Straubing to Bratislava

You will have guessed that we were never at a place called Straining as my last post title would suggest, duh, schoolgirl error, I would have hauled my students over the coals for not checking their work, shame on me.

Here are some stats:

• Kms cycled to date: 2498
• Average cruising speed: 19-25 kph
• Fastest downhill to date: 56 kph
• Most Kms cycled in one day so far: 78
• No of nights in hotels: 7
• No of wet days: Too many to mention
• Max temp to date: 36 (France)
• Min temp to date: 8 (Austria)

We have met some absolutely delightful people in all the countries we've visited.  We often get what I like to call the 'respect' thumbs up from people of a more mature age, in recognition of the fact that we are still having a go, at our age.  Young people, generally, seem to take fitness and health for granted, and so they should.  When we were in our 20/30s I'm sure we were the same.  But it's as you get older and realise that health and fitness is something that needs to be worked at, nurtured, and not taken for granted, that it becomes precious.

So here we are in Bratislava having a mini break in the Hotel Esprit, but the last 10 days or so has come and gone in a bit of a whirl, a synopsis:

From Straubing we made our way towards the Austrian border stopping at the lovely Vilshofen site site.  Five Euros for a tent and up to 5 people is an absolute bargain.  An honesty system is in place where campers register and put their money in recycled envelopes, in locker number 11.  It serves not only campervans and campers but has a boat dock also.  There is a sitting area, comfy chairs all under cover, which was just as well for us because it absolutely hammered down from 7pm onwards the night we were there.

We had mixed weather on our way to Austria but there were a couple of days that were distinctly cold.  Wearing hats, neck ruffs and socks cold.  We're talking 8 degrees.  There were two days when it absolutely threw it down AND it was cold.  My sense of humour definitely went missing for a bit.  What's really annoying is campsites that purport to cater for cyclists but then don't.  So, when a site says 'and for all you cyclists, our warm, dry garage is there for you to use' one imagines that applies to cyclists universally.  In one case it only applies if you are staying in the expensive Gasthof, not one of the plebs who are actually cycling all day, every day.  Some sites provide covered gazebos, which is an absolute bonus when it's wet, as it's possible to cook and keep kit dry, specially in the morning when we're packing up.  Drying wet clothes at the end of a day is a challenge.  One campsite decided that our towels should not be hanging in the shower room over night, and so chucked them in the bin!

The Donauweg (Danube route) is a bit of a mixed bag.  Some of it is beautiful, a cycleway following the river, no vehicles at all.  Other times we have ended up on busy roads, steep inclines and very fast drivers.  Not quite as fast as the Germans I have to say, but still faster than we'd like.

We really liked the Wachau region, just west of Vienna.  It's a wine and fruit growing region, and everywhere was bursting with fruit.  An Austrian cyclist we met there told us that Wachau was 'the best' food in Austria.  I hope that's true because our experience of the rest of the country (not that we've been in many parts of Austria) has been pretty poor.

We did 'the right thing' and visited Vienna.  It was all a bit pompous and a touch opulent for our taste, with more styles of architecture than you could shake a stick at.  I even spotted a mini Parthenon amongst the Neoclassical.  The best find of the day was the Market.  We were spoilt for choice when deciding what to eat.  The felafel looked amazing, as did the fish, but we opted for the Vietnamese noodles.  Truly authentic and very reasonably priced, it took us right back to Saigon (Before anyone says anything, I know it's called Ho Chi Min now, but when we were there EVERYBODY still calls it Saigon, ditto Bombay).

There's a reason why the road from Vienna to Bratislava has many, many wind turbines.  It's windy.  When I say windy I mean stop you in your tracks windy.  At one point I was down to 8 kph.  Again, complete loss of sense of humour at that point.  BW knows exactly what to do in those circumstances.  Say nothing.  Do not try and make it better by saying things like 'oh well, it could be worse' because he gets a look that could freeze hell.

This three days is a well earned break off the bikes and in relatively luxury.  We're very glad we chose Bratislava rather than Vienna, having visited both.  We are close to the Aupark Shopping Centre, and a 20 min walk to the old town.  BW has gone off this morning to find a bike shop to see if he can buy some new shoes as his Keen boots are falling to bits.  We have a list of 'stuff' to buy, so we'll be going to the Aupark later, and probably have some noodles for dinner, in the enormous food court, which seems to cater for all tastes.

Which brings us to where next?  Well, in an effort to have some semblance of a summer we are hopping on a bus to Zagreb tomorrow, that will save us a week of cycling.  If you have a look at the weather in that region you will probably burst out laughing at my mention of the word 'summer' because they are currently being hit by rainstorms.  Oh well, maybe our 'summer' has to wait until India!

Talking of India, we have begun thinking about getting there and organising visas.  So in the next couple of weeks we will book flights, New Delhi or Bombay, and then decide on a route.  By that time we should be up to 100 kms per day, that's the plan anyway.  When we get to Dubrovnik we will decide whether Albania is a goer, or whether we hit Montenegro, Kosovo, Macedonia and into Greece.  We can fly to India from Athens, and if we are running out of time we know we can get a ferry from Thessaloniki to Pireaus.  But that's a little way off, we're thinking 1st or 2nd week of November.

First up, it's Croatia!

Laters

Bratislava photos     https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10155681346891565.1073741841.698211564&type=1&l=4d601b9e71

Austria photos   https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10155681329686565.1073741840.698211564&type=1&l=c1749c27aa