Back to Romania (or Ukraine..? or Moldova...or Georgia?)
So back in June 2016 I had a week to spare and as always, decided to go biking, this time the destination was Hungary. I started in Wiener Neustadt, and after visiting the very much interesting city (with remains of a city wall, Jewish tombs, a commemoration of Matthias Rex having conquered the city, an impressive catherdal), set off towards the caste of Forchenstein, which was quite impressive, except I got rained on real bad. After crossing the mountain, I found a place to stay in the vicinity of Oberpullendorf...
Schloss Forchenstein
...but hey, I am not writing about the past trip, but the current one, still, there is something quite relevant about it. So here it goes, I promise to be quick:
From Oberpullendorf I got to Koszeg, then after a scenic and rather hilly trip got to Keszthely on the Balaton (where I got wet yet again plus eaten alive by the mosquitoes). OK, not to many details, but this one was funny: after a sharp turn on a tiny road I almost hit a stork in the middle of the road, we both almost got a heart attack). This was close to 160 km's, so a century in miles. The next day it was in Marcali, south of Balaton where I spent quite a few hours getting my bike fixed, as always, I usually realize something needs to be repaired on the trip itself. There was a real nice path to Kaposvar, which is a nice town with a large theater, I then considered myself to be lucky to have found a place to stay in the hills outside the city. The next day I crossed the Mecsek mountain, then rolled into the Mediterranean town of Pecs, with a huge dome, a couple of mosques from the Turkish times, ruins of late-Christian burial places (a UNESCO World Heritage site).
Pecs - the remains of a mosque
From there I got to Mohacs, a tragic place for those familiar with Hungarian history, this is where the Magyars got trashed by the Turks in 1526, starting the occupation of medieval Hungary for some 150 years. On the way there I rode next to the hills of Villany. Crossing the Danube on a small ferry, I made a short friendship with a Japanese biker, who had been living in Hungary for 30 years, he made a quick origami for me in like 45 seconds. Then I crossed the Serbian border, it was not my favorite place, it led me to a narrow and bumpy road with lorries, plus it was head wind, plus it was nasty weather - but got compensated when I made it to Subotica (Szabadka), a very pretty town with many art-nouveau buildings.
Subotica - Szabadka
On top, it was nice seeing Hungary score three goals against the later-champion Portugal, it is another story that we also got 3 goals, still, a very lively game. I found a small hotel (in fact, it was called the Small Hotel) and next day ventured back to Hungary, where my aunt was waiting for me with my cousin in the pretty town of Szeged.
Szeged
It was a nice lunch-afternoon-dinner-breakfast we spent together, but then came the reason why I am writing this preamble.
As I cannot stay put (i.e. still), I had to keep riding, but as my vacation was coming to an end, I had to find a place I could reach in the remaining 3 days and get back safely to Vienna by train. I will spare you the details of the torture of trying to buy train tickets with the bike and its rider, but after about 90 minutes, I had a reservation from Oradea in Romania for Sunday evening.
I had spent a month riding all over Romania some three years ago, a great adventure and during the three days, I wasn't disappointed. The road I took was a scenic one, with rolling hills, huge herds of sheep (with the very friendly shepherd), old churches - what also impressed me were the three towns I visited, Timisoara, Arad and Oradea. All three are worth a visit, but if I had to pick a favorite, it would be Timisoara - though the center of Oradea was truly impressive.
Timisoara at night
On the second last day, I made a (what I considered to be) a short-cut across a mountain, which turned out to be a struggle, shoving my bike up a steep mud-road full of mosquitoes, by bike often sank in the ponds, the mosquitoes were having a feast on my ears, necks, legs - I was surrounded by a cloud of these beasts. The view from above partially compensated the torture - and when I got to the first village, two liters on mineral water disappeared in my thirsty body within like 5 minutes. The last day, I was still in Arad and had to be in Oreda by 5 pm the latest, but I also wanted to visit the city, so I took the shortest road - 120 km of a main road with quite a lot of traffic, it wasn't too bad, though, as the road was good quality and had a shoulder. In Salonta, I was reminded by a lady that Janos Arany, the Hungarian Shakespeare was born there, shame on me that I did not remember that was my school days, especially as my high school was named after him. the house was beautifully kept in the style of the 19th century.
House of Janos Arany
Finally, I got to Oradea, where it was time to catch my train. I never got to the newspapers I painstakingly bought, as I met Armand, a French biker from Nizza (yes, the Nizza that was just attacked two days ago), who was returning from an Iron Man, where he finished 6th. I actually would not care about my position, as long as I could finish swimming 3 miles, running 27 and biking some 112 miles. I spent the night in Budapest, where huge crowds were celebrating the Hungarian soccer team, even though they were eliminated by Belgium 4:0.
So why this long story? Guess I just wanted to explain that I enjoy biking in Romania and have yet to be disappointed there. No wonder that for my long vacation, I decided to ride there yet again. Now comes the story.