Vac to Budapest 39km

An emotional ride today being my last official riding day. Budapest! I made it despite all the challenges before and during. 

It was a mixture of pathway, road and footpath. As I approached the last 10km into Budapest, the footpath, which is part of the official EV6, was extremely rough and not something I would consider a ‘bike path’. I’ve included some pictures but I was too busy navigating the worst bits to get photos. 

My welcome to Budapest was a bus trying to run me over because I couldn’t turn into the street where my apartment was because it was closed for a film set. Maybe I needed to apparate at that point! There is security at both ends of the street and I have to prove where I’m staying to be able to walk in and out. Not sure how long the filming will go for but there are some cool cars around! 

Sturovo to Vac 52km

After an unsettling night in an exorbitantly priced campground, I decided against a rest day and headed out towards Budapest knowing it wasn’t my destination today. The partying, doof doof music, and chatting continued until around 2am. This was one of the worst nights I’ve experienced in a campground in more than 20 years of touring. There was absolutely no respect for fellow campers. Around 1am, I  considered packing up and sleeping on a park bench as far away as possible. For 39 euros, I wish I could get a refund! 

The ride to Vac was delightful, a mix of levee, path, road, and rough concrete riding. Unfortunately, in trying to avoid one of the many large pot holes or ‘jumps’, I’ve strained my left knee. I’ll cover it in Volataren gel tonight and hopefully it will survive for the final day of riding into Budapest. It seems so long ago that I started this journey in Brussels. I’ve had to adapt and be flexible along the way as things have influenced my ride, rain, heat, mountains, etc. I managed to wash the bike today and the annoying ticking from the front brake is actually the brake rubbing the whole time I’m riding. Imagine how fast I could have gone without this! ;-)

My accommodation is lovely with a shared kitchen and air conditioning. Hopefully a better nights sleep and then the final kilometres into Budapest. Bittersweet to be at the end, but so proud I’m almost there! 

Cicov to Sturovo 85km

The pension last night was lovely and thankfully I had a great breakfast before leaving. It was a long ride today, with a mixture of levee riding and road riding. Some of the surfaces were very rough including some not so fun gravel at the start. I stopped a couple of times for a drink, once accepting help from a local who filled my water bottle. The cute caravan had cold coca-cola and that was just what I needed for the last 30km given food was non-existent apart from a banana and a gluten free madeleine.

I booked some swanky wellness campground and I’ve never seen anything like it before. It’s a wellness hotel, with a hostel and campground, pools, eating outlets, swimwear, activities and people everywhere! I’m pretty tired and ahead of schedule so thinking of a rest day here tomorrow. The town looks lovely as does Esztergom across the river. 

Bratislava to Cicov 80km

After a quiet night in the very basic campground, we headed off reasonably early and managed to circumvent the hills to get back on the Danube. Tom cycles quite a bit quicker than me, so after navigating out of town, he headed off for our destination. My lack of phone service meant I was navigating by very limited signage for the EV6 here in Slovakia. There is a distinct difference in the amount of signage and quality of the cycle paths here in Slovakia compared to Austria. There was a gravel section today that was completely unrideable, so I rode the road, as I’m sure many others do. Again, the levee riding gets quite monotonous, especially doing 80km, full sun, no respite. I ended up being slightly misplaced but managed to get back on track by hot spotting my phone from my iPad. I’m in a hotel tonight so looking forward to a decent sleep.  

Vienna to Bratislava 78km

It was a lovely day cycling out of Vienna although navigating out of big cities is always stressful. I’m still riding with Tom, so thankfully he did the navigating to get us back on the Danube and did an excellent job. The levee riding is very safe but it does get monotonous after a while as there is not respite from pedalling or the sun. 

I crossed into my sixth country today, Slovakia. Unfortunately. My phone does t work here so I have limited internet access until I hit Hungary. The old border crossing buildings still stand. 

Bratislava has a lovely old town. Unfortunately, I’m camping five kilometres out of town and up a hill so I had limited time to see the city.