Day 46 - Kovin to Golubac (48 miles)

Last night there was a thunderstorm while I was tucked up comfortably in my room and the forecast is for more of the same this afternoon. Unless I am lucky I expect to be caught out in bad weather today as I have elected to have breakfast here and for a later arrival at the village of Golubac.

I left just after 9am leaving me plenty of time to make twenty-five miles and a 1.30pm ferry even with some unsurfaced tracks. The first fourteen miles were exactly that, very much a repeat of yesterday with a mix of rough and then rougher surfaces and with some areas a little soft after last night's rain. The last few miles were mostly on tarmac where I could make good time although there was a surprise couple of miles across grass alongside a small tributary to reach Bela Crvka - a handful of houses and a couple of quiet restaurants by the river - and the ferry jetty, a flat gravel area on the river bank. I passed an hour having lunch in one of the restaurants and then waited for the ferry.

Beehives on Derelict Coach

If I continue to travel east on the north bank I enter Romania. Crossing to the south bank keeps me in Serbia a little longer with the Danube becoming the border between the two countries from this point. The ferry itself turned out to be a flat barge with a small tug attached alongside to guide it across the river, pivoting round to face the direction of travel on each crossing. The few cars and foot passengers disembarked, three cars and two cyclists went aboard and we started the slow one mile crossing.

Our destination was the small settlement of Ram, overlooked by the ruins of an old Ottoman fortress from the days when the Danube was the border between the Ottoman Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary. I left the ferry, cycled uphill out of the village and onto quiet country roads, more agriculture and lots of multicoloured, boxy beehives. The blue skies were clouding over, there was the feel of rain in the air and I still had twenty-four miles to go. I was pedalling with a purpose, trying to keep ahead of the bad weather I knew was coming.

As I pedalled I could see grey angry clouds off to the south and hear the occasional peel of thunder but it wasn’t until I was within ten miles of Golubac that I felt the first drops of rain and heard thunder overhead. Another five miles and the rain was steady, although not hard, and to the north lightning was flashing somewhere on the other side of the Danube followed by the thunder rolling across the sky towards me. The ghostly shapes of the big hills that line the Danube here loomed out of the cloud and rain that clung to them and I could see a grey and misty Golubac across the curve of the water in the distance, a smooth and flat cycle ride away, following the edge of the river.

I have been in Golubac an hour now and the rain is still beating against the window outside my accommodation, a tiny and drab self-contained apartment in this small riverside town. The forecast is for rain throughout the night and into tomorrow so it looks like I will get wet again when I head into the Iron Gates gorge, the start of which is just a little further along the route.