26.06.2016
Yesterday’s tail wind turned into today’s side and head wind. At times we even had to pedal down hill to keep going. So progress was slow. More hills, not as high, but with the head wind, hard work.
Diana began to consider sewing all our clothing together to make a sail and try tacking down the road! However sensible Simon pointed out the other traffic might present problems.
There were extensive fields of sunflowers, which were lovely to see.
Our destination for today was to be Saray, but we were passing through another town about 15km away , Vize, when there was a loud BANG, CRACK. On checking the cause of this, we found the rim on the back wheel had split. Thank goodness we were not going at any speed and were in a town.
We unloaded and moved to the pavement to consider what to do. Thankfully the first person Simon asked if he spoke English and where there was a bike shop was able to assist. Off they went with the damaged wheel. But came back with the verdict it was beyond repair.
SO, the tandem was dismantled and put in its bags. Everything loaded into a taxi and we were taken to a local hotel.
Here we have booked a coach to Istanbul and our accommodation. Once again we have contacted our trusty tandem shop in Yorkshire to discuss what to do about that wheel.
So close, yet so far ………Istanbul is just 120Km away….
Kirklareli to Vize: 34 miles
Distance travelled so far: 2786 miles….
25/6/16
Our road to Malko Tarnova, although a primary route, had little traffic and the surface was good – and although we were beginning to climb into the hills the gradients were modest.
We also visited Nessebur, the old town near Sunny Beach, which pre-dated the tourist development.
A school group visiting at the same time had a fine time trying out the array of cow / goat bells.
We cycled along a new cycle path to the end of a long and narrow isthmus. Here the sand was black and we watched several kite surfers whipping along and jumping into the air. Fun to watch.
It was once the centre of a large city. Over the centuries it had been destroyed during conflict, then rebuilt several times. It was razed to the ground by the Crusaders and then not used for a few hundred years until rebuilt by the Ottomans in the 17th century.
In a reconstruction of a bath house, there was an interesting multimedia show, projected onto the ceiling, telling the story it’s history. Legend has it there were 3 beautiful nymphs that looked after the springs. But they fell in love and were turned to stone by the gods because they were no longer looking after the healing springs.
Burgas is lovely, but we really want to be moving on!
The road to the coast was quite busy and a dual carriageway to boot, so we were glad that it was a relatively short distance to Burgas. We spied a cycle path once we got into the built up area, so we took the opportunity to join it, only to discover that it was like one or two british cyclepaths in that it suddenly stopped and dumped you into the road again, without the benefit of a dropped kerb.
After a refreshing drink at one of the bars in the “Sea Park” we met up with our hosts and settled in to our temporary home.
This next stage essentially followed a river valley through steep hills, the road being mostly level with small ups and downs gradually gaining height as we went up the river valley .
The surface of the road on our way wasn’t brilliant, but with lots of twists and turns, it kept the speed of traffic down. The scenery was very attractive, and we were thankful we were following a watercourse between the hills.
After a very pleasant stay in the family hotel we found in Razgrad we loaded up and set off on a hot and sunny morning. Just down the road we were interested to see our first minaret attached to a small mosque… indicating a muslim presence in the town. The mosque had a very pretty garden beside with its usual washing area for those coming to pray.
Our route out of town was along a newly painted narrow cycle path beside the dual carriageway…. which suddenly stopped with no dropped kerb to the carriageway… we then rejoined the E70 road we were travelling the day before. Decent surface, wide road and not too much traffic, although what there was went fast.
Our ‘banana and water’ stop was at a picnic area beside the road with a nice little seating area under cover from the sun. We took the opportunity to call our friends at JD Tandems in Yorkshire to confirm and pay for our order of our Schwalbe Super Marathon tyres to be sent to where we will be staying in Burgas on the Black Sea coast.
Beside the little shelter there were a couple of workmen cutting the long grass and clearing away rubbish. The fellow using his scythe to cut the grass said (by sign language) driving a car from UK was much better!
We managed to find accommodation through Booking.com at a small village called Nevsha. The map showed a small road leading from the main road to the village, but on arriving at said road it turned out to be an overgrown grassy track…. further consultation with the map indicated a similar “white” road about 3km further on, so keeping our fingers crossed we pedalled on up yet another hill to get to it.
We packed our tent up from the lawn of the “English Guest House” in Ruse where we had been staying, taking advantage of the warm and mostly sunny morning to dry the fabric after last night’s torrential rain. We said our goodbyes to Magdelaine and hotel manager, Vaselska both of whom had been very kind and helpful during our stay.
Our route out of Ruse unexpectedly was along a cycle path – a rarity in these parts. It helped us negotiate the busy route out of town avoiding the heavy, fast traffic on the wide main road.
A visit to the tourist information alerted us to some sand sculptures by the river. So we pedaled down to have a look.
We were almost back in Ruse with some rain when the heavens opened, so we sheltered and just watched the rain as the thunder and lightning flashed and crashed around us.