22 September Sremski Karlovski - Belgrad

Sunday is a good day for cycling without too many trucks. I wrestle me through the waste, glass, PET-bottles, sleeping drunks and new visitors for the last day of the wine festival. After asking some locals, I make it to Carlovci station over a very wet and bad dirt track. This is definitely not the Eurovelo 6. Via a very steep climb on a ‘Roman Road’ I make it to the village. 

For 6,5 kilometer, I used more than 1,5 hours! But the view down to the Danube is stunning.

 

On top, I stop under a plum tree. The last ones from this abundant summer are already fermenting a little. Not bad! In the summer anyone can survive here, because the fruits, nuts and vegetables are everywhere in the countryside. You see many people picking raspberries, rosehips, gathering walnuts and so on. I have also picked up many apples and peers from orchards or wild trees along the roads. This is something we have forgotten in The Netherlands. I remember that along a new street in Eindhoven, the municipality planted trees that gave purple plums. After many complaints from the residents – the plums were attracting wasps, were dirtying the parked cars and street - they were replaced by another kind of tree. Nobody came to the idea to harvest reap.

But then it’s just pushing the big blade and road hogging the kilometers. I eat lunch at Slankamen at the shore of the Danube after going down 12% descent hairpins. Well nourished these are a piece of cake by now. Many thumbs up I receive from car drivers and people along the road. The Serbs can really value sports, I have learned.

Scott, the New Zealander, has sent me an address of a very nice hostel, with the name ‘San Ars Hostel’. I find, 1,5 kilometer before the Sava river flows into the Dunav. It lies conveniently on a houseboat along the Eurovelo route. It’s beautiful, clean, spacey and well designed. I am going to stay here for the rest of the time in Belgrade. After a meal from fresh trout, parsley, garlic, and spinach in a cream sauce I crash.