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| Janet and Bernard up by the dome of the Basilica |
The following day the weather looked pretty good, so we took our friends, Janet and Bernard to Esztergom for a day trip. As we are all over 65 we travelled free on the train and managed to catch a bus all the way to the Basilica, so that we didn't have to walk the well over a mile that is the distance between the two. The last time I was in Esztergom I went geocaching there on my own and then ended up walking about 10 kilometres between all the caches.
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| One of the Basilica's bells |
We have never done the full tour of the Basilica before, so this was something new to us too. We started with the crypt, then went inside, followed by a visit to the Treasury, after which Roy left us. He has vertigo and walking all the way up to the height of just under the dome of the Basilica would have left him completely petrified. Our guests who are 79 and 83 made it with no effort, much to the amazement of most people around them. The views from the top were fantastic and on our way down we also had a look at the bells in one of the lower towers.
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| Bernard on the little Skanzen train |
Once reunited with Roy, we walked about a bit, I also showed Bernard the geocache by the Basilica, which he thought was great. We slowly walked back to the bus stop, caught it back to the station and managed to catch one of the trains back to town within 15 minutes. In the evening we went for dinner at our absolute favourite place, called Regős, where all four of us had a really lovely time, good food and excellent service.
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| A lovely group of palóc houses in the Skanzen |
On Friday we decided to have a day out, followed by travel down to the village directly from our outing. This was a fascinating, if somewhat boiling hot day yet again. We visited the Szentendre Skanzen, which has grown tremendously in the last few years, so we used the train trip to the other end of it and walked back slowly, looking at things en route. Often on previous visits, we got so tired long before the far end that we never got over there to have a look.
This time we had a really good time at the NE section, which - of course - is the region where Bér is. The style of hipped roofed thatched cottages were very pretty. Unfortunately just before we went there was a massive storm over the Skanzen and some houses had much damage in their roof and other outside parts, like corners of adobe walls and at the bottom. Still, it was quite pretty all in all with helpful attendants answering most of our questions.
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| The Skanzen windmill |
We visited the painted church, which we always do, then walked to the reconstructed country inn for lunch. That was a well earned rest, after which we took in a few more regions before we have all run out of energy to walk any further. The bakery provided us with some strudel and further bottles of water, before returning to the car.
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| Roy, Janet and Bernard on the ferry boat |
The trip to Bér was quite exciting this time as we turned North, away from BP, then crossed a short bridge to the main island in the river, followed by a short ferry trip across it to Vác. Once disembarked, we made our way across quite pretty, hilly country to Bér at our leisure. Remembering how awful the weather was when Janet and Bernard last visited us 7 years ago, we were hoping that it should be better this time. Well, the weather forecast didn't bring any cheer, as after all those beautiful sunny hot days, there was a likelyhood of rain for the weekend.
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| Bernard, Feri, Anna, me Janet and Roy at the Mill |
Saturday unfortunately proved the forecast absolutely correct with pouring rain in the morning and a likelyhood of it continuing all day. Around lunch time there was a small let-up, but we decided to take the car to the Mill for lunch, just in case in started raining hard. The Mill, the sweetness of the owners, especially Anna, the environment and the food all made for a very pleasant meal. We all concluded that Bernard had got smitten with our hostess, so we promised him a return the following day.
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| Janet and Bernard striding out in the forest |
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| The Mill complex |
This exciting expedition was followed by yet another lunch at the Mill, which was equally delightful and delicious as the one the day before. Anna came over to chat to us often and we managed to get a group photo taken of all of us, the first one ever. It was a delightful visit and our belief in Bernard's regard for Anna was further confirmed.
Monday dawned with glorious sunshine and not a whiff of rain, so it was a bit annoying that we were returning to town. Still, we promised Janet and Bernard a nice restaurant visit en route for lunch, which was just as good as we remembered it. Funnily enough, we haven't been for a while, as the last time we were there we noticed a deterioration in the quality of service. Thankfully, the food has stayed excellent, so we had a delicious lunch, but the service not having improved we decided not to return in the future.
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| Part of the Buda Hills with the Children's Railway route |
On Tuesday Janet and Bernard have gone out on their own, after I have planned a route for them, including a ride on the cogwheel railway up into the Buda Hills, another ride on the Children's Railway, a visit to a lovely old look-out tower on the top of János Hill and a return on a couple of trams. I provided them with the names of the places, the numbers of the transport routes and a hiking map, and apparently they had a fantastic time and didn't get lost once.
The farewell dinner was at Bernard's invitation and we chose a really lovely, old fashioned XIXth century restaurant in Old Buda, not far from the river. This is one of the posher places in BP, but even here (and including my pike-perch) the average per person did not go above £15. As everybody wanted to drink alcohol, this time we used public transport, which worked out brilliantly.
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| Keleti Station |
After Janet and Bernard's departure we had less than two days to sort a few things in town and then get prepared for our long weekend by Lake Balaton with friends. I also had to pick up three replacement cache boxes from someone, so that I can exchange the box, should I find a neglected and/or damaged one while caching. This was all done, the present bought for our host, arrangements made with Zsuzsi and Koxi for travel and then something very exciting happened. My friend Klári put on FB the picture of a glorious blossom that appeared on one of her cacti. I said I wanted one, which was only meant in jest, but she then appeared with one that had a bud ready to burst out in a few days. The problem was only that we were travelling within a day, so I was in danger of not seeing the bloom, because they open up one evening and they die by the next day. So a hard, but responsible decision was taken that the cactus had to come with us. It did, but its fate will be revealed later!
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| The old stove in Pityu's house |
The friend, Pityu whose house we were heading for is an amazing person, although I don't yet know him very well. We met last October when he offered his house as a venue for the 60th birthday celebrations of a mutual friend of ours. I have seen him only once since, when he came visiting us in Bér last month and he did seem very, very nice. Well, there is no word to describe Pityu's niceness. He is the most indulgent host you could ever meet. He never mentioned that he would feed and water us all weekend, without stop and to such an extent that we are now all on a slimming diet to get back into our clothes. He has already invited us to visit him again in October, but I'm sure I will take a lot of ingredients for cooking, as it isn't fair that he should pay for everything and do all the work. But about this later! First for the program that we had from Friday morning until Monday morning.
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| Pityu, Zsuzsi, Koxi and Roy at the "Sea of Stones |
Even Roy came with us in the heat and it was absolutely magical around the stones. There is a pile of stones where two big flat ones on the top wobble if enough people start jumping up and down on them, but we didn't manage it. Roy wouldn't climb up and the rest of us were not heavy enough. We also saw what are called "bird baths", which are little puddles that form in the indentations in the stone. Pityu found me the cache and we moved on happily to the next one, which was on top of a nearby mountain.
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| Me, Koxi, Pityu and Zsuzsi on the wobbly rock |
We originally wanted to leave both cars at the other end of Mindszentkálla, so that Roy could have a comfortable, shady place to wait for us where he might even get a drink. Then we realised that we could take Pityu's car further, so that we have less distance to walk. This seemed an ideal arrangement, except that we missed the place where we could park and reach the top of the mountain quite quickly. Nowadays they must give the job of making and placing signs for walkers to absolute idiots who have never been on a hike in their lives. It was 20cm from the ground, the letters on it were tiny and just to make it a bit challenging, it was behind a big bush. As we were in the car at the time of passing this, no wonder that we missed it. We parked only about 100 yards further on by a spring and a roadside cross and then got going in the other direction. Consequently we covered a lot more ground, but finally made it to the top. The cache turned up quite easily and the view from the top of the look-out tower was heavenly. On our return we ate our sandwiches and had a drink at the bar where we met a really lovely dog who was after Roy's sandwiches. He did feed him bits, but we loved the dog too as he was such a darling.
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| Zsuzsi, Pityu and Koxi on the Fekete Hegy look-out tower |
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| The lovely golden retriever in the pub |
Dinner was taken in a very good mood, especially that Pityu's daughter with partner and his daughter have also turned up. A lot of food and drink was consumed and some crazy people were up until about 1am playing bridge. I went to bed quite early, so that I could be up at 6am to attempt the third cache again. In the meantime I was watching the cactus, as my friend said that unless you keep an eye on it, it might come out into blossom and be gone by the following morning. It looked as if it was growing, but no sign of the flower yet.
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| Some of the 277 steps to the top of Bald Mountain |
On Saturday morning Ági and I got going about 6.10am and once there, it was so obvious where we went wrong. As the cache was called 277 steps, all we had to do is find a path which then ended up in the 277 steps to the top. It was a bit strenuous, but it didn't take us too long and the views from the top were yet again breathtaking. It was practically 360 degrees all round with views of the lake as well as villages and mountains everywhere. We came back down on the path which went parallel with the wrong one and at one point we could see through a garden the other one, but, of course, the day before we couldn't cross there due to it being private land.
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| Muggins on the top of Bald Mountain |
Once back at Pityu's a lovely breakfast awaited us in the form of some bread dough baked in an outdoor oven, which then you could put grated cheese, sour cream and garlic on. Yum, yum!! Unfortunately it wasn't too easy to get everbody motivated, so it was quite late when we finally got going. On top of this misfortune, we also had the TomTom throwing a hissy fit, so it was about midday when we set out on our hike to a monastery ruin deep in the forest up another mountain. Now, you would think after this everything went well. No such luck!! We came across some very faint markings on trees and followed them, as the hiking map had also marked the path that way. After about a good half hour going round in circles in a complete jungle we gave up and went back to the main path.
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| Breakfast on the terrace |
The rest of the route was quite simple, I have no idea why I left the main path. Perhaps my British trust in maps made me go off the well trodden trail, after all that is where the path was marked on the map. No such trust any more, at least not in these parts, that's for sure! The monastery ruins were underneath a 6ft high forest of stinging nettles. It was somewhat painful to reach the cache, but we found it quickly. Who would want to hang about in nettles higher than one's head? Eventually we found that a memorial erected in memory of the 12th century monastery was accessible without getting stung to bits, as they have cut a path to it in the nettles. The walls, on the other hand were under ugly blue plastic, presumably to protect them during excavations.
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| The memorial to the XIIth century monastery |
The next two caches were a lot less painful and a lot more interesting. The first of the two was near an exhibition hall where local arts and crafts were exhibited. The box was very easy to find and we moved on to the next cache quickly, as everybody was desperately hot and hoping for an early dip in the Balaton. The next and the day's last cache was near another "Sea of Stones", but this time in a forest and on a much more grandiose scale. We hopped about on the stones, careful not to drop into one of the many crevasses around. The cache took a bit to find, as it wasn't quite where the co-ordinates pointed, but finally we spotted it in a bird feeder in the middle of a vineyard.
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| The big rocks in the forest |
And then we went straight to the lake, where a very nice little swimming area was fenced off and access to the lake plus changing facilities, showers, toilets and bars/cafes were provided for a very reasonable fee. After a nice cool down we departed for Pityu's house suitably knackered, but happy. Dinner was great and plentiful again, the beer, wine, pálinka and port flowed, cake was consumed and bridge was played until the early hours.
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| Down on the lakeside beach |
On Sunday we started with a big market, where you could buy anything you could think of, from cheese, bread, ham, fruit, veg and honey all the way to fur coats, carvings and old furniture. The cache was very cleverly hidden, but Pityu spotted it straight away.
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| The wrought iron stall at the market |
The second cache was by the ruin of an old church, not very far from the market, so we moved the cars only a little bit and then walked. Koxi managed to find the .com cache first, but we finally spotted ours in a (you guessed it!) bird feeder. This must be a very popular method of hiding cache boxes in these parts, I thought.
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| By the old church ruin near the market |
It was the third cache that provided the strenuous exercise on Sunday as well as the magical views and an exposed cache hide that I will never forget. Roy stayed with the car again, which this time was just off the road at the beginning of a driveway to a winery. He found shade and dropped off, I assume. The last 300 yards of the climb to the top was brutal. It felt absolutely perpendicular, but at least it was in forest. The top, however, was in the full glare of the sun, in the open and with sheer drops on all sides.
The cache was about 10 metres below the summit, by the top of some extruded basalt columns, under a tree. Great exposed place where I could take panoramic photos and frighten the others, who (with the exception of David) refused to come down with me. Tóti Mountain is definitely my favourite so far of the Balaton Uplands' Witness Mountains. This was the last one of these to be climbed this time round, but I have decided that I will not rest until I climbed them all. With or without a cache on the top!
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| David by the basalt columns on Tóti Mountain |
We had one more cache to find, which thankfully was at the end of a very short walk to a look-out tower and with not much climbing. The village, above which it was, erected it to provide a nice panorama, but we all thought it wasn't high enough, as even now, you couldn't see some of the panorama for tall trees. The box, however, was hidden extremely cleverly. You had to climb under the bottom level of the look-out tower and it was inside one of the corner pieces of the tower's structure. For the second evening we went to the lake to cool down and have a little rest, before the evening's activities started again at Pityu's.
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| David, Koxi, Zsuzsi and Pityu on the Salföld look-out tower |
From my point of view Sunday evening was tremendously exciting, because the cactus chose our last night there to open its gorgeous flower. As I was told that it would die by the morning, I had to stay up while Roy, David, Pityu and Ági were playing bridge again, inspecting the plant every 15 minutes or so. Round about 11pm the flower was open and then I found that my camera had gone barmy. I finally could photograph it, but it was a bit stressful with the camera playing up. As it happens, it wasn't dead the following morning and some more, even better, photos could be taken of it in natural light.
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| The cactus flower in all its glory |
And then Monday morning came and so did the rain. This completely ruined our plans for doing a bit more caching before heading for home. Still, the total was 10 caches, but this long weekend will go down in the annals, not for its cache total, but for the lovely people we managed to spend 3 days of fun with. We have already agreed to do it again, most probably in the autumn.
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