Around the world in ...., emmm, a canoe?: August 2013

So I thought I'd shock everyone by updating more than once this month and here it is! We left our friends in Baka Palanka with very full stomachs and a bag of delicious home made krapfen (like jam donuts) to keep us paddling. We paddled hard every day after into strong head winds but still managed between 30 and 40km a day. This has definitely been the toughest stretch so far, simply because of the worsening weather. Passing through Novi sad was pretty manic as we realized a big storm was building behind us. Knu looked more like a speedboat as we hauled ass to get the few km through the city and onto a safe beach to let it pass. Things have quietened since then and we now know exactly what to expect, with the rain arriving every evening like clockwork! In general its not that bad, and after a few days in a warm dry bed (our first since Vienna, and only 2nd in 2months!) we're already looking forward to getting back out into it. The main thing is now we're really hoping to hitch a ride on a barge, so we're gonna go hang out at the petrol station for the barges which is just outside the city. We even made a few new friends, mostly artists and musicians, who've taken over a disused building near that petrol station and turned it into work studios and apartments. Its incredible, this place has everything (it even has wifi!!). Hopefully there'll be a barge along soon. Otherwise we're gonna paddle on the few hundred km til the first of two huge dams, called djerdab 1 & 2, and hope to get picked up there. All we can do is keep our fingers crossed! Oh, and we've got a nice fresh bottle of Jameson to try and sweeten the deal! So, we're off now to get ready.

Colin & Andrea

: )

ps. A huge congratulations to Granty and Niall on their weddings and to Sylvia and Matthias on the birth of their beautiful baby girl, Melina : )

We needed flags for the boat in Serbia, so Jordan gave us his Serbian one and we got the other from and Irish bar!

Delicious fish paprikash

Our happy bakers!

Shika, (el bandito). It was his place we were hangin out in.

A very happy Andrea

No danger of going hungry with these guys around

When we got back after our feast, dja dja had this ready for us!!

This little fella got away with our bread and salami. We were too full to catch him, or care

Shica's house. He stayed during the floods and could fish from his bedroom! The water was at the top of the yellow sign

Back for more, this time meat paprikash

Delicious : )

We travelled on for a bit with Max who was travelling slowly from the Serbian border to Belgrade!

This place was stunning. There was an eagle sitting about 150m away tearing apart an unlucky bird!!

Chilling out by a nice cosy fire : )

Tasty breaky after Novisad

The Serbians dont try and cage the danube, they know it floods and so use the flood plain for grazing. Seems sensible enough!!

The Serbian flag on the mast, Irish one is down for the night

At least the bad weather made for a pretty sunset

In Belgrade

Happily scribbling away

We're alive!! Just in case people were starting to wonder! It' been nearly an incredible month since our last post that's taken us from the hills of Austria, and into the perfect sandy beaches that stretch endlessly through Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia and now, Serbia. Lots to say, so lets pick up from where we left off, Vienna. We came back to find Knu happy and healthy exactly where we left him, and since it was already late in the evening we paddled just across the river where sandy beaches line the bank and had a perfect view of Vienna all lit up as the sun set. The current in this stretch of the river is incredibly strong so we had two days of very easy paddling and drifting to carry us the 70km to our next capital city, Bratislava. So far we had had beautiful weather the whole way, mid to high 30's, sun shining and not a single drop of rain, but here the heat wave really hit. We headed into the city where it was 45C!!! Knowing the importance of staying hydrated, I packed our rucksack with beer and we headed off for a snails pace walking tour of the city, which took all the sights that could be reached while walking in the shade. If it was in the sun, it could wait. Beer in hand we slogged our way up to the fortress to get a perfect view over the city. Headed off after two days off enjoying the city and into a ~100km undeveloped stretch of the old Danube, where we'd a nice break from the big ships and any sign of modern life. Picked up the pace a bit get cover the 220km to Budapest and one of the biggest festivals in Europe, Sziget. We landed in the perfect camp ground (which even had a pool!) in Budapest and stayed there for a week, relaxing and discovering the city. After checking out the program for Sziget, which goes on for a week, we decided to get tickets for the Thursday, which had Regina Specktor on in the early evening and was headlined by an amazing Spanish band Ska-P. We danced and crowd surfed the night away in an unbelievable atmosphere. Headed off from Budapest in very heavy winds, which were right at our back, so we basically flew through the city. That gave us the idea of making a sail so we stopped, chopped up a tarp, found a decent looking stick for a mast and tied it all together. Not suprisingly, the minute we did this the wind died, but a few days later it was back and we sailed 30km!!! Now we use it if there's a half decent wind to take a break from the paddling. Had great fun at the border between Hungary and Serbia, where we were helped to fill out all the forms for going to the black sea and I got officially declared Captain of Knu!!!! : ) We werent long in Serbia when we got invited onto a catamaran for an early morning schnapps, and as tends to happen, one led to another and all of a sudden we were camping with the serbs working our way through local beer, homemade schnapps, sausage and the local speciality, Paprikas...like goulash but with fish... We earned out keep by pulling in 5 fish ourselves and we headed off the next day to bump straight into the next bunch of incredibly friendly serbians, and so today were heading off after being fattened like geese for the last 3 days. We even got handed a live catfish on the beach one morning by a very friendly fisherman who we'd never met but who just wanted to come over and say Hi. At this stage we've had enough fish for a lifetime and are looking forward to a break! We've been on the river now nearly 2 months, enjoying all the sights along the way, but now we have to hurry a little! All the locals tell us it wont be that warm anymore at the end of September so we have to cover the next 1300km or so a little quicker than the last 1300! We'll try our best to keep in touch and keep the blog updated! Colin and Andrea : )