Slovakia - riding the mountains
The day did not start early, but what a start it was. Bleary eyed we gingerly poked our heads out of the tent only to have our eyes massaged by the most stunning of views; to our surprise (we had arrived in pitch black) luscious green mountains on all sides cradled our campsite in Martin, a beautiful area in Slovakia.
After unpacking the remains of our gear, we got our bearings. We met Victor mid morning and asked if we could use a power socket under one the roofed barbecue areas. This was going to be our new office as we spent the day catching up on our journal. With food from the campsite restaurant – the soup is a must – we had a very productive day.
The following day sitting in Victor’s office we again spent the day catching up. Our journal was now up to date, but communications and internet access had been difficult over the last few weeks so emails had to picked and even more sent.
With Victor’s kind permission we tapped into the sites phone lines, dialed up and got to work. Despite the connection being slow we got all of our jobs done and with the sun slowly sinking behind the mountain range, it was time to play.
With the panniers and tank bags taken off, our bikes were transformed from the workhorses they’d been to the hill bashing toys we wanted. Off to explore!
The tallest mountain is Martin ‘Ole, with its peak 13Km from the campsite. Half way up the road becomes dirt track and rocks. Both bikes happily bounced along, back wheels occasionally bouncing out of line with an overly excited blip of the throttle. Weaving on and off the track around rocks and in and out of water ravines we made our way to the peak, finally enjoying the relative lightness of our machines. The view at the top was breathtaking as distant mountains gently faded away in the subtle pink hues of the fading day. Beneath us there were just rolling green forests as far as the eye could see.
Slovakia is a very beautiful country.
With the light finally gone we slowly made our way down, grateful for the new powerful Hella Xenon lights on my 1100GS. (Thank you Barry and Keith at SED)
