The day got off to a terrible start when about 100m from the hotel Mum's water bottle fell off her bike and a car behind us diverted its path to run the bottle over. They then laughed as we looked at the ruined water bottle splattered all over the road. We were both then in a terrible mood which wasn't helped by the hot, busy city exit, with frustrating cycle lanes ending on motorways. Eventually we got out onto the road we wanted to be on, and it was not a fun time.. Turkey's nice wide shoulder had disappeared and the road was busy busy with lots of truck traffic. These trucks were driven by mean Europeans who thought nothing of pushing us off the road. I'd been so excited about being back in Europe but it was mainly shit. It was also raining. We were also climbing. Every town we went through was pretty depressing - honestly people in Bulgaria are all in a bad mood. There were some road safety signs with the message "Drive carefully. somebody loves you". I wish they said "Drive carefully, somebody loves the cyclists you just nearly killed". Eventually we got to the top of a hill, diverted into a forest and set up camp.
June 16th - Rish to Razgrad - Bad Bulgaria
Today (I'm having real problem with tenses, sorry literary readers (including a published author)) was pretty similar to yesterday and we were (are?!) getting sick of the busy roads, and of Bulgaria in general. The towns were all dismal and people were (are?? Why is this such a problem today?) just not at all friendly. Frequently people would slow down in their cars and just deathstare. Mum was enjoying practising her Russian again, (she's apparently been reading Anna Karenina in Russian so is obviously pretty pro) but nobody was giving her anything back. It was mainly agricultural land so the scenery wasn't exciting either, although there were beautiful fields of wild flowers.
We decided to do as many miles as possible to get out of Bulgaria ASAP. Bulgaria really is terrible towns sandwiched between a massive wild camping site. This means we could just pull in as it got dark, and we found a beautiful place. We still haven't (right I'm switching to present tense) been able to methylated spirits which really limits our cooking options and makes evenings pretty miserable, but luckily we have the kelly kettle (massive shoutout to El for being a LEGEND). Life always looks a bit better with a cup of tea, and it also means we can cook very quick cook pasta which is what we had tonight (??? I'm having a shocker). Anyway, it's always nice staying in a wild camp site where there is no chance of being discovered, it makes it a good night's sleep.
June 17th - Razgrad to Romania - Is everyone drunk here?
We left Razgrad with the aim of getting out of Bulgaria which we achieved. Yay. I feel like I shouldn't really do anymore Bulgaria bashing on this blog so I won't... We managed to make it to the border bridge and crossed over to Romania! The border officials smiled at us! What a relief. Not all of Europe is horrible! On the other side of the border we met two French walkers who recommended that we stay in the hotel in the border town as there weren't many other safe places in Romania. This annoyed me a lot because how could they possibly know that? Anyway we ignored them and rode on throughout Romania. Everyone was really really nice, but they were also really drunk. Literally everyone. Frequently cars would drive past and we'd get a whiff of ethanol out of the window. Lots of people stopped us and were very friendly, in a very drunk way. We had a tailwind which we knew was rare so we decided to cycle on for as long as possible. It then started raining so we looked desperately for a wild camp site, but it was all farmland and not hopeful. At the start of this trip this would have made me a bit stressed, but now I really do know it will all be okay. After the disastrous first night in Morocco I'm pretty sure it can't get any worse. We eventually found a field of chopped down reeds(?) and decided to camp on there. We put up the tent in the rain. We ate sandwiches in the tent listening to the rain on the roof. I made a cup of tea in the rain whilst Mum took this arty picture.
We fell asleep listening to the rain on the roof.
June 18th - Romania to Corabia - Does it always rain here?
We woke up listening to rain on the roof. We ate breakfast listening to the rain on the roof. We packed up our bags in the rain. We discovered the reed stems had formed tiny knives and made lots of holes in the bottom the tent whilst listening to the rain on the roof. We took the tent down in the rain. We set off in the rain. We rode allllll damn day in the rain.
Romania is very different from Bulgaria, you can definitely tell it wasn't in the USSR. Mum just told me it was. I've done some googling and I'm still not really sure. Anyway the Romania we saw is all pretty villages with flowerbeds and a bench outside every house. Despite the rain, everyone was sitting on these benches, most of them drinking beer, even as early as 7:30 (AM). This makes for a cheerful atmosphere. Eastern Europe women are great. They've all got really dirty faces and none of them wear any shoes. They're so unselfconscious and it's fab. Romania really does feel like going back in time - horse and carts everywhere, we were practically in a Thomas Hardy novel. As Mum said "I am Tess". We stopped for lunch in a bus shelter and were joined by two other cycle tourists, one of them a Cardiff grad living in Bristol! They had just met each other and we had a nice lunch despite the torrential rain.
Actually our lunch was a bit substandard because the bread went seriously downhill after we left Turkey. Mike and Luce had both stayed in the same cheap hotel an appropriate distance away and their positive reviews and the continuing rain convinced us - we headed there ASAP. Once we got there we dried everything out, had showers and went to the hotel restaurant. They only had pizza, and it was only $1. This is far too cheap for a pizza but luckily hunger is always the overriding emotion for us. The restaurant was absolutely crammed - but everyone seemed to be working there? They were also all eating? The world is a strange place.
June 19th - Corabia to Rast - "Why is there always something to be frightened of?"
We were convinced there was going to be a hotel breakfast in the morning, but went down to the bar to find the remains of everyone's meals the night before. This made me feel a bit sick. Anyway we cracked on with yoghurt and muesli and got back on the road. It quickly started raining again and I was very miserable. It really isn't nice cycling in the rain. You'd think after 22 years of parenting, Mum would be good at pulling me out of these slumps in a motivational and inspiring way. No. She normally says something along the lines of "oh for goodness sake phoebe stop being so bloody pathetic", which at least changes my emotion from sadness to anger. Anyway the rain stopped in time for coffee.
We had coffee on a picnic bench next to a roadside memorial. Along these tiny country lanes there are a worrying number of roadside memorials and they're all very extra, with massive photos and gravestones. It turns out we chose the wrong bench as lots of people came to visit this memorial, looking scathingly at us as we made a literal fire (kelly kettle) next to them. For lunch we stopped by a well, which Mum played with. Suddenly people came rushing out of their houses to tell us we couldn't drink it. We've been drinking well water all the time in Romania so we weren't sure why this way. We didn't even need any water but we were unable to communicate this and they all went back into their houses and brought us out a bottle, then sat with us while we had lunch. One young man (maybe 25?) got out his phone and showed me a video of a dog appearing to drive a tractor. It was sort of funny, but it turns out it wasn't his dog or his tractor. He was crying with laughter, and he'd seen it lots of times before... After this he showed me a video of a group of youths beating up a man with dwarfism. This made me cry, but not with laughter. It was genuinely incredibly traumatic. I hope I managed to at least slightly awake him to the ethics of this, but in reality I think he just thought I was a party pooper. The sun actually came out in the afternoon and we had a nice ride.
When it was time to camp we found a field by the side of the village.
June 20th - Rast to Burila Mica - Hornets are not nice campmates
We woke up in the morning because an old couple were weeding the sweetcorn at 6 AM. They were very cheerful and unfazed to find two "turistas" camping in their fields. We weren't sure why they were quite so keen to weed so early but there you go. Soon after we set off - the rain started again. The landscape wasn't really changing much but it was very enjoyable riding.
We had stopped for lunch when a policeman came and talked to us, and then drove off and came back with three chocolate bars each! They were traditional Romanian, and of course were very alcoholic. It rained on and off all afternoon as we meandered through farmland along the river. We cycled as late as possible, intermittently trying to buy methylated spirits to cook on. This led to some very funny conversations, including one pharmacy where they really seemed to know what I meant - and then came back with Vitamin C tablets.. When it was getting dark we stopped to camp in a field near a village. We weren't very hidden but at least it wasn't active farmland. We cooked, and then a massive buzzing insect started flying around me. I swatted at it and Mum gave me an irritating lecture about not aggravating it. Suddenly we were surrounded by these massive insects, which we thought were hornets. We reckoned we might have camped over a nest and packed up supper stuff as quickly as possible whilst doing complicated dance moves to keep them away. Once we were safely in the tent they all swarmed around, hitting the fly sheet and making lots of noise. We were pretty safe inside - but how would we get out?
June 21st pt 1 -Burila Mica to Donji Milanovic - Into Serbia .
We set off early and made good progress to the border town of Drobeta. The road to Drobeta is a european trunk road and was very busy - we expected this as all the other cycle tourists we'd met had warned us. We stopped for a coffee in the city and then passed through, into Serbia!
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