7 June 2016 (hot and sunny) 63km

Thank goodness we had done 98km so we were tired enough for sleep despite a bear running about outside. After an uneventful night, we decided that today we would take it easy as there was a campground that appeared to be about 50-60km away and a scenic town in between.  So we set off from our bear camp at 6.40am having to push our bikes through thigh high wet grass to get to the road first.  Picked up breakfast supplies at the second village we came to when we saw a small shop open.  This was Svati Anton and a nice little village it was too.

Svati Anton - a nice little village

One thing we have noticed in Slovakia, is their obsession with whipper snippers.  We noticed it before when we were in the Bratislava district but as we approached Budapest, the lawnmower came into play and the whipper snipper took a backseat.  But now we’re back in Slovakia, the whipper snipper population has increased accordingly.  We often see gangs of people with whipper snippers and rakes and assume they might be doing community service as a punishment for a minor crime?  But there are also individuals or pairs, walking along the side of the road, brandishing their whipper snippers like weapons, or sometimes balancing them on a bicycle that they are pushing along.

Pete cycles up (and I mean UP!) the main street

Before we knew it we were in Banska Stiavnica, which had a Unesco symbol on our map meaning there was something a bit special about it.  As we entered we wondered what on earth it could be as it did not look special at all.  Followed the signs to “Centrum” which of course was up one long hill.  

As we climbed the cobbled street, so the houses looked old and quaint as opposed to old and decrepit and at the top of the hill was an impressive church.  The town square was beyond that where we had a chat to a couple of British motorcyclists outside Tourist Info.  Then it was onward and upward to the castle – why the hell did these guys have to build their castles on top of bloody great hills?  Anyway, grinding up this hill was really doing Pete in as his crank has been squeaking and clunking for days now.  

So after looking at the castle I made him go to a bike shop and get it fixed.  Of course the bike shop was right back at the bottom of the hill but the guy looked at it and repaired it straight away.  “Kaputski” he said as he removed the crank and replaced it with another one for 13 Euro.

So then it was a quick trip to the supermarket where we had to buy water as well as lunch supplies as the guy at bike shop told us not to drink the water.  

The castle at Banska Striavnica

Photographed this building outside the bike shop.  They got so far, then just walked away, leaving it to rust and get overgrown with weeds.  It's a common occurrence and you wonder why.

We have noticed that a lot of villages have wells that are still being used.  Found the road out of town which was more like a roller coaster, but far less fun – up and down, up and down in the scorching heat.

Views from the "rollercoaster"

On the downhill out of town we came to a turn-off which looked like it could have been the one we wanted but it had no name, no number, no sign pointing up it to the next village, nothing.  Handily though there was a house at the corner and two people stood outside who we asked “Podhorie?” as we pointed and they nodded yes.  So up we climbed, having lost the benefit of a run at it, but it wasn’t too bad for the 6kms or so to Podhorie, which is where we found a shady bus stop and had lunch.

Then it was onto Mociar and wow, what a climb!  Thankfully it was mostly in the shade but it was hard work nonetheless – about 6km and 12% gradient in places.  When we finally made it to the top, we had stunning views over a beautiful valley and thought we’d take a photo, preferably of the two of us if we could find a handy place to pop the camera.  Fortunately they have Jesus on the cross all over the place here, and sure enough, there he was.  So made use of his cross for the camera and then headed into Mociar, looking for the road to Jalna.

We thought we were heading in the right direction in this very run-down out of the way village as the compass was heading North and there weren’t exactly a lot of other options, but inexplicably our lovely road surface suddenly turned to rutted gravel.  We asked a guy walking down the street “Jalna?” and he points at the gravel road.  Pete can’t believe it so goes and knocks at the door of a house.  An old woman comes out, looking quite delighted to have a visitor and she too points down the gravel road. Groan!  So there’s nothing for it but to jump on our bikes and bump our way out of there.  I said to Pete I didn’t think it was that far to Jalna, I thought only about 3km.  Turns out it was 6km but luckily it was downhill all the way and we got tarseal for about a quarter of it.  It was also very scenic.

Eventually arrived in Jalna and took the main road west to Ziar where we were going to turn North to Kreminica, but decided we didn’t want to chance getting another road like the last one, so stuck to the main road.  But even that was difficult to find and when we stopped in Ziar to ask directions, we found we’d overshot the turn-off by 3kms.  We thought “stuff Kreminica” and asked if he knew of another campsite nearby.  He said there was a place for wild camping about 10km west, which was the direction we wanted so we decided to go there.  I asked if we could fill our water bottles and he said yes and took us down an alleyway and down into a basement into the headquarters of his motorcycle gang.  He proudly showed us his clubrooms, invited us to use the impeccable toilets and made us a cappuccino with their fancy coffee machine – and very nice it was too!

So thanks Estoni, much appreciated and off we went to find the wild camp.  Just as he said, it was 10km out of town and surrounded by a bunch of fishermen and a few sunbathers.  

We rattled down the track to join them, distracted by a couple of storks in a field along the way.  As we approached, a couple of old guys got in the water and swam across so even though the water didn’t look particularly clean, we had two days of sweat to get rid of so we were right in there with them.

The water was beautiful and refreshing and not too cold so we swam around for about ten minutes.  It was about 6.30pm by now so we lay on the groundsheet in the sun for awhile before getting on with cooking tea.  We felt a little conspicuous as no-one else was freecamping but by 8.30pm when only a few people had left, we thought “Stuff it” and put up the tent.  Nobody objected, so once everything was in the tent, we made a coffee and wrote up the blog.