29
Jun
1700 Finally into Belgrade and I manage to shake off concerned tour-guides who think I won’t make it up the hill to the hotel - but I do and keep up with the field the whole way. My bike has performed brilliantly - not a puncture, snagged cable or snapped spoke to complain about. The rider hasn’t done too badly either! This tour (or blog) wasn’t about my disability. But more eagle eyed readers will have noticed that I walk with sticks. This is as a result of a spinal injury some years ago. Getting back on a bike and taking part in this tour is part of my answer to anyone who tells me what I am not able to do.
The groups who have ridden from Romania and Hungary now combine in crazy mass of nearly 400 cyclists through the streets of Belgrade. This is far scarier than any solo riding I have done even around some of the busiest streets of London, Delhi or Istanbul. We gather in Kalemegdan Fortress overlooking the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers. The British Ambassador to Serbia, Stephen Wordsworth has been kind enough to come and meet the Embassy team at the end of this route and my wife, Melanie, and the kids are also there. A final spin on the rowing bike for the cameras and it’s time to spend some time with the family.
The Belgrade and Zagreb Embassy teams make it to Kalemegdan Fortress in Belgrade. From the right (Obrad and Uros Canic, me and my daughter Emma, Nigel Fenn, Stephen Wordsworth, Sandra Grujic, Vladan Avramovic
1200 The ride to Sremski Karlovci from Novi Sad is quick and the hill up from the Danube no problem - maybe because I’ve been able to dump 20kg of stuff in the Belgrade team’s minibus. The final run downhill into Sremski Karlovci sees the highest speed of the tour - 50kph on the cycle computer. The train station at Sremski Karlovci is a vine-strewn building with a shady garden. The heavy black presence of an express steam engine and the ‘Romantic’ train carriages completes a bucolic pre-Beeching image of a rural railway line.
This last ride has passed so quickly there is a sense of pent-up energy and enthusiasm for the next challenge. Aching legs are quickly forgotten and new friendships cemented in promises of future rides. My Turkish friend who had first ridden a bike a few weeks ago is now cooking up ambitious plans for a ride along the Aegean coast of Turkey through Troy and Ephesus. Another idea from my Macedonian colleague was an Adriatic route through Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro and maybe beyond!
0830 The Hotel Dugi on the outskirts of Novi Sad turned out to have a distinctly Yugoslavian flavor - think socialist youth camp and varnished chip-board as a design feature. The pressure of 200 sweaty cyclists meant it immediately ran out of water for the showers and even the toilets. There was room to stand up in part of our attic room - but when I pushed opened the skylight with my head I dumped the bulk of the day’s thunderstorm in the centre of the very small carpet - better perhaps than all over the bed!
However, for the first time the sun is shining in the morning and a big crowd gathers quickly. The Belgrade team (Vladan, Nigel and Sandra) arrives in the nick of time. They look very professional in their Embassy team cycle shirts. Sandra’s bike is a gleaming carbon fibre racing machine - watch out fast group! There is just time for a team photo before we head off through Novi Sad and across the Danube again.
1600 We take the bus from Vukovar and head on towards the Serbian border. The last time I came to the border of Serbia with my bike was the summer of 1995. The Balkan wars were in full swing, Hungary was swarming with refugees from Croatia and Bosnia and the Serbian border guards looked at my bike and my passport and turned me back. 15 years on and the contrast is complete and very positive. 200 cyclists have passed through this beautiful and now peaceful countryside in safety. And with a smile and a stamp most of us are into Serbia. It still helps to have the right papers however and two of our number who have managed to get this far without a valid passport have to turn back to Croatia.
1200 The town puts on a real effort for the event. Ruthenian singing, Slavonian pop music, ballroom dancing and baton twirling. Slightly incongruous in the middle of square where each corner shows the evidence and stark reminder of the siege of Vukovar nearly 18 years ago. But at the same time it shows that life does carry on after war and that it is possible to re-establish co-existence - even partnership.
The gentlemen of the press have also joined us and they are a bit interested in the tour - but more interested in the Slovenian block on Croatia’s EU accession negotiations. A shame there aren’t more Crotian press here - just a slightly desultory HRT camera team. Nonetheless I do a short piece for camera on the enlargement and environment objectives that this tour is promoting.
1030 I stop to help David Hudson, my friend and colleague from the Commission delegation in Zagreb, sort out a puncture and suddenly find we’ve been left behind by the rest of the group. When we finally get going again David sets a cracking pace down the straight road from Osijek and we cover 30 km into Vukovar in not much over one hour. Turns out to be the right thing to do as we make it into Vukovar just ahead of the rain.
0820 There was heavy rain overnight and it’s a cool blustery morning. I can feel a bit of stretch in the tendons but surprise my self by being able to touch my toes. Bernard is leaving me today to head back to Zagreb. Many thanks to him for his companionship on the first section of our ride and despite his bike problems, I think maybe he’s caught the tour cycling bug!
1830 The final 25km into Osijek begins to hurt - but there is a real sense of joint endeavour across a very wide range of people of all ages from across Europe and beyond.
This morning I was engaged in high-level dialogue with a 12 year old Czech boy on who had the wettest pants - an honourable tie in a thunderstorm we decided.
This afternoon one of my riding companions was a British/Irish lady, who wanted her younger son, disabled by meningitis and cerebral palsy, to be able to enjoy riding with her.
Later I was chatting to a Turkish man resplendent in a matching cycling outfit that shouted ‘Turkiye’ from every panel. I discovered he had only learned to ride a bike two months ago by riding up and down his 10m back yard in Istanbul. And he cycled more than 30km in one go for the first time last week.
I have spoken more French, Spanish, Dutch, Hungarian, Croatian, Czech, Polish Serbian and whatever other languages I can pretend to make a stab at today than in a year of classic diplomatic activity.
This is Europe - and it’s a lot of fun.
1530 We’re treated to a spectacular display of high-kicking, thigh slapping folk dancing from a local Baranje folk troupe incorporating both ethnic Hungarian and Croat participants. Now if only I had figured out how to take and upload video…
1300 We finally get our just rewards for pushing on through the rain with a stop at Damir Josic’s winery in Zmajevac on the edge of Kopacki Rit. Some excellent Grasevina from his vineyards and a spectacular Goulash cooking over an open fire in the cellar restaurant suggests that this might be a good place to come back to with the family - or maybe the whole Embassy!
1230 Ok so I shouldn’t have underestimated the Slavonian mountain. I didn’t get into a low enough gear and ran out of puff just 500m from the top of a long slow climb. And when I stall on a hill it tends not to be pretty. But only a scrape to show for it.
Bernard and I fly the flag (or is it a baton) on our re-entry to Croatia. The rain has stopped and the sun is promising to emerge.
1030 Wet, but not bedraggled we arrive at the Hungarian border. The first drops had started as we headed out of Mohacs and had strengthened steadily along the way until we were cycling through a real thunderstorm. I count myself lucky that on my low-slung recumbent I’m a foot shorter than all the cyclists around me.
0745 Grey on the Danube and thunder forecast for later. Slight trepidation about what lies ahead - not made better by being warned by one of the Croatian guides of the mountains of Slavonia. But I think she was teasing!
Organisers are now getting worried about the wet weather plan for the event in Belgrade. Doesn’t bode well.
