The concept of “share the road” has taken on a new twist.  Here in Romania, we have found ourselves occasionally sharing the road with horse drawn carts, not to mention speeding cars, big trucks, and decrepit bicycles carrying almost anything (computers, engine parts, multiple shovels).  On other parts of the trip we have had everything from solitude on bicycling paths  to  unusual fellow cyclists

Jim and I continue to attract a lot of attention with our recumbent bikes.  Yesterday a woman and her son came over to try to figure out our bikes.  When she finally got the gist of how they work, she said “super, super” (I think the only word she knows in English).  We have had drivers pull over to take our picture but hey, turnabout is fair play!

Since I last wrote we left Slovakia after a very brief visit  entering into Hungary.  Once again, Jim and I along with a couple of fellow riders made a wrong turn and ended up in Hungary before we were supposed to.  I know it probably seems that we fail to follow our directions quite frequently but following signage in languages that bear no resemblance to English

can be challenging.  Anyway, Liz, our fellow rider from Britain, Jim and I found ourselves taking the “long way round” to our destination.  Not only did it take us a while to navigate our way to our intended stop for the night, but it even took us a while to figure out what country we were in.

Thinking that we were still in Slovakia, we went into a grocery store to buy some water.  When we received change for our proffered Euros, we found that we got an unusual looking currency in return.  Out on the street Jim asked a woman who was passing by;  “What country is this”.  Needless to say a fairly confusing conversation ensued and the woman got a good laugh out of the fact that these crazy bicyclists didn’t even know what country they were traveling in!

Our next rest day was in Budapest.  What a beautiful city!  Jim and I hired a guide a did a walking tour learning about its history .

We visited the Jewish ghetto from WWII where we saw commemorative plaques to some of the Jews who were deported to the camps   .  Per our guide, 70% of Budapest was destroyed during WWII and rebuilding really didn’t start until after the Soviet era.  The view from Buda (the hilly side of the city) is spectacular.

We had a lovely dinner on the waterfront

before heading on our way to Romania.

We have had some really hot days of riding  since leaving Austria with a record-breaking heat wave in this part of Europe (lucky us).  Some of the landscape has been like the Great Plains (another corn field!) so the it has been a bit of a slog (we wanted to do this??).  The first part of Romania was more of the same but with enormous fields of drooping sunflowers (I understand how they feel).  Entering Romania we had our  first actual border crossing  (many of the other borders were not even identified–hence the Hungary story) but it went smoothly.  We are now entering into the mountainous regions  and finally had a cool ride this morning.   We have some daunting climbs ahead.   Wish us luck and strong legs.  Will keep you posted on whether or not we manage to ride these funny bikes over the pass to Vlad’s castle.  Here we come Transylvania.