Mohacs: Near the Croatian Border

September 6, 2015

I was anxious to get going this morning, after yesterday's weather-induced day off. It was windy and cold when I left, but it didn't take too long to warm up.

I went through the small town of Batya, where there is a newer and more commercial Paprika Museum. It was closed on Sunday, so I didn't need to decide whether to stop.

I did ride past lots of paprika fields, so I had my fill of paprika-viewing for the day.

I went through some other small towns.

In Fajsz, I tried to follow the directions in the BikeLine guide to reach the dike road. I didn't see any EV6 signs, and the guide had ambiguous directions like "at the first larger intersection turn left" and "just before the end of the village turn right". I ended up at a dead-end in some industrial facility, and retraced my route back to town. I went the direction that should take me to the river, and found the dike road and a EV6 sign. And the road was paved! That was exciting because the guide said it wasn't until much further on.

The dike road out of Fajsz, paved since the BikeLine guide was published.Long and straight.

The road provided some pleasant riding. It did have an occasional car, which required squeezing by, but with a great surface and low traffic, my figure of merit was sky high. The downside to the dike road, not that I'm complaining, is it goes through few towns so there isn't much opportunity for coffee or snack breaks, and being on a dike it's difficult to find a discrete spot to relieve yourself. Later in the day I found myself wondering if it was a safe place in a thunderstorm, but that's jumping ahead.

EuroVelo info point. The first of these I've seen.

I stopped in Baja, which was the biggest town today, and had a small lunch, with ice cream of course. Then I bumped into another bike tourist in the middle of the cobblestone square. He was from Belgrade, but had graduated from Fort Lewis College in Durango. Since we were both from Colorado we chatted for a bit. He was anxious to show pictures from his trip and offer advice for travel on the east and south of Belgrade, but I couldn't get anything from him about the route from Baja to Belgrade. After declining his offer of a beer, I excused myself and moved on.

Leaving Baja, I headed down a hill at a good speed, and then abruptly stopped to take a picture of the river. There was a couple walking by, and they thought I needed directions. When I said no, I just wanted a photo, they suggested I take one of them. The husband was quite a ham.

The wife not so much.

They were asking me something else, and indicating a roof with their hands. It didn't occur to me until later that it might have been an invitation to their home, and I missed out.

Here is the picture I stopped for.

I continued on. The dike road was dirt and gravel for a while, with lots of puddles from yesterday's rain. That made slow going.

Suddenly it got quite cold and windy. I glanced in my rear view mirror, and the clouds were dark and scary. I was about 6 miles from the ferry I needed to catch to Mohacs, so I focused on pedaling and not the landscape, and got just a few drools of rain before reaching the ferry.

There were three guys there that had been at my pension last night. I hadn't realized they were cyclists until I saw their bikes when retrieving mine when I was leaving in the morning. They are from Austria, and are headed to the Black Sea, making bigger miles than I am. One has an electric assist bike. We went together to a pension in Mohacs. I declined to share their room, which had 4 beds. I wanted to spread out, and the single room is cheap enough.

Mohacs is just a few kilometers from the border with Croatia, so I'll have a new country tomorrow. Hills start again, tomorrow, too, and I'm a little apprehensive about that.

Today's ride: 84 km (52 miles)
Total: 2,052 km (1,274 miles)

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