October 5, 2021
To Varaždin
a border to cross
We have another very nice day for our ride to Varaždin today.
As it turned out, we were the only guests in the hotel muziKafe last night. For breakfast we were offered eggs and a beautiful platter of cheese, meat and fruit. Our host also made very good espressos! The muziKafe is a very nicely decorated hotel full of interesting art and unique furniture pieces. Music from various artists, including one my favourites - Bob Marley, play continuously through out the common areas. We really enjoyed our stay here.
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We rode a short distance toward the river and turned right on the well marked cycle route. Our first 15 kms were all on very smooth paved roads through small groups of homes. The pedaling was easy with the wind to our backs. With the day's temperatures getting warmer, we rode side by side and thought that we would be in Varaždin in record time!
But all good things come to an end! That happened when we began a section of trail through the farming fields near the Drava river. The route became very rough gravel and full of small rocks. With our small-wheeled Bike Fridays, we were taking quite a pounding and progress was slow. We were again on pavement as we approached the town of Ormož but at times had to also ride short distances on a non separated highway.
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We rode by the train station at Ormož at exactly twelve noon. We could see the once a day regional train departing for Budapest. It takes about five hours and 15 stops to get there. We had thought about this routing as way to organize our return to Vienna but decided to continue with the plan of going to Zagreb. The Ormož train station is right on the Drava and there is a border crossing to Croatia at this point if you cross the bridge. We planned to cross the border about 10 kms further along as we continued to ride the Slovenian part of the Drava cycle way.
Our route once again took us through fields where the cycle path alternated between asphalt and bone jarring rough sections. Not at all the crushed rock that often provides a smooth surface and was used in previous areas.
The road to the Slovenian - Croatia boarder was a non separated highway but there were few vehicles as we rolled right up to the border control. We could see a man in the booth and other officers outside the kiosk. Not sure of the procedure and because they did not seem at all concerned with the two people on bikes had that just rolled up, Pat said, "just go??".... to which we received the reply "just NOT go", with a chuckle.
The first station was the passport check as Croatia is not yet part of the open border Schengen Agreement. The second stop at the next kiosk was a vaccine card check where our passports were once again checked. This officer had a good laugh at our small bikes and just shook his head. When we got the "all clear" we were both pleased and not sure why, but relieved. Crossing some borders in Europe is so much more stressful than it use to be.
As we left the border we noted that the Drava route was now marked with blue signs and was directing us back on to rock paths between the fields of corn. No thank you. The road was not at all busy and we found a secondary route into Varaždin. Eventually it joined up with the highway that had a separated bike lane. At this point, it was not very nice riding as it was a very busy road at this time of day.
From the Varaždin tourism web site,
"Varaždin is the city of baroque, young people, music, flowers and bicycles. „Little Vienna“ with rich natural legacy interwoven in parks, a must see destination, located in the North of Croatia on the southern bank of the River Drava. With 46.946 inhabitants and the average annual temperature of 10°C, the city of Varaždin is one of the most attractive destinations to live in or to visit in Croatia. It is the tourist, cultural, economical, educational and sporting centre of North-western Croatia."
We particularly noted the abundance of young people going to school and lots of people riding their bikes.
As Croatia also does not use Euros, we needed to stop at a bank machine to get some of the local currency - Kuna. We could not remember the relative exchange rate so we just chose the mid point suggestive selection of 1000 kuna. As our beers were only 22 kuna we figured we should have enough pocket money for now. Later we determined it is about 20 kuna to the CAD.
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For dinner we walked to Restaurant Bedem that was just beyond the main part of town but near the castle. Although they had very few guests this evening, the service and our meals were very good as well as reasonably priced.
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We walked back to our hotel through the main plaza enjoying the warm evening. Tomorrow we will be enjoying the last of a string of sunny warm days with a ride to Koprivnička.
Today's ride: 60 km (37 miles)
Total: 744 km (462 miles)
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