Day 41- Majdanpek - 81 miles
After the ordeals of last night's dog fight around my tent, I didn't do a great job of hiding my anger when I was woken up to 6 guys standing laughing a few feet from my tent at 6am. They had rocked up to fish at the spot and obviously wanted to get out on the water before the heat set in. It seems to be a trend that humans somehow don't consider that inside a tent would be someone sleeping. Animals, on the other hand, seem to be acutely aware of me in there. I stormed out in my boxer shorts pretending to do something with the bike just so I could glare daggers in their direction. They got a message of some sort, maybe not what I was going for, but they did walk off.
I took a few moments on the riverside to take in the scenery before starting out on what I knew was going to be a long day. Ahead of me was a 2000ft uphill 'shortcut' then a mad dash to Romania via Bulgaria. A lot of elevation, 2 border crossings and the most miles of any single day so far, all coming off of the worst night of the trip so far. Hindsight is 20/20.
The climb was tough going for a couple of hours with long stretches of 10+% gradient and mosquitoes feasting on my back. Covered by trees the whole way, I didn't even have decent views to distract me, so I kept my headphones in and smashed through some podcasts to take my mind off the slog. Coming down the other side, I was treated to panoramic views of Romania and Bulgaria on the other side of the Danube. I really didn't have any idea what to expect of either of these countries and would be crossing into both by the end of the day.
The road from here was fast and hectic, so I kept putting off the break I know I needed as I just wanted to get it done. I reached the Bulgarian border around 2pm, cruised through and stopped at the first bench I found. Though I was only 10 minutes in, it was definitely a change of scenery with families of 8-10 people cruising down the pothole ridden roads in a horse-drawn carriage, staring at me like I'm the one who opted for a strange mode of transport. In the 30 minutes I was there eating I had 4 different kids from the local area come by to say hello, a lot friendlier than most of the adults I passed today.
I chose to take the direct road from Bregovo to Vidin where I'd then cross into Romania. With barely any cars on the road and most businesses I passed now boarded up, again I decided to push through fast so I'd have time to stock up at a supermarket and grab dinner before finding camp. Vidin felt like a major border city, a little rough round the edges and busy. I felt like I was getting looks from a lot of people and not in the usual fun way. Find dinner, buy groceries and get out of here. Google maps suggested a fast food spot as one of the highest rated restaurants in the city. I ordered 3 plates of food then Sat down to realise it was all served stone cold. At least the chicken was expertly cooked to medium rare.
On the final 5 miles to the Romanian border I noticed how long my shadow was - 7pm and the sun was setting. I wasn't too worried about the light at this point as I only had 8 miles to go to the wild camp spot that Andre had stayed at a few days before which shouldn't take any more than 40 minutes. The Romanian border crossing was not like any other I'd been to so far this trip. A semi-official looking chap came out of the adjacent police station and asked for my passport which I assumed was for my usual border check glance and stamp. He walked over to his mates, told a joke that I was definitely the butt of and they all looked over and laughed, to which I nervously laughed along, the unbreakable English defense. The policeman then walked back into the station and when he emerged 10 minutes later he had lost a passport and gained a pint. I asked and turned out they were changing shifts so I had to wait another 15 minutes before a different policeman came out and sent me on my way.
By this point it was now a full blown race against the sun. Every minute I looked back over my shoulder to see less and less of it peeping over the horizon, combined with the suddenly frantic drivers I was getting pretty nervous. Setting up camp in the dark is one thing, but trying to do this whilst also probably trespassing adds a lot of extra stress.
I got to what I thought was the spot right after sunset, pitched my tent, had a shower in the bushes and got inside. Right as it turned to absolute darkness I was jolted by the sound of 2 or 3 dogs near by. I went for a walk to check and realised that I was camped a lot closer to a farmhouse than I'd have liked, definitely close enough for dogs to be smelling and getting annoyed by me. It went on like this through most of the night and I started second guessing every little sound, thinking the farmer had let them out of the gate to check what was wrong. For the second night in a row I had a pretty crap sleep because of dogs, so need to be more careful about where I stay. On the bright side, this was the biggest ride of the trip so far which, considering I started with a big climb, was an achievement for sure.
Day 42 - Ciupercenii Noi - 84 miles
I woke up feeling frazzled and fragile from last night's broken sleep so rented a whole apartment for the evening in Corabia, only €12. Romania felt like another big step away from what I was used to, more so than Bulgaria. Following one straight road just north of the river I quickly got into a rhythm of passing through a small town, riding through 4 miles of nothing, then another small town and repeat. The towns felt quite chaotic with so many people walking around but seemingly doing nothing. I say this because I couldn't find any shops, or at least any with stocked shelves, the ATMs were all out of order and there was very little in the way of restaurants.
As I left maybe the third town, a guy riding a moped just in front of me slowed to almost a complete stop and then just as I pulled out to overtake he then accelerated away from me again. I realised he was staring at me in his mirror as he again slowed to nearly a complete stop, I tried to smile and wave but his face was cold. It went on like this 4 times until I realised we were coming up to the edge of town and there was now no one else around us. I felt like if I keep going then I'd be leaving the relative safety of other people as witness, so I pulled over and pretended to check my phone for directions. I did this for a few minutes whilst I watched Mr moped staring back at me in his mirror. Eventually he turned around and pulled into a house just past me. I figured this was as good a time as any and sprinted for the next 20 minutes past to get to the next town. Maybe I was just being paranoid but this had me looking over my shoulder all day.
The rest of the riding was really fun, flat roads with lots of interesting new sights. The horse-drawn carriage actually seems to be only just a little less popular than cars, kids attempting to race me on foot or holding out for high fives and I even saw a helicopter land for a wedding in the middle of a village. I should say the locals seemed just as shocked as I was about the last one.
The outskirts of Corabia were a stark reminder of their communist history, with huge factories that dwarfed any other building I'd seen in Romania so far, now left abandoned.
I checked into my 7th floor apartment after lugging the bike up the stairs and went for a walk into the center to find food. It was a really pleasant surprise compared to my initial impressions of the town and everything else I'd seen so far in Romania with a big open square in the middle filled with statues and gardens, quite hard to believe I was in the same country.
Day 43 - Corabia - 63 miles
Last night I'd text Andre to organise meeting up to travel together before we cross into Turkey. He was in Bucharest at this point, a full day riding East from Corabia. We agreed to both head south and converge at a town called Elena in 2 days to find a camp spot together. This was also the last major town we'd see before riding over the biggest mountain pass either of us had tackled so far.
I caught a ferry over the Danube to the Bulgarian town Nikopol. This was the end of my short stay in Romania and for me more importantly the end of my time following the Danube. I'd cycled along the river through 4 countries now and genuinely felt sad to be peeling off, as there was a strange comfort in the consistency of following the river for so long whilst facing so many ups and downs along the way.
I planned my ride through smaller towns along the valleys to avoid elevation and keep it moving quick. In all honesty it felt like a sigh of relief after a hectic few days in Romania to be riding through seemingly deserted towns. It was a shame not being able to collect waves from the elderly people sat in their front gardens, a staple of all of the other Balkans countries I'd crossed so far. For most of the day the only highlights were freaking out over a snake that turned out to be dead and finding a hammock in a public park.
10 miles before my target end point of Gradishte, I bumped into Fanny and Greg, a French couple cycling to Istanbul from their hometown. We rode together the rest of the way whilst trading the usual stories of the road until they peeled off to their hotel for the night.
I found a field connected to the local football pitch to set up camp. When I arrived it was completely deserted and stayed that way for the first hour until I decided I should shower. Thinking I was all alone I hung my water bladder on a wooden frame and stripped off. Mid scrub, I turned 180 to get the water on my back to see a middle aged lady had walked into the park with her dog. I could barely make out her face as she was at least 200 meters away, but I'm still sure we made eye contact as I'm standing there fully nude. I yelped and dashed to hide behind a wooden post slimmer than a lamppost. Hopefully she was far enough away to not make anything out, either way she swiftly turned and walked a different direction.
Aside from a couple of dirt biking teenagers doing laps for an hour, this was a surprisingly peaceful campsite. Even the chorus of dogs barking at each other was far enough away that I was able to ignore it for once.
Day 44 - Levski - 55 miles
The roads heading south were much nicer than the last few days, and a good test of the legs for what was coming over the horizon. I stuck to fairly major roads that strung together lots of little climbs throughout the day in an attempt to take the most direct route. With every summit I saw a little more of the Stara Planina mountains ahead dwarfing any peak i'd be riding over today. This was the first day where I really noticed my legs were coming into their own, 3500ft of climbing with 40kg of weight really didn't feel like an issue today and definitely gave a real confidence boost.
I made it to the proposed meeting point first and waited for Andre to arrive at a small pub whilst putting my new solar charger to use. Andre arrived after having cycled a lot further than me that day, where we shared a few pints and had a good catch up on how each of our journeys had been since meeting in Serbia a little over a week ago. Considering we'd only met the once before it felt like being reunited with an old mate. I'd scoped out a lakeside wild camping spot just outside of town shared by just a handful of fishermen dotted around the water. We had a well deserved swim, cooked our pasta and stayed up late to watch the sun set. Having company made wild camping feel that much safer and less intimidating, and this was probably the best sleep I'd had since Belgrade.
Day 45 - Elena - 69 miles
I woke up first and started packing down around 8:00, ate my breakfast, attempted to dry my soaking tent covered in dew and washed my clothes. I knew that Andre preferred to start riding a little later than me and was also faster on the bike so I set off first knowing that he'd catch me on the one road up into the mountains.
The climb took just over 2 hours of non-stop uphill to around 4000ft elevation snaking back and forth up the slopes. Again, I was chuffed with how well my legs managed it without stopping or needing to get out of the saddle. The only stops along the way were to take photos of the valleys either side of the road and to drown myself in insect repellent as I was getting feasted on the whole way up.
Andre caught up to me nearer the top and we rode the last of the ascent together. The last third of the climb took us through thick forrest and we both had dreams of emerging at the summit to see panoramic views of Bulgaria, but instead the road was sandwiched by overgrown bushes either side with just a loud power line poking it's head over the top. We didn't waste any time and started the race down hill. Rolling down a steep hill for close to 10 miles is as nice as it sounds. Easily cruising round the bends at 30+mph without ever having to pedal and only having to pull on the brakes when we caught up to some of the slower cars on the road.
We made it to Tvarditsa at the base of the mountain earlier than we expected and stopped to eat a full rotisserie chicken on the curb, surrounded by hungry wild dogs. Riding east we aimed for Sliven as our final big stop for the day, a major city around 30 miles away that we'd be able to resupply at before leaving town to find a spot to camp. We'd both expected this to be a fast and relaxing stretch on mostly flat roads but were instead met with the most brutal headwind that didn't let up the whole way. This 30 mile stretch should have taken us just over 2 hours but was instead closer to 4, the wind was so strong that you'd still lose speed whilst pedalling downhill.
At Sliven we split up as Andre wanted to find a post office and I was off to the supermarket. At a 4-way intersection of busy dual carriageways, I was waiting in the centre of the junction for my chance to turn left, crossing over the oncoming traffic that also had a green light. I heard a massive bang and was teleported forward a meter, it took me a good few seconds to realise I'd been hit by the car behind me. I turned around to see the widest eyes of a very elderly man just barely able to see over his steering wheel staring back at me. As I turned back to make sure I wasn't now in the line of oncoming traffic I felt another massive shunt forward and realised he'd hit me again. My back wheel wasn't turning now, this was potentially a trip ending mechanical issue or at least a massive delay. In hindsight I think that he had just panicked after the first hit, but in the moment I let my anger get the better of me. Slapping on the bonnet of his car I was shouting for him to follow me as I dragged my bike off the road. After another 10 seconds of sitting in the middle of the junction, he drove in my direction and then straight past me without stopping.
I took 10 minutes to check over the bike and thankfully was able to get it running smoothly again, it was only the mudguard that had gotten twisted round the wheel. The fact that this stranger had hit me twice and watched me drag my apparently broken bike off the road before driving off without saying a word really pushed me over the edge. I met Andre at the Lidl and we took 10 minutes to talk it all through before we rode out of town to find a camp spot. With everything that had gone on we were running late and pulled up to our lakeside spot with 20 minutes left of daylight that we needed to set up tents and cook dinner. By the time we finished our moonlit beers I was just about ready to laugh about the day, and even made time for a quick swim under the stars.
Day 46 - Sliven - 50 miles
We woke up to find a farmer outside our tents looking on curiously, he seemed friendly enough but still we thought best to get up and out as soon as possible. The first 9 miles to Yambol were quick. This would be the last major Bulgarian town we'd see before crossing into Turkey this afternoon and so again we were on the hunt for a post office (no luck yesterday). We found a post office the size of a hotel where Andre was finally able to buy some stamps and sat at a cafe for an hour whilst he wrote out his backlog of postcards that he'd been carrying since Serbia.
We stayed here people watching a little too long and had to put in a massive stint to catch up as we both wanted to cross into Turkey well before sunset as we didn't know what to expect of the border crossing. This was a very different Bulgaria to what we'd seen the last few days. On either side of the road the landscape was arid as far as I could see, essentially riding through a desert all afternoon with the odd burning pile of rubbish in the distance. The Turkish border was easier than we thought. We snuck to the front of the long queue and breezed through security before realising that I'd smuggled in a couple cans of beer and Andre had smuggled in his pepper spray.. both illegal (FAO the Turkish government, I should say that this is of course a joke).
We rode 8 miles from the border to get to the camp spot we found on the wild camping crowd sourcing app Park4night. In those 8 miles we were chased 3 times by dogs and had our first few few sightings of the infamous Kangal sheep dogs in the distance. Kangals are the stuff of nightmare for anyone planning a ride through Turkey, a giant breed that are trained to attack anything that gets in too close to their flock or too close to what they deem as their territory, including wolves and bears. I made the mistake of reading a lot of horror stories from other cyclists who'd been unlucky with Kangals in the past, so fair to say I was crapping myself. A real sign to be scared of these dogs is that even the locals tell you very straight that these animals are dangerous... and they often go on to tell you what will happen to you. For the second day in a row we pulled up to our camp spot just before sunset, set up our tents and got started on dinner. Just as we were tucking into our food I spotted a Kangal over Andre's shoulder staring at us. We both found our flip knives and Andre searched for his pepper spray as we nervously watched on silently. It walked off and came back 20 minutes later with a friend, this time they moved much closer and started barking. Again we waited them out and they left, it was too late for us to think about moving camp at this point so we jumped in our tents and hoped for the best.
Day 47 - LalapaÅŸa - 65 miles
In the night we'd heard sniffing round our tents and my tent guy rope was tugged at one point, some embarrassing texts were exchanged in the dead of night as we'd both silently cowered in our tents prepared for battle. Andre and I woke a lot earlier than the last few days. I think we were both waiting for just enough sunlight to be able to pack up and get out of there.
As we were collapsing our tents, four dogs appeared and circled our camp. They seemed more docile and curious than yesterday. As three of them explored our camp the much larger Kangal of the group stood staring straight at us not moving for at least 10 minutes with it's empty eyes and spike studded collar. I got a photo of the more curious 3 dogs as they flanked around us without spotting this more intimidating Kangal that was just to the right of my photo below, in hindsight it's probably good that I was unaware.
We had been planning to take a more rural and winding route to Istanbul up until now to avoid the notoriously dangerous road approach into the city from the south coast. After a dramatic 10 mile ride since the Turkish border we both agreed that we'd much more happily chance it with trucks on the motorway than spend the next 200 miles feeling as if we're being hunted on every small town road. I spun us up a new route riding almost exclusively on motorways from here on, so we just had a short stretch of rural farm lanes and smaller towns to get through before we met the new route.
Riding south towards Babaeski on the E87 made for a quick 15 miles covered in just under 45 minutes with tail winds the whole way and a full lane hard shoulder all to ourselves. As alien as it seems to anyone from the UK, riding on the hard shoulder of motorways is completely legal in Turkey.
This great progress came to a near stop as soon as we turned east and straight into a powerful headwind that didn't let up for a second for the rest of the day. We broke the riding up into small 6-10 miles chunks and loaded up on iced coffees and ice cream at every petrol station we passed the rest of the day. Andre and I took turns being the man on front eating wind but it was still overwhelming even when riding behind, often averaging between 6-8mph. I had to hide the stats on my cycling computer as it was getting too depressing. We still had a long way to go and our minds were now starting to turn to the looming challenge of finding another Turkish wild camping spot as the sun was getting low.
I'm not a spiritual person, but I've almost come to expect that when I'm at my lowest on these trips I seem to have the strangest chance encounters that seem almost scripted to keep the plot moving. In a petrol station eating my 4th Oreo ice cream sandwich of the day, I came outside to find a local cyclist checking out my bike. This was strange enough as no sane cyclist would have chosen to be riding in these conditions, let alone on this highway. Immediately he told us that we absolutely had to visit the Cyclopark in Lüleburgaz, the next major city about 10 miles along the road. We didn't quite understand what this place was but he said that they take in cycle tourists and give them free accommodation, result.
This last section was a real slog, both of us were low on energy and barely able to speak to each other. We pulled up to the Cyclopark which turned out to be a hell of a lot more than just a free bed, this was cycle tourist Mecca. The city council of Lüleburgaz run this huge centre that was more of a theme park for cycling to teach local children how to ride bikes for free on their simulation roads complete with bridges and imitation road junctions, as well as providing free maintenance for anyone with a bike and free accommodation for any foreign travellers passing through. The only stipulation was that you must act as an ambassador to cycling whilst you're there, taking time to talk to the local kids who idolised bike travellers.
There was a wall inside to write your name and put an 'x' on the world map next to your hometown (first from Milton Keynes) and free spare gear that other travellers had left to pay it forward if you needed. It actually made me quite emotional. Often I've felt really isolated on this trip and then after some of the hardest days of the trip yet, I'd arrived at a place that had been a safe haven to countless other cycle tourists riding east through Europe to Istanbul or further to Central Asia and beyond. It felt nice to be a part of a much bigger community of cyclists who'd probably had all the same struggles I had, but also managed to make it this far and keep going.
