You may recall that I was planning to join Roy at his usual Wednesday lunch with his expat crowd, but I wasn't sure if I should go. Well, I am really pleased that I did go, as this lot of old boys were a lot friendlier and chattier than the last ones. Interesting to see the dynamic, as it depends on who turns up, how they treat others in the group. As I wrote last week, I would have enjoyed it even if I was ignored, as I really love Becketts.
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| Roy looking smug in Becketts |
It was really funny that having 9 people round the table, every single one of us had ordered fish and chips, and without agreeing to it beforehand. It was delicious as usual, considering his fish comes all the way from Ireland, but I must admit, that they still have some need for improvement in batter making. Still, I loved it and I think the rest of them did too, as everybody cleared their plates pretty sharpish.
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| A plate of fish and chips |
Other than the above, nothing too exciting happened last week until Saturday. We were both trying to get over the physical exhaustion of our three days away: Roy did a lot of driving, and I did quite a lot of walking, getting to and from caches. There was the paperwork, as I mentioned last week. To extend 30 logs with text and upload a lot of photos, had also taken me 3 days on and off.
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| Flags on the ceiling at Becketts |
I also had to plan for Saturday, but more about that later. Other logistical efforts were made in relation to my own GCWALK in November, by updating the cache page with details of the planned hike. I am also in the middle of negotiating for buying an e-bike, and hopefully should be able to arrange a test ride and if all is well, I'll purchase it sometime in the coming weeks.
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| Szokolya station with a small train in the distance |
And finally we arrived at Saturday, for which I had a plan to go geocaching with my friend Csilla in the Börzsöny. It was under danger of being cancelled, as I started feeling really bad with my arthritis. I have lived with that horrible degenerative disease since I was a teenager, but recently it became extremely painful and debilitating. It was touch and go, but finally I decided to risk it, as my hiking poles usually help a lot, and thankfully I was right.
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| Csilla at the top, showing the gradient |
The day turned out to be an absolutely delight, mostly because of Csilla, who is a real darling and a joy to be with, but the weather was beautiful too and the caches fascinating and satisfying. We started with the hardest climb, which was short, but steep. It took only a mile to get up to the top of the Great Rock Mountain, but at the cost of 200 metres of height climb. We started at Szokolya railway station, which is quite small, as are the trains too. It isn’t a narrow gauge, but might as well be, as the rolling stock is out of museums and accidents are frequent. Yesterday, it was only working between Balassagyarmat and Szokolya, as about a month ago there was a train South of there, leaving the track and doing some damage. Needless to say that it’ll not be repaired until spring, or even later.
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| The view from the top of Great Rock Mountain |
We left very early, so we were there before 8 am. After fuffing around with the GCJaro cache at the station, where a hiking competition’s event centre was, we started our first climb of the day. Those of you that know that according to the rules in the UK, no orienteering course should contain more than 5% climb, will be horrified to hear that we actually had 200 metres climb in that short hike. That is roughly 13%,which was gruelling. There were several different routes, but we took the steepest, because it was the shortest. Also, because we didn’t want to disturb those that were taking part in the hiking competition, who went on longer, therefore less steep marked paths.
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| The view from the forest with a totem pole |
We went on what to me looked like a forestry earth road, then a tiny, narrow, wild goat track all the way to the top. Once there, we recognised why it was so steep and all effort and aching joints were forgotten by admiring the panorama from there. We found the cache quite easily and came down very carefully, worrying about slipping.
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| The old radio museum |
Back in the car we relocated to an old radio museum, where we found the cache and which was quite interesting. Afterwards we carried on to a small sylvan car park, the start of another cache up in a different set of hills. This was thankfully less steep and about the same length as the previous one, but the end was a bit difficult. For some weird reason, the satellite reception was mucking us about by jumping all over the place, so I had to get out my serious GPS, which since the appearance of the smartphone app for caching I only use when such situations occur. With the help of that little gadget the cache was found in no time at all.
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| Worm channels in dead wood |
Views from a nearby clearing were also magnificent, this time with the Danube and the Visegrád Mountains in the background. Once back at the car, we went back up into the hills behind us, but using a different valley with a different road from our first one. Here we parked at an interesting place, which I have already known, as the two caches there I have already found nearly 10 years ago. Csilla and I went to find a 2-part multi-cache, which was ahead of the car park, going West, and a lot further down. All the way down, I was thinking about the climb back, which didn’t cheer me up as I was getting very tired and full of aches.
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| A glorious path in the forest |
The points were at a spring with a meadow and a memorial. Both was tough to get to, as the forest was full of fallen branches, but we managed it at the end. The climb back up wasn’t too bad either, but I was happy when we were back at the car. At this point I told Csilla that if she wants to look for those two caches, which I have already found all those years ago, I can’t go with her, as I needed a rest. She said it was fine and off she went. An hour later I was getting very worried what happened to her, so I rang her and thankfully she answered quickly. Apparently, she couldn’t find one of the two caches and kept trying. Eventually, when she got back it was getting dark, so we departed quickly for home and were there before it really got completely dark. Fantastic day, first of many, I hope.
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| The Danube from above with the Visegrád Mountains behind |
Sunday was spent having a rest, as that first very steep climb had definitely given me some stiff muscles. It has been a long time since I did a climb like that, and my muscles were complaining. In the meantime, unfortunately, Roy started coughing badly, which is not good, as I was hoping that he would not catch the lurgy that is doing the rounds at the moment. It may be Covid, but the gangsters that run this country have not bothered to purchase any vaccines, and even if they change their minds, by the time those arrive, everybody would have had the disease already.
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| Autumn crocus |
So, I am trying to keep him indoors, which is often difficult, but I have to admit, he must feel dreadful, as he missed his pub yesterday without any complaints. I am a tad worried that he will catch another infection on top of this one, and that could be deadly, but he is still adamant to go and see Lyle and Heather today, so let us hope he gets a bit better.
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| David Grimal |
I have a concert with Bozsa this evening, so let us hope that he is well enough to be left alone, or I will miss my beloved David Grimal. Such is life, but let us be optimistic and I will update you all about him in the next post.
The mysterious Little Deer Meadow
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