Freewheeling from Zurich to Istanbul
A travel blog documenting my solo bike ride from Zurich to Turkey from July to September 2008“Don’t cry because it’s over – smile because it happened”
Still feeling tired after my effort of Sunday, my spirits were dampened when I woke to the fiercest of winds.
I battled the hills and wind out of Kladovo for a while before I got the chance to enjoy a strong tailwind.
I took today slowly, taking a brake in Negotin to have some ice cream and enjoying all the tiny sleepy villages I passed through as I slowly made my way to the Bulgarian border. The last 3 days have been very slow going and its been a little demoralising to watch my long term average slowly move down from 19.5 km/h to 19.1 km/h.
It wasn’t until I crossed into Bulgaria that I realised that how much the road surface had been slowing me over the previous few days. Its clear that Bulgaria’s accession into the EU has resulted into some pretty smooth road surfaces between Bregovo and Vidin, but beyond that, I found myself questioning how it was that, based on the that which I have seen of the two countries, Bulgaria is part of the EU and Serbia isn’t
The villages I passed through were by far the most backward I have seen, with old women working the fields in the late afternoon and not a tractor to be seen anywhere.
Whilst in Belgrade I spent some time researching places to stay in over the coming few days and I had found reference to a campsite on the Danube near the the ferry crossing into Romania. It was situated 4.5 km north of Vidin near the town of Antimovo. I even managed to find the coordinates for it. I arrived as the sun was setting and I found the gate to Dunav campinge locked. Two people well within earshot seemed to be ignoring my efforts to get their attention and I eventually scaled the locked gate to go and have a chat with them. From what I could make out from our exchange, this place has not operated as a campsite for 15 years and the propreitors would not let me camp there for fear that guests staying in the swanky lodges would take offence. Instead the kind gentleman I spoke to phoned a friend and let me camp outside his container with his dog. This is by far the least beautiful place I have spent a night and one that had me feeling very uncomfortable.
The trailer/container that I camped beside seemed to have been suddenly deserted months before and I wondered if the person whose abode it had been, had perhaps died quite suddenly. This weird note on the door added to this suspicion.
“You can smell death before you see it”
Last night, after pulling into Toma campsite 20km past Golubac about 1hr30 after sunset at 7:01, the guy in the reception was at pains to point out that there was another English speaking cyclist staying in the campsite.
James, an Englishman living in Germany, is the first native English speaker I have encountered on this trip. He is only the third cyclist I have met since leaving Budapest. James seems to have met quite a few people and our discussion way into the night shed some light on this. In most other ways our experiences have been similar and it was great to have someone to share them with.
Roadkill was one such topic we touched on. I have briefly mentioned this in earlier posts and I will elaborate on this further now. Roadkill has become part of my daily life since I entered Hungary. There is no smell like rotting flesh and you can smell death well before you see it. Sometimes you are lucky enough just to smell it. I am still undecided about which offends me more: Whole swollen bodies on the side of the road, with flies buzzing around them, and no evidence of innards spilling out, or the more recent, less smelly, variety in pools of sticky red/black blood with organs spilt out onto the road, and brains spilling out through eyes.
Today, as I approached a recently mangled cat I heard a car behind me moving out to overtake me and I desperately hoped that he didn’t run over the mortal remains… and potentially send some flying towards me!
I don’t imagine that this makes for great reading, but it is one of the least glamourous parts of my daily reality which I am trying to bring across.
I also shared with James some of my route and my plans to be in Bucharest within 4 days. “Crazy!” he declared and he explained himself. This is when a penny dropped:
James is using a set of maps provided by Bikeline. Everyone else he has met has been using the same maps. As a result, he passes through all the same towns and villages as other cyclists, and relies on the maps to determine where he will be and when.
I spent some time studying his map this morning and it has a wealth of information and certainly would make this trip a lot easier. I feel a little stupid for not having purchased these maps.
That being said though, it has meant that my trip has required more indepedent thought, that I have been taking routes that others haven’t nescessarily, and that I potentially have had a more unique experienced encountering people that are less accustomed to seeing cycle tourists.
Yesterday I met a delightfully friendly man on a ferry who took time to tell me about the Grand Canyon of the Danube. I entered this area as the sun was setting yesterday and today was by far the most spectacular day of my trip. After discussing the Lord of the Rings-esque landscape with James last night, I was absolutely blown away to emerge from a tunnel to find a massive head carved into the rock on the Romanian side of the Danube. I was quite unprepared for this.
I took today very slowly. Yesterday hurt me and as I started into a head wind, I decided that I need not rush to cover the 105km that I cycled today.
Over the next 3 days I hope to cover 400km, much of which will be a departure from the Danube, inevitably meaning that I will be heading uphill. I am getting an early night tonight.
A very long, lonely and hot road
The night before I left Belgrade was one in which I hardly slept. I had had about 3 hours sleep when I woke at 6am in the hope of an early Sunday morning start out of the city.
Over the previous few days the temperature in Belgrade had steadily crept up to 38 degrees and with no relief from these temperatures over the coming days, I left Belgrade hoping to cover 170 kilometers to a campsite 19 kilometers past Golubac.
I was tired, my mind was not on the road, and this day proved my toughest yet. The road out of Belgrade was very hilly and it soon sapped my energy as the temperature rose to 38.6 degrees by 11h30.
(Another cool graphic using Ascent by Montebello Software: This profile also includes the temperature during the course of the day)
Late in the afternoon I made a ferry crossing of the Danube which brought about a forced break of about one and a half hours in which I managed to get some much needed rest.
This put me under a great deal of pressure to get to Toma camping before sunset, something I failed to do.
On the ferry I met a very friendly and articulate Romanian that had lived in Serbia for most of his life and he told me of the wonderful scenery I was about to encounter, pointed out some Turkish ruins, and warned me of Gypsies, thieves and dogs in Romania (and took a picture of me 
)
The scenery of the late evening was spectacular, I would have preferred to have been passing into the narrowest part of the Danube a few hours earlier and unfortunately I was only able to appreciate the beauty and tranquility of Toma when I woke the next morning.
A few days in Belgrade
This is a very short post. My blog focusses on my cycling, of which I did very little in Belgrade. If you are interested in Belgrade and what it has to offer, I am sure you can find plenty of tourist information on the place. I don’t feel there was anything outstanding about my time there. By that I do not mean to say that it doesn’t have a lot to offer and isn’t a great city, but rather that unlike the little villages I pass through, and the individual characters I meet along the way, the experience I feel I had in Belgrade was not too different from that which others traveling there may have had.
One noteworthy exception worth a mention are the women in Belgrade: Of all the cities I have now cycled through, Belgrade certainly has the most beautiful women. They aren’t as friendly as most other Serbs though!
I did stay a few days in Belgrade. I decided that I wanted to be around people on my birthday rather than camping wild away in isolation. I met a few fun Irish guys that took it upon themselves to ensure I celebrated my birthday in a conventional fashion and we made a trip down to the barges on the Sava river and they soon out drank me.
Serbia: Novi Sad to Belgrade
After spending the night in relative luxury in Hotel Novi Sad with its crisp white sheets and warm shower, I made a slow start to what I thought would be an easy ride to Belgrade. While still making my way out the city center I saw two women touring on bikes and went to talk with them. Having not seen anyone on a bike since leaving Budapest almost a week earlier I was interested having a chat but these two rather unfriendly cyclists clearly were not big on conversation or company so I soon moved on past them
There were a two firsts for me in and around Novi Sad; it was the first time I saw what is obviously an Eastern Orthodox church and I saw my first Roma/Gypsies in Serbia.
The trip between Novi Sad and Belgrade is one of my least memorable days. There was little that makes it stand out besides the hills. Although the Serbians are the friendliest people I have encountered thus far, the trip was spent primarily on primary roads with little opportunity to interact with people along the way and instead I fought it out with heavy traffic on poor and hilly roads!!!
Once more, these pretty handy profiles and maps are from Ascent software that I have been using along with my GPS and will write more about soon.
Here are a few pictures from today:
Crossing the Danube on leaving Novi Sad
A village I passed along the way (Petrovaradin I think)
A random street in Novi Sad
A picture taken on my arrival in Belgrade
Thanks to everyone for all the encouragement and support I have received so far. Thanks too to everyone that has taken the time to leave comments. I appreciate them. I will be spending a few days in Belgrade resting up, doing some maintenance, and planning the route ahead. Check back more soon for more posts.
