49 km (30 miles) – Total so far: 130 km (80 miles)

We awoke early after a poor night’s sleep and packed our luggage ready for it to be “magically” transported to our next destination. After filling ourselves at the breakfast buffet we eventually began our trip from Slovakia to Hungary. It was, for the most part, an uneventful trip; we cruised down the dykes that are built to stem any flooding of the river and made our way to Čunovo were we met a couple from Belgium who we met in Vienna – they arrived at the hotel as we were leaving. They are travelling the same way as us so no doubt we shall meet again. We also passed a couple of proper looking cyclists at this point, however, when they arrived at Čunovo they ordered a pint of beer each and lit up a couple of cigarettes – so maybe out for a Saturday morning pedal rather than an epic tour like us, still, we are adding them to our slowly growing list of “scalps”. There were a huge number of cyclists at this cafe, a veritable ” Eureka – Two Mills” of central Europe – no pints of tea on show though !

After Čunovo we made our way through the flat Hungarian landscape (rather like Norfolk, to mis-quote Noel Coward “Very flat, Hungary.”) to Bezenye where we had lunch. It was very hot by this time and the cold lemonades were gratefully received.

We detoured over some rough terrain and eventually made our way to Mosonmagyaróvár, our stop for the night. The hotel is nice, not as big as the previous ones, but very pleasant. The view from the window, you will be pleased to know, is not dreadful – not good – but not dreadful.

After a refreshing shower we explored the entertainment on offer – which isn’t much to be honest. The town seems to exist solely to service the dental needs of neighbouring countries. There are more dentists and dental surgeries in Mosonmagyaróvár than anywhere else in the world (I made that up, but it might be true !) The town’s name comes from an amalgamation (or maybe amalgam – there’s that dentistry again) of Monson and Magyaróvár but locals tend to call it Óvár which means “Filling” – (made that up too, but this is less likely to be true)

Anyway, we had a nice meal, met the Belgium couple again, and then retired to the hotel to check the trip for tomorrow and get some sleep.