Day 35- Calafat to Orayahovo -150.6 kms

2 Jul

Today’s ride could be summarised with 2 words....hot and long

Let me deal with the HOT part first....

The day started with clear skies and cool temperatures in the mid teens. But as the day wore on the temperatures were in the mid 30’s and as we were in the saddle.... so to speak for about 11 hours with stops for coffee, lunch and afternoon drinks we wore the brunt of the hot weather

The LONG part relates to the 150 kms we traveled during the day. As I said earlier we were in the saddle for over 11 hours. This is our longest ride on this tour and the second longest on the Chris/Peter bike trips

The day was supposed to start early but the room we had for the night had no natural light so we could not see the sunrise as we have done on most mornings on this ride. So we were up and about at 6.30 am and all packed to leave at 7.00 am.

Finding a bakery at Calafat proved to be a real difficulty so we settled for a stall selling some sort of local bakery delights .... they were edible but not what we had in mind!!

After breakfast we were on our way and the first challenge was to cross the border between Romania and Bulgaria which was not a problem... not so for the many trucks which were lined up to get clearance....

The good news is that my temporary passport seems to work well thank goodness!

After crossing the border it was a short hop to Vidin where we stopped for coffee.

As the day was heating up we decided to head to the halfway town of Lom ( 75 kms) doing our usual 5 km alternative leads. There was one big climb in the morning of about 300 metres over 2 kms which cleared the cobwebs

By the time we reached Lom the temperatures were in the mid 30’s and we were parched and in need of s drink and light lunch. We found a nice cafe that served salads and bitter lemon drinks.... I have become a real fan of bitter lemon and lemonade on this ride!!!

The lunch break was almost an hour and with the heat we needed to get our energy back for the ride ahead

The ride for the next 50 kms was on variable roads some good surfaces but some really bad roads as well

We had one 2 km climb of about 300 metres on a cobblestone stone road!!!

At the 120 km mark we found a town large enough to have a cafe and I had to Coke’s and a Fanta in short order... I am finding that Coke provides a short hit of caffeine on hot days which helps to maintain energy on the longer rides

After drinks it was on to Oryahovo where we arrived at the hotel shortly after 7.00 pm. To say we were glad to arrive would be an understatement.... 2 bitter lemons a shower certainly mad a big difference to how I felt

We ordered dinner which were titled “meat balls “ but were in fact meat patties

It is interesting that today we ran across a couple doing the EuroVelo 6 ride ... they were fro Germany. We had a good chat

At the hotel we ran across 2 young girls doing the ride from Holland ... we first met them out of Belgrade on the EuroVelo 6 route just before I had my bag/ passport mishap

It was great to catch up and have a chat about our respective adventures

The hotel we are Stuart tonight is excellent and it is air conditioned and has good food and we can wash our gear... something that is really needed now

It is now 9.15 and I will be in bed after a long day in the heat

Now for the photos.....

A delightful drink of homemade lemonade....