It was drizzling when we awoke. We knew it would be as we had been spending a bit of time checking various meteorological forecasts last night. The next few days were not looking great, and in particular tomorrow was looking dismal.
We had capitulated between heading to Zagreb (capital of Croatia) or Maribor (Slovenia, near the Austrian border).
We decided on Maribor for a few reasons. Firstly, the route looked safer for bikes and secondly it lined up with Ljubljana and Trieste, with safe card options available.
We had a brilliant breakfast with lots of foods we had not seen or tried before.
It was very cool (8 degrees C) and lightly drizzling as we left Verazdin.
This village was about 10 km into our ride.
We were amazed by the art work on the egg.
This lovely lady ventured along with a lantern to place at the base of the statue. She told us a lengthy story in Slovakian about the lamp and statue, however not speaking Slovakian, we failed to understand one word.
We smiled. That seemed to suffice.
I think the countryside is often lovelier with rain. Most of our photos today have a rainy haze.
Upon closer inspection, that is a graveyard directly below the church, on a reasonable slope.
We bid Croatia farewell for a few days. In the photo below I am waiting my turn to handover my passport to Croatian border control.
You may recall that when we left Slovenia and entered Croatia yesterday that both border patrol men were devoid of a personality.
Today was different. I handed my passport through the window, the guy flicked it open and smiled and said “Australian!” I smiled and nodded. He then said laughing, “Do you have a kangaroo in your bag?”. I laughed and crossed my head. He wanted to know where we’d been, where we were headed.
As I rolled forward on my bike, it was ground hog day, as he asked Tony the same thing. 😂😂😂.
Some 100 metres ahead, we then went through the Slovakian checkpoint. No chatter but I got a smile.
Here we are then, back in Slovakia. It is such a pretty country.
We were on some really quiet roads now.
Lots of forest everywhere.
We came to a red light as the road was reduced to one lane. Looking back you can see a massive crane and an old castle like building. Not sure what was going on there.
We crossed the Drava River. It is quite shallow here, and you can still see the castle and crane, and Tony’s bike.
The view looking on the other side of the bridge.
As with many European countries, every village has at least one shrine.
We have been quite amazed at the stork nests. As we watched these two, I was convinced they we’re statues as they did not move.
However, the town air raid siren started its awful sound and scared the living daylights out of us, and the birds moved ever so slightly.
Another village shrine.
We had ridden through so many quiet villages. Neat as a pin, and all had a penchant for growing grapes. This is a typical size and structure.
Cutting through farmland I realised I had not seen any canola today!
We then crossed a dam over the Drava, that retained most water in a large lake, and streamed into a feeder canal.
We rode around the lake…
Crossed over this bridge.
We arrived at the very scenic town of Ptuj. We decided to have lunch here at a riverside restaurant.
A fantastic meal of mushroom soup and entree sized beef stew. Just the thing to warm you up on a cold day, as the temperature had not yet reached 10 degrees.
On the outskirts of Pjut was this highly decorated church. The white is not paint, but a plaster like product.
The next 20 km was like this. Pure magic.
We had a couple of short steep pinches. 19 degrees pulled me up though…bit tough with the gear on the bike. 14-15 percent with gear is my maximum, for a short pinch.
So here we are now looking over the river at the old town section of Maribor.
We choofed off to the railway station as we made the decision during lunch (again studying the meteorological reports and weather warnings) to not ride tomorrow and play it safe.
We will train the 120 km section to Ljubljana. However, we could not buy a ticket! Only one train per day allows bikes! Tickets are purchased ready for the 11.45 express service tomorrow.
We are staying in a very trendy apartment in the Old Town. Our bikes are with us (cleaned them up first) on the balcony. Very nifty electrically louvres to open or shut. They are shut to keep our bikes dry.
We had a brilliant dinner. Dogs are allowed in this restaurant. The table opposite has a little pooch taking up a seat. It was an incredibly pampered dog! You can just see the little dog in the photo and on the floor is its pink water bowl.
A brief walk around town after our meal….brief because it was really cold and I am wearing dress…bare legs…brrrrr.
Our route today.
Today was what I love best about cycle touring. The scenery was magnificent, the roads quiet (except the very slow crawl with start and finish towns), lots of laughs and soaking in the countryside ambience.
A shorter ride of 80 km was welcomed after 320 km in the previous two days.
Until tomorrow, thankyou for reading.
Ooroo 😊💪🚴
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Then at the other end of town was this junk shop where you can buy your own stork or other ‘ornaments’ for your garden. Do they leave this crap, oops….I mean do they leave this ‘stock’ out overnight? I guess they do, seriously, who would steal it?
Finally we reconnected with the Danube river. Here is one of a series of war memorials along this particular stretch.
The border between Slovakia and Hungary is in the middle of the river, so the other side is Hungary.
We were back onto the bike path when it started to rain again! We had cleaned our bikes some 50 km earlier when we stopped at a service station. However, this rain provided a further clean. We deliberately rode through larger clean puddles for a ‘rinse’.
Finally we got to cross the Danube and take some photos. We had been able to see the Basilica for some time in the hazy distance. We were pretty impressed standing on the border of two countries and gazing in wonderment.
Our accomodation is only few hundred metres from the Basilica. Our bikes are stored in the courtyard downstairs somewhat dirty but heaps better than earlier in the day.
After showering and doing our laundry we started walking.
The old castle was closed, and is located adjacent to the Basilica. This photo was taken looking in from one of the gates.
A pretty impressive entrance gate to the basilica, although I note from the Roman numerals, it is not ‘that’ old, with the 1874 date.
Through the arch is this building.
Then up to the very top of the hill is the Esztergom Basilica, otherwise known as the Cathedral of Our Lady Assumption and Saint Adalbert.
The photo below shows the (netted) dome, the Sanctuary and High Alterpiece. The High Alterpiece is the largest in the world painted on a single piece of canvas (13.5 x 6.6 metres). The work is of Michelangelo Grigoletti, based on Titian’s well known work, The Assumption, which can be seen in Venice.
The organ was first played here in 1856 in the presence of the famous Hungarian composer Ferenc Liszt. Renovation works commenced in the 1970s and are continuing.
Tony captured some great shots overlooking the Danube, Esztergom and Slovakia.
Walking back down the hill is this statue near the castle.
yakkablog 