Day 36- Oryahovo to Zimnicea- 137.5kms

3 Jul

Today was hot and I mean HOT!!!

You will see in the photos a shot of the Garmin in the middle of the day where the temperature was over 40 degrees.... you might say we were silly to do the ride in the heat but we need to be at at place called Giurgiu tomorrow so abcan catch the train back to Bucharest to then fly back to Paris to meet the connection with Etihad home

The day started early again with breakfast at the hotel which was “gobbled down “ as we thought we had to caythe 7.00 am ferry across the Danube to Romania.... so we rushed down to the ferry terminal and cleared the border only to be told the ferry was going at 8.00am ..... bugger!!!

We knew that the day was going to get hot so waiting for an hour was a real blow

The ferry crossing was good and it gives a real chance to see the river from a different angle . Here the river is wide and the flow is significantly slower than further upstream.

After the crossing we had to clear Romanian customs which was simple and it seems that the temporary passport is not causing any problems

As we rode on the day was starting to heat up so we opted to take regular rests and either eat an ice cream or other food and drink water or other drinks.... the amount of water I drank today was staggering.... I reckon I was drinking a water bottle every 20 kms!!!!

I also found later in the day I was getting very drowsy and having a Coca Cola really pepped me up... normally I am not a Coke drinker but this seemed to work for me... Phil Eager one of my riding pals back home got me on to this.... well done Phil!!!

I think the locals along today’s route also thought we were mad riding in the heat as on many occasions we received claps and welcomes from the locals sitting on the side of the road. On several occasions we were high 5’d by local children on the road... all very friendly really.

Over the past couple of days we really noticed how 3rd world parts of Bulgaria and Romania are... there was a lot of horse drawn wagons which are used for farm work and the people seemed to be doing a lot a manual work with sickle and synth. The other thing is that in many towns there are vacant buildings like factories which have been deserted many years ago and the supporting infrastructure like housing has been left to rot...

Many of the towns have older people living in them and we saw some of the younger generations dotted in the towns. Seems to me that the young want to live in the bright lights of the big cities.

Getting back to today’s ride.... we had a day of over 12 hours riding and recovering and were glad to arrive at our Airbnb home which is air conditioned..... yeh what a relief

Having the home to ourselves was great and the owner had stocked the pantry with eggs and tomatoes and Chris made a delightful omelette for us both... going out for dinner in the heat would have been too much

I must say that the day was a hard one for me and I found the heat really drained my energy... I am glad it is over and am looking forward to bed

Tomorrow is the last day of riding for me as I leave Chris at Giurgiu .... be sad not to go all the way with Chris to Costanta but the muck up with my passport prevents me from doing this.

Be sad to leave but in a way I am glad to be going home to see the family

Now for the photos

Border crossing from Bulgaria