A decent sleep, and then back to where we got off the ferry at Stara Palanka. Today, the route takes us alongside what appears to be a canal and we are on a raised bank alongside it. Sounds like a good scheme. Unfortunately there is no path and we have to rough our cycles through the grass it’s hard going for quite some way. Once we get off the rough ground and back onto the road we make really good time are we heading to Dubovac where Passepartout has prepared us a lovely breakfast the day is starting well. Next we are onto some rough ground again and it’s really hard work another 6 miles or so and we managed to get back on the road we make good time and get to a lovely little time on the riverbank, Pancevo. This is a terrific little place with a very modern well-laid cycle path, which passes some river restaurants created on barges in the river. We are looking forward to getting into Belgrade at an early hour and having a look around the city. The best laid plans. We come upon quite a major road and the cycle route takes us off it onto another green bank alongside the river. This is very nice and a wildlife oasis near to the city. However it is a nightmare to get a road bike over. There is about 10 K of this and we make really slow time our hopes of an early finish and look around the city slowly evaporate. We finally come off the green path and make a passage over the oldest and most rusty bridge, we have seen for a long time. At long last we arrive in the city where we have booked some apartment rooms. We meet up with a van, but of course there’s nowhere to park it, but we are very tired by now so we just dump the van on the street and hope for the best. We get a decent shower and just have time to walk through the square and find a great restaurant to eat. Belgrade is a very cosmopolitan town and we feel we are leaving rustic Eastern Europe and heading towards a more western society. Unfortunately, as we are in a city. The road restrictions for parking start at 0700 so we have to get up and be underway by then. We manage it. It’s the first day on the trip that I have actually awoken to my alarm I’m not been awake earlier.
Riding through the city early in the morning on a sunny day is actually pleasant experience. We cycle around the fortress and have great views as we head out of town. It is the first time I have ever been in a cycles only lift!
We pass some great river areas there, a restaurant barges there a nightclub barges and we pass some lovely areas full of recreation and restaurant places. We meet up with the van in a shopping area and have some breakfast and coffee. We are 15 km into the ride already and it’s only 8 o’clock. There is a different feel to the countryside now. We pass by a a small ridge overlooking the Danube. Some really nice houses have been built there with a great view and they look quite plush. When we stop for lunch, there is a local farmer selling strawberries. They look delicious and we buy some – they are. We set off after lunch and 4 kms along we hit the 1,000kms marker! One quarter of the challenge done!
The rest of the day is fairly uneventful and we make really good time with a good tailwind. There is quite a climb about 5 miles or so outside of our finish but a magnificent downhill dash the other side. We now find ourselves in wine country, and we pass through small town called Sremski Karlovci. It is a very pretty place. There are lots of local tourists around. We also note that there are plenty of wine caves, offering tastings. Had we not been cycling we would have loved to have sampled some of those wares. After that, we just had to negotiate some busy local roads which included some trucks that came very close to us, and a long Bendy bus driver, who seem to have a dislike of cyclists and did his best to run us off of the road. All of a sudden we arrive at our destination Novi Sad. We then just have to negotiate the city which is very modern and has lots of cycle paths. It is the second biggest city in Serbia and it’s very cosmopolitan. It even has several bicycle shops where we take our battered bikes to get fixed and serviced. It was quite sobering to discover as we crossed the main bridge into the city that there was a memorial plaque there. It marked the occasion in 1999 when allied aircraft from NATO destroyed the bridges and other infrastructure during the Balkans conflict. There were some fighter aircraft flying overhead off and on during the day to remind us that conflict is never far away. Just time then to get to the apartment we have rented and for the van and driver to head off to a decent campsite to give them some rest too. It’s fun to look around the city which is very modern and enjoyable. We take a beer in a renovated railway car in the city centre. Tomorrow is a rest day!
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