Day 27 - Kalocsa to Sombor - 116.2 kms

23 Jun

Today we were awake again early at about 5.15 am and were packed and ready to go a little before 6.00am. We had located a bakery in the Main Street in Kalocsa last evening on our after dinner walk. Kalocsa is a very pretty town with some very big ornate government type buildings and a lovely baroque cathedral. I should try and do a bit of a history review of the region when I get home....

Anyway we were on our way after some fresh pasteries at the bakery and our first stop was on the Danube in time to see one of the river boats docking near Kalocsa with a bus ready to take the guests from the boat on a local tour

For us though it was on the bike trail for about 5 kms of very loose gravel surface!!! Needless to say this is not my favourite riding conditions and the going was slow. I was buoyed by the fact that this was the only rough riding for the day...... yeh!

After that the riding surface was a very good bitumen cycleway until we reached Baja at about 60 km mark for morning tea. It was market day in town and the market area was packed so we headed for the town square where we found a local cafe for coffee and a cake... all very nice really given we were refreshed and only had another 30 kms to go!!!

So after morning tea it was off to the Hungary/ Serbia boarder and on to Sombor for an early day.... well so we thought ....

Arriving at the border we presented ourselves to the immigration officers and after looking at our passports were told that we could not cross at this point we needed to go through st another crossing.....well you could not have deflated us more with this news more

After consulting the official further we located a route that might be fairly direct to get us to Hercegszanto .... so off we went. At first the roads were ok, then gravel, then it was tractor tracks with deep ruts and sand and altogether very yuck traveling. This was for 10 kms and at the end you would not believe it but there was a an outdoor church in the middle of nowhere.... somehow the cycle gods had been looking after us after the disappointment of the earlier failure at the border crossing

From the church it was a short distance to Hercpfhcocoudoy or whatever!!! Where we had lunch!!! AND a cool drink because the temperatures were in the early 30’s by now and it was quite humid

We had lunch of pitta bread and souvlakia which were quite good fuel for the 30 km ride across the border and on to Sombor.

The ride to the border post was quite short and we had to present our passports to both the Hungarian and Serbian officials and they let us through

This takes us to 7 countries being France, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Slovakia and now Serbia so far on this ride.

Immediately after the border crossing you guessed it..... yes the roads deteriorated badly and it was slow going until we got closer to Sombor.

We came in to town and Chris saw a watermelon stall on the side of the road and together we ate a quarter of a melon to quench our thirst after an interesting days ride

We arrived at our accommodation at about 3.15 pm...cleaned the bikes, did our washing and had a cool shower.... wow it is a great feeling to shower after a ride in the heat. We were lucky to start early to get a few kms up before the heat and humidity kicks in

I just want to make a couple of comments about the road conditions so far on the ride. It goes as follows:

France Germany and Switzerland- great roads and bike track surfaces in general. The best of these 3 is possibly Germany
Austria was ok but there were some poor road surfaces
Hungary, Serbia ( so far) and Slovakia are the worst roads and bike surfaces. I guess this has a lot to do with the fact that many of these countries were part of the old eastern Soviet block countries where there was no investment in road infrastructure.

We did a bit of an analysis last night on the trip so far and we both think we can make it to Costanta on the Black Sea assuming we continue with our current pace of over 100kms per day and we stay safe...

Now for the photos

Early morning on the Danube... a big boat docking at Kolosca