day.

unfortunately this photo just doesn't show the true colour of the moon which was almost the same colour as the poppies in the foreground