Day 21. Serbia

 Ash emailed me last night saying he's had enough of my raving about the good weather. Well Ash, this'll make you happy, woke up to a wet day ,temperature has plummeted to 24 c, and to top it off , a flat tyre

Nicole, the owner, made us a nice breakfast even though it wasn't included . Nicole is Serbian and she explained how difficult it is for a Serb to survive on this side of the border, the open distrust and hostile prejudice . A bit like being a real estate agent in NZ I guess. 

  The cemetery on the way out of town had 3 stalls selling artificial flowers. Fairly typical of Eastern Europe .  Tacky ?

More bad news, this stretch to Ilok was up and down with a HEAD WIND

Until this strange cloud went across us and the wind stopped then came in strong from behind. Yay!

  Because they use so much wood in winter there are always people moving it around

And every house seems to have a corn store like this 

The councils here can't be accused of not supplying amenities. Out side the bar this chap shows me the bottle opener wired to the tree.

At Ilok we used up the last of our Croation Duna on bread then crossed the river into Serbia

It was a short ride into Backa Palanka, where we met yet ANOTHER Frenchman heading for Constanza

This is Jean Marie , we went to the bank together and drew out Serbian Dunar. No coins here, even 10cents is a note. We still can't find a tourist info center where we can find a cycle map.

  Now this'll make Ash happy, we thought we'd make the next village for the night but half way there the sky's opened up and we just made this fruit stall

Luckily, the farm house next door was advertising a room so we went in. An old man came to the door in his undies and proudly showed us the house we could have. Oh Boy, smelt like no one had been in there for a year. Trail boss gave it the thumbs down so we took to the road again, wet as ducks and made it to Backi Petrovac, 8kms further on. It's called the Oasis and it's wonderful

Day 21. Serbia

 Ash emailed me last night saying he's had enough of my raving about the good weather. Well Ash, this'll make you happy, woke up to a wet day ,temperature has plummeted to 24 c, and to top it off , a flat tyre

Nicole, the owner, made us a nice breakfast even though it wasn't included . Nicole is Serbian and she explained how difficult it is for a Serb to survive on this side of the border, the open distrust and hostile prejudice . A bit like being a real estate agent in NZ I guess. 

  The cemetery on the way out of town had 3 stalls selling artificial flowers. Fairly typical of Eastern Europe .  Tacky ?

More bad news, this stretch to Ilok was up and down with a HEAD WIND

Until this strange cloud went across us and the wind stopped then came in strong from behind. Yay!

  Because they use so much wood in winter there are always people moving it around

And every house seems to have a corn store like this 

The councils here can't be accused of not supplying amenities. Out side the bar this chap shows me the bottle opener wired to the tree.

At Ilok we used up the last of our Croation Duna on bread then crossed the river into Serbia

It was a short ride into Backa Palanka, where we met yet ANOTHER Frenchman heading for Constanza

This is Jean Marie , we went to the bank together and drew out Serbian Dunar. No coins here, even 10cents is a note. We still can't find a tourist info center where we can find a cycle map.

  Now this'll make Ash happy, we thought we'd make the next village for the night but half way there the sky's opened up and we just made this fruit stall

Luckily, the farm house next door was advertising a room so we went in. An old man came to the door in his undies and proudly showed us the house we could have. Oh Boy, smelt like no one had been in there for a year. Trail boss gave it the thumbs down so we took to the road again, wet as ducks and made it to Backi Petrovac, 8kms further on. It's called the Oasis and it's wonderful

Day 20. Heading east again

The route in Croatia is mostly on shared roads. It's Sunday morning so it's not busy yet. Even at 8.30am the cafés are all busy though ,as the locals have their morning coffee ,or beer. Many of the houses have mountains of firewood already piled up for the coming winter.

I was going to say he's got everything but the kitchen sink, but it's there !

  We picked up the trail again on this bike track into Osijec. Goodness knows where it went

Osijec is a nice old town on the river Drava ,still with the old tram systems

The bread shops don't have the temptations of the French or Germans though. 

And supermarkets take a bit of finding

When the 1991 war hit this area and Serb tanks drove in to Osijec , one local parked his little car in their path as an act of defiance. The tank just drove over him and crushed it, so when the war finished this memorial was put on the very spot. Only this time the little car wins !

As we rode east to tonight's stop at Vukovar the damn road was blocked off and we got lost. You techno wizards out there will be glad to hear that I've got my GPS working and it was able to find us another route .. I don't think we'll ask it's help again. Took us through a farmers maize field . The look on his face as we drove past him on his harvester was worth the effort !!

And eventually back onto the closed road. Still under reconstruction. 

 Anyway, we eventually found the right road and got into Vukovar about 3.

This town still shows all the signs of the war and the underlying tension just showed itself this week when the 2 sides couldn't agree on how to commemorate the start of WW1

We rode in to town past the cruise ships and found a reasonable pension called Zara's. 

Day 19. Half way

Firstly let me tell you of a fantastic night of music last night. The iPad had a flat battery so I missed the photos but it was in this street

A Hungarian folk band was belting out gypsy type music and the crowds were dancing in large circles. Mesmerising and so cool !

  Breakfast this morning was 4 eggs and salami as we talked first to Elisia in Australia ,and then to Tracy and the boys in NZ on Skype 

Far too much for us but we managed.           Nearly !!! We hadn't even got out of town and I had to play charades in a mini market 

   "Emergency, wife needs your toilet"

     "No " (that was clear )

     "Toileten ,toileten, toileten"

      "No, town center" ( points )

      "Ok, here in the vege aisle "

 "This way quickly please "

Now , how do we get out of Baja.

  Met another Frenchman last night, Marcel and he's on his way to Constanza also. We saw him in the distance half way to Mohacs and only caught up when he stopped to take a photo of the horse and wagon. The singe shaft is very common in Hungary.

I remember this area well from 4 years ago when we were here in a camper. Crossed the Duna on the ferry and then had lunch in town. Nice place Mohacs

It was only 10kms to the border so we set off after lunch. It's Saturday afternoon,so the road was dead quiet. The crossing into Croatia was the second milestone today, the first was clocking up 1500 Kms , about the half way mark.

These guys see dozens of silly buggers every summer all trying to bike the Euro 6.

    Met another French couple at the border. Heading for Belgrade .Sorry guys I missed your name

We went another 15kms to a grotty town called Beli Manaster. Lots of pensions but all a bit suspect, until we came to this 4star beauty. Bit dear but we've earnt it today