Hundred and fifth week of the pandemic

The main events of the last 7 days were definitely to do with geocaching. We decided to spend half of the long weekend in Bér and the other half in BP. Most day in the last week in Bér were quite uneventful, although I had a fantastic day with my friend Wilka geocaching in the Zemplén. It was a round trip of 400km to drive, but I didn’t mind. He is such a good company, drives very carefully and with skill, and takes most of the hassle out of caching, which allows me to enjoy it a lot.

Boldogkő Castle

We saw lots of sweet little villages, lots of churches, an old power station in the middle of a river, a ruined palace, which is being renovated, a gorgeous medieval castle, and a few others besides. They were mostly drive/in, but we had to take a few walks to get to the caches. I left home at 7am and got back at 7pm. En route home I saw a large number of Ukrainian cars, which was heart-warming to see, as at least these people were safely out of their war.

The church at Vizsoly
 

Then on Sunday we came into BP, so that I could go and drive off to Veszprém to stay with my old friend Edit and we had a brilliant time together geocaching and hiking. On the first day we only found 5 caches, but we did a fair amount of hiking. The start was a spring near a village and then a cache high up above the village, from where there was quite a nice panorama to photograph.

The cave at Borzás mountain

After that we parked up and hiked to the top of a big mountain called Papod. There was a lookout tower there, which afforded very nice views. En route to the top we detoured to a cave, which was in a large rock wall, which was quite impressive.

The Calvary Chapel at Lókút

At the end of the day we drove up to another village, which had a really nice chapel and stages of the cross. At the end of the day we had dinner and I fell over like a felled tree about 8pm. As it happens, I had a brilliant night of sleep there. I only woke up once to go to the loo and then went back to sleep for another 3 hours. I had 8 hours all in all, which is unheard of.

The limestone pavement

The second way we ventured a bit further, all the way into the High Bakony mountains. The day started with climbing down to the mouth of a railway tunnel. That was pretty exciting. Then we walked up an old and neglected study route, but at the top, where the cache was, I also saw some gorgeous limestone pavement. I really didn’t know that they had anything like that in Hungary. I have only seen them in England.

The bridge over the pond at Szarvaskő pond

 

Then we went to see a spring with a little pond and then walked to a totally derelict Ecological Park. I think they might have had something like an Ecological Park when the cache was new, but nothing but a few derelict wooden shacks remained. Still, the walk was pleasant and we found the cache after a little search in the nearby woods.

Muggins in the ravine

Then came the highlight of the day. We had to climb to down to a fantastic ravine, above which there were two caches. One was a fantastic looking rock pillar, the other a spring. However, the most exciting experience was to climb down from the spring into the bottom of the ravine. It was steep, it was rocky, strewn with fallen logs and surround by enormous rock walls. Fantastic, I though, that is what geocaching should be about.

Natural limestone steps

The last one was another chapel and stages of the cross, which was neat, well cared for, just we couldn’t find the cache. Finally, Edit found it under a root stock, which was miles from the coordinates. All in all, this visit was well worth it. I had some fantastic hikes, I found 12 geocaches and I saw some sights that were worth seeing.

My friend Edit by the lookout tower on Papod

Now we are back into BP. I have just visited my doctor today and I’m having full blood works tomorrow, and have appointments to a rheumatologist, gynecologist, and a bone density test within the next week. Wish me luck!