Bratislava to Budapest by bike - (part 3 - Gyor to Esztergom)

Setting off on Easter Sunday morning, we did suspect that we might need some form of miracle to get us going and out of the city - luckily after cycling for about 20 mins past seemingly identical concrete tower blocks on the outskirts of the city, we managed to pick up what constituted the cycle path. But not before we had had to ask one old Hungarian gentleman, who bible in hand appeared to be on his way from church and decided that the usual game of confuse the tourist was not a suitable game for Easter Sunday, and a helpful garage attendant after the usual game of 'Nem beslek magyarul, beslesz angol?' 'Nem beslek angol, beslez nemetul', and so in a mix of Hungarian, German and English (hundeutlish, which seems to be a good lingua franca for tourists outside of Budapest).

After about an hout of cycling along a relatively quiet road and crossing over the M1 motorway, we found a hill, yes a hill on the Carpatian basin, something to break up the monotony of the rolling plains - and on top of the hill was the biggest collection of wind turbines, we had ever seen - unfortunately, by some feat of engineering brilliance, the wind turbines were posted on the top of the hill and it was a wind tunnel - not so brilliant was the fact that the route took us up the afore mentioned hill and into the afore mentioned wind - needless to say, sense of humour was struggling somewhat and it was not even midday. Coming down the hill was a more pleasurable experience, although the presence of around 200 birdboxes in the trees a long the side of the road was alittle more striking.

The route then took us back across the motorway and a long a dirt path alongside the main Budapest - Vienna train track - despite several attempts at the internationally recognised action for honk your horn, only one train obliged - leading me to the conclusion that the Jet Train trains (linking the 2 airports) are driven by Austrians with no sense of adventure or sympathy for lunatic cyclists whilst the local Hungarian services are a little more friendly.

Eventually we arrived in Komaron where we had planned to stop for lunch - this is an interesting town (apparently) as half of it is is in Slovakia and speaks Slovakian and uses Euros, whilst the other half is in Hungary and does Hungarian stuff - we thought this might be a little bit of novelty but then when the Lonely Planet to Hungary doesn't even credit it with a mention, you know you have guessed wrong on the side of the river to cycle upon (compare the 2 wikipedia entries for more evidence)

Hungarian one

Slovakian one

Unfortunately, upon leaving the rather disappointing town of Komaron, and completely missing its far more interesting twin, we proceeded to effectively enter what can only be described as the twilight zone - after another 20kms where morale had reached breaking point, we arrived at the gates of a derelict factory in a place called Almasfuzito - claim to fame, it was bombed during WWII as it had an oil refinery - current status, pretty much as we suspect it was left in 1944, although there was a working train station offering trains back to Budapest and at this stage in the day, if the train had been at the platform it would have had two bikes and riders on it - but 'luckily' we had missed one and didn't fancy waiting around in the land of the living dead for an hour for the next one. After a stop in the only bar showing signs of life, and I mean this in an abstract fashion, and some emergency chocolate intaking, we pushed on towards Esztergom - not before having used the facilities in the station which take some element of experience to be believed. I reckong the town would benefit from a sign like this one

It was like the setting for some independent horror film - 2 young, naive English tourists on a cycling holiday arrive in the Hungarian countryside. Having stopped in the local bar and eventually extracting themselves from the attentions of the local drunks, who view them as fresh conversation practice, our young protagonists spy a glimpse of civilisation in the railway station and proceed to try and understand when the next train to civilisation might be (cue, hilarious usage of hundeutlish). Whilst waiting for the train to arrive, our hero makes his way into the station building pushing open the door that has dropped on its hinges and screetches like a banshee, awakening something dark that lives in the depths and comes to investigate...

Anyway, in the real world, Katy and I decided not to wait around and see if the cast of the 'Land of the Living Dead' or any other George Romero movie were about to arrive and, having also discovered that Hungarian buses wont let you take bikes on them, mounted our trusty steel steeds and set off to try and re-discover the Danube, which mercifully we did after about 5kms and the whole atmosphere lifted as we appeared to be back in the realms of the living.

As the Basilica in Esztergom started to appear on the horizon, we stopped to have a celebratory chocolate croissant to celebrate the fact that we had covered 100kms in a day - against the combined efforts of the wind, dust, traffic and the zombie residents of Almasfuzito. Only to then find it was another 15kms in Esztergom but we finally made it to our hotel to take a well deserved shower and wait for Steven and Helena who has decided to come and join us for the final leg into Budapest the following dinner.

After an interesting dinner in a pork knuckle specialist restaurant, we decided that taking a walk across the bridge in Sturovo in Slovakia was in order and so proceeded to follow the noise emanating from the only bar in town that appeared to have late opening on a Sunday evening to find pints of Zlaty Bazant for 1 Euro a go! On the walk back into Esztergom and Hungary, the clouds started to gather and it became obvious that the rain threatened for the weekend has started to arive (late in typical Hungarian fashion).

Esztergom is a really pretty town, a little bit like the Hungarian equivalent of Canterbury, being the centre of the Hungarian Catholic church and we will be back to have a proper look over the summer - especially as the only times I have been previously are to play rugby which has not always been a great experience!

Esztergom