The bed in the guesthouse was very comfortable and after the shorter stage yesterday, I felt again fitter. On the stairs outside was a cat sitting. But it didn‘t want to be stroked. Just before leaving, I met the woman to whom the cat belongs. She is cycling through Europe and now slowly on the way back to Amsterdam. I was then inundated with information about great small camping places, where I get more information about campings in Serbia, that people are more open in Serbia than here (since Swiss are as well not the most open people, I felt rather comfortable here and it will be interesting to see what I like more 🙂 ). I said goodbye, went to the Spar around the corner, cycled to a bench and ate breakfast. I noticed now on the planned route that I won‘t go to Serbia already. First it will go to Croatia.
The route was mainly on a dam and after some kilometers well paved. Before Dunafalva, I got a call from my wife. Unfortunately, a relative died today. Now I have to decide to go back or continue. I was thinking about it on my way to Mohács, where a train could be taken.
Additionally, I got stung by a wasp in the upper leg. Here are more different flowers along the dam, and therefore more insects, but among them also many wasps. At list I assumed that it was a wasp. Luckily, I didn‘t react allergic and didn‘t have to take the pills, which I carry with me in emergeny, because an allergy test showed once that I may react on wasps.
I arrived in Mohács and talked to three persons from Germany. They were very interested on the „Niesentreppenlauf“. Why? Because I was wearing a shirt from that run. It is about the beautiful mountain Niesen with its typical pyramidal shape. The shadow of the mountain on the Thunersee is as well impressive, almost a pyramid. The stair along the cog railway has 11674 steps. But you can do this longest stair of the world only during the official run.
The ferry was with about 3 Euro quite cheap compared to other ferries I already have taken along the Danube.
Now I had to decide and as you probably assume from the few kilometers I did today, I decided the cancel my trip for now and go back to Switzerland. Somehow, it is hard to stop my tour here, but somehow, I also know, it is the correct decision. I can easily continue to tour later again.
The train to Villány and then to Pécs will drive in about three hours. Therefore, I looked for a nice spot to sit and enjoy the view on the Danube. I will come back again.
The train was a super small and old train. The conducteur was very helpful and could talk well in English. In general, there was usually at least one person with rather good English in the restaurants. I said „angolul“ and either they talked then in English or called another person to come. I had learnt some basic words on Duolingo. Here are a few: köszönöm/thank you, szia/hello or bye (almost like see ya), igen/yes, nem/no, bocsánat/I‘m sorry, elnézést/excuse me, szívesen/you are welcome. And some more, but first you will have to know how to pronunciate them, especially s/sz/zs/cs are rather counter-intuitive at the beginning.
Back to the people working at the railways: the conducteur was probably in his thirties and had a long curved mustache. On the ride to Villány, the barriers were closed and opened by hand. At several train stations came a person out of a building, well-dressed in a railroad employee uniform and always wearing the typical hat and the a plate with a green circle on one side to signalize that the train can start (although there was nowhere any other train). I had the feeling they like it and celebrate it a bit. Only the whistle was missing 😀 . The train was also very shaky. Everything felt like about 40 years ago (although I can‘t really say, since I wasn‘t born then yet 🙂 ).
I had only a few minutes to change to train in Pécs and I was already warned by the mustache conducteur, that the train to Pécs is usually too late. I assumed, he informed them on the other old train and they drove in full speed to Pécs and we were almost in time. I booked the tickets (as well for the bicycle) online at jegy.mav.hu, which was working great and were cheap. From Pécs was a direct train to Budapest-Kelenföld. Since I managed to catch that train, I booked now the direct Flixbus from Budapest to Zürich. There was no train connection for the next day with bicycle. I had 8 seats for myself and could already sleep by lying. Most probably, I can‘t sleep in the seats of the Flixbus (I could but not long).
Cycling during the night through Budapest turned out to be a lot easier than I thought. Always a separated path for the bicycle. I went to the Burger King to eat dinner and to shorten the three hours of waiting. At 01:50 I left Budapest with the bicycle attached at the back of the bus and arrived well at 16:00 in Zurich.
So fast plans may change.
