“SANDY TRAILS”
Part 2
The third riding day, which led me and my black beauty through Hungarys Puszta Plain, was a great one! Perfect weather, changing trail conditions and interesting things aside the route, made this day a great day of dual-sport-riding. Here is the second part of this days ride report …
With the picture below the first part of this day ride report ended. If you haven’t had a closer look to it already, it would be a good moment to start first with: Part One, before continuing with this part.
Part two, here we go!
I used the time during the break at this junction for drinking a lot of water. The rain last night caused very muggy weather. Because of that I was sweating a lot. A few minutes later Чернотa and I rode on. We crossed an area …
which was for sure kind of…
a steppe land. Under a thin grass cover was sand everywhere. I tried to avoid making any damage to this sensitive ecosystem and followed the existing single tracks through it. Directly at …
the route of the Trans Euro Trail, we found this old rails of a small railway. No idea what was the reason for building these rails in the middle of nowhere. The …
weather was partly cloudy and perfect for …
riding along such …
highspeed sand trails. It seemed, …
that Чернотa wasn’t the only “pony” which followed the TET ^^. After …
a higly needed potty break, whilst inspecting the chain, I recognized an uncommon fruit jammed between the bash plate and the footrest. It looked like a cucumber.^^
In the afternoon …
it was time to leave the track, for getting some food supplies. Now we had been somewhere, near Hungarys capital Budapest. The track surface …
changed again from …
mud, to hilly …
single tracks, and …
compacted, dry…
soil tracks.
In the east of Budapest is this abandoned monument located. I tryed to find some information about it but wasn’t able to get something proper, because the Hungarian language is a real barrier, despite the all mighty google search and google translator!
I took the opportunity …
for enjoying the view, whilst having two greasy pieces of cold pizza. *mhmm*
A bit further north, the TET route ended within a corn field. The farmer has over-plown and over-planted the existing track, so there was no chance for me to get through this stiff corn-stalks, without damaging the bike. But I found a detour: …
Just a few hundret meters back, there was an old abandoned military base. It was obvious that this base was out of order. So I used a huge hole in the fence for having a closer look at it. My curiosity was rewarded with the finding of an old …
missile silo. Silos like this have been used back in Cold War for hiding mobile atomic missiles. According to a short web search the USSR had stationed close to 200 pieces of nuclear weapons in bunkers like this in Hungary till its fall in 1989. Wow, what a number!
We rode on …
and found this knee protector in the middle of nowhere. Surely another TET-Rider lost it. Hopefully he/she just lost it and didn’t got hurt in an accident.
I stopped for a moment at this steel structure. May an antenna? I don’t know.
I continued the ride, which …
had some nice …
steep and sandy hills to offer.
The …
cloud-play was astounding at this day. We …
rode through one last …
village before …
we started with climbing this hill range in Hungarys northern part. Soil tracks …
changed to …
washed out gravel tracks …
and at least …
only rare used …
forest trails have been left over. I haven’t made a picture of a very tricky and clutch torturing section, short before the last two pictures:
The slope there was challenging with the fully loaded 690ty and the single track, which we followed, was overgrown with tall grass. The grass has hidden soccer ball sized rocks. It wasn’t easy to keep the necessary speed upwards the hill, whilst I was trying to avoid hitting the arm-fatiguing hidden rocks. But finally Чернотa and I made it. The …
last few km up to the top …
of the hill range, have been easy to ride. I enjoyed the great view over Hungarys eastern plains from up there.
After a few miles, whilst riding through the forest, a bee stung me in my left upper arm. Somehow it was able to enter into my jacket. I stopped to remove it and had a look at the wound. It got swollen a bit in the area of my upper arm and as I knew from a few stings before, I’m a lucky bastard and not heavy allergic to such stings.
We followed the Trans-Euro-Trail northwards and I stopped at this …
little old/closed accommodation. It was marked from the responsible TET-Linesmen as a little side trip along the TET-route. Because it was a nice place, I built up …
the tent. Just while making this picture I heard a distant engine noise coming closer.
A Jeep showed up and stopped at the property. Like always in such situations on foreign property, I had first a bad feeling. A forest ranger and his wife went out of the car. I greeted them friendly and vice versa, they also have been friendly to me.
They asked me what I was doing there. I explained them, that I intended to stay there for the night and will leave early in the morning. After a few further friendly words they allowed me to do so. For free!!!
The couple started to carry some fire wood out of the back of their car. Because it was a huge amount of firewood I begann helping them to unload. While doing this I asked them why they need so much wood.
They told me, that their son was celebrating his birthday at the incoming weekend up here with his friends. So the plan was to put a huge pot onto the fire for cooking a classy Hungarian Goulash, what would take nearly the whole day and a huge amount of wood. That sounded great!
They also showed me the accommodation building from inside and gave me an internet address of this nice and spare tourist accommodation –> CLICK.
When all the wood was stowed, we wished farewell and the nice forest ranger and his wife went off.
Now it was time …
for a neat meal. I love it to have aside my snacks a can of liquid gold. Stuffed with 300 grams of smoked meat and the equal amount of cheese, it was time to have …
a wash at the sink behind the buildings. Despite the cold mountain water it was a real pleasure after three days of sweat, mud, sand and dirt … .
After that I was ready for the sleeping bag … .
Total distance on this day of riding: 410 km or 250 mi