Archive for July, 2007
Thursday, July 19th, 2007
73km Vojka to Petronell-Carnuntum
As the song goes, “mama said there’d be days like this”. Today we hit bottom. Continuous days of intense heat have worn us down, to the point where this evening as we were cycling the last few kilometers to a campsite, both of us felt like we wanted to end the trip. It was past 6pm but the sun was still beating down on our heads. We could have brewed tea in our water bottles, they were so warm. We were on a busy road with trucks and cars flying by too close, waves of heat were coming off the pavement and our efforts to rest in the afternoon meant we were cycling late and hungry. For a few minutes, we seriously asked ourselves what in the world we were doing on our bicycles. Of course this was just a temporary feeling — once we’d had a cold shower, rested and eaten we felt better — but those few moments of despair really showed us how much the heat was affecting us. Later on our radio we heard there is a heatwave on in central and southern Europe, causing forest fires in Greece. Here in Austria we are definitely feeling it! Our day started much better. We’d gotten up early and cruised into Bratislava well before midday. We took a few hours to see the well kept and beautiful city centre and we went out for lunch, a rare treat. After feasting on two hearty plates of perogies and dumplings (they don’t do “summer” food in this part of the world), we went to a local park to sit under the trees for a few hours. We felt good as we left Bratislava but obviously we miscalculated because even late in the afternoon the sun was too much for us and by the time we entered Austria a few kilometers later our energy was starting to fade. This wasn’t helped by the cycle path. It is very clearly marked and in great condition here, but not many trees grow along the path so it’s a bit like cycling on an airport runway. Hot! We’re now trying to recalculate how we go forward from here. We want to keep going, but equally we don’t want to cycle so badly that we feel miserable and sick of the sun at the end of the day. The obvious answer is to go much more slowly but we’ve cycled a steady 60-70km a day for the past 11 months with hardly any problems, so it’s hard to accept that maybe we have to do only half that to stay happy. Maybe just a little more ice cream consumption would help? Make ours chocolate.
1 Comment » - Posted in Cycling Trips, Journal Entries, Slovakia by andrew
Wednesday, July 18th, 2007
86km Komárom to Vojka
Another day, another eight hours of scorching sun. Our recipe for getting through the heat includes an early start, a long lunchtime nap, stops at every cemetery to refill our bottles with cold water and wet our t-shirts and the occasional beer. With this combination we manage to stay on our bikes for quite a few kilometers, although we continue to be amazed at how much the heat builds and how long it sticks around. Even now, as the sun is setting, we still find it too warm to go to sleep. Happily we have a nice view to admire as we wait for the temperature to drop. We spent the last stretch of our day on the Danube Cycle Trail – yes, we finally found it! We crossed its path late in the afternoon and followed the paved bike path along the Danube river for about an hour before we set up camp on the canal bank. As we cycled we watched many barges making their way up and down the river, carrying their loads through huge sets of locks. Farms made up the main sights earlier in the day, along with the seemingly endless fields of sunflowers and wheat. Most of the hay has been cut now and farmers are out great numbers shaping the hay into bales.
1 Comment » - Posted in Cycling Trips, Hungary, Journal Entries, Slovakia by andrew
Tuesday, July 17th, 2007
96km Tahitótfalu to Komárom
The perils of other campers are keeping us amused as we eat supper and write our journal this evening. The couple next door are trying to put up their tent. It’s from the sports chain Decathlon and they boast that you should be able to throw the tent on the ground and it will expand on its own, almost putting itself up instantaneously. The tent even has “30 seconds” written in big letters on the side. It’s been a good 15 minutes now and this couple are still working on their tent. First it wouldn’t lay flat, then they seemed to be confused about which way round the various strings should be. Will they get to bed before dark? We’ll wait and see! Before we relaxed in the campground, we had another hot day of cycling in the sun. We’d hoped to follow a cycle trail since the “Danube Cycle Path” from Budapest to Vienna is quite well known but either we are blind or the path is well hidden because for most of the day we couldn’t find a cycle trail at all and when we did see a path it was either in bad condition or right next to the busy main road. Hardly the quiet cycle ride along the river that we’d envisioned and we suspect we weren’t alone in wondering where the “Danube Cycle Path” was, since we saw dozens of cycle tourists heading the other way also on the main road. (more…)
1 Comment » - Posted in Cycling Trips, Hungary, Journal Entries by friedel
Monday, July 16th, 2007
56km Budapest to Tahitótfalu
It was time to leave Budapest today, but not before we tried to sort out a problem that’s been literally keeping us awake at night. One of our Thermarest sleeping mats started to delaminate a few days ago. This means it develops a big bubble in the middle of the mat and is a bit like trying to sleep with a balloon under you – far from comfortable. The same thing happened in Morocco with our other mat and Thermarest kindly and swiftly sent out a replacement under their lifetime guarantee. Great customer service.
At the time, they had also suggested trying their distributors. That didn’t work for us in Morocco but since we were in a capital city on this occasion we thought we’d cycle out to Budapest’s Thermarest representative to see what they could do. Some good luck got us through a set of locked doors and into the right office, even with an English-Hungarian translator in tow to get our message across. The poor woman in the office didn’t know quite what to make of us but she called her boss who spoke excellent English and quickly sorted us out with a new mattress.
Success! And another gold star in our book for Thermarest. This time, however, we decided to try a different model of sleeping mat – the Z-Rest Lite, a closed-cell foam pad – and we’ll see if it holds up better to our intensive use. To give an idea of just what we were asking of our sleeping mats, we stayed in our tent about 170 times before the second mat gave up on us. That’s the equivalent of taking a 2-week camping holiday every year for 12 years. We’re still impressed with the Thermarest self-inflating mattresses, but maybe they’re not quite designed for the type of extended trip we’re doing. We’ll certainly keep you updated on our experiences with the foam pad. (more…)
1 Comment » - Posted in Cycling Trips, Hungary, Journal Entries, Trip Equipment by friedel
Sunday, July 15th, 2007
Walk, walk, walk in Budapest
We walked our socks off in Budapest on Saturday but before we trotted all over the city we started the civilised way with a couple hours at the Széchenyi Medicinal Bath — the largest one in Europe and also the warmest in Budapest. Heaven! After being soaked and pampered, we then hit the streets, first walking down the world heritage site of Andrassy Avenue. So many beautiful and rather large homes and embassies line the street, which was designed after French boulevards. We meandered our way down to the Danube and through the castle district, where we enjoyed a great view over the river. The city was absolutely packed with tourists — even more so than usual since there was a French street fair on for Bastille Day — but we did manage to find some quiet back streets with cute shops and always gorgeous buildings, particularly the churches. Today we’re going to do some shopping to get a few things we need for the rest of our trip and we’re going to check out a Chinese market nearby our campground.
