Monday 11^th June 2018

Woke with huge red lumps, the lady at the Camp Farma 47 said they don’t have any mosquitos, not sure if they’re mozzie bites but they itch like mad grrrrr! Ourselves and Jeanne have both decided to stay at a free parking spot on park4night, (N45.25195,E019.868161),  we met them in Novi Sad at the side of the fortress under the clock with the dodgy fingers, we are all sweating even Jeanne and Tai and they are used to hot weather being from South Africa, we went and had breakfast together, Tai made light work of a big fry up and Dave tried a custard slice type cake recommended by the guide from the night before, he washed it down with cold beer, we took our time and spent a couple of hours in the shade discussing travels and life. We can’t decide what to do, beach, fortress or town?

It’s too hot for decision making and too hot for walking, we tried to go into the fortress museum, but it was closed for cleaning.

On the site of Petrovaradin fortress archaeologists have discovered that the history of the locality is more than 2000 years old, inhabited by the Celts in the 3 & 4^th century BC, the Romans in the 1^st century AD, the Turks had a go in 1526, then the Austrians played their part in 1692, constructing the fort now known as Petrovaradin fortress and is said to be the most preserved fortress in Europe, it was demilitarised in the 20^th century.

There are 16kms of underground corridors spread over 4 levels, it was considered unconquerable as it covers 112 hectacres, had 13 gates and 400 cannons, it was given the nickname Gibraltar on the Danube.

Jeanne and Tai are on their bikes, Jeanne took hers back to her van Miles McFlattery and Tai brought his over the bridge and into the town, we wandered around the pretty streets and crashed out in a pretty little alleyway at a bar in the shade, literally melting! Tai went whizzing around on his bike coming back with various bumps and scrapes and bits falling off his bike, he still has energy even if we haven’t.

It cooled just slightly so we set off to find the synagogue in the arts quarter and unfortunately that was closed too, not having much luck today.

Novi Sad is also famous for its annual music festival called the EXIT festival, each year in the upper town in July and thousands of music lovers flock here from all over the world and the campsites are rammed packed full, glad we will be out of here by then!

We all wash our feet when we get back to try to cool down, buckets and bowls outside but we don’t care.

Dave is fixing Tai’s bike, his bike rack has come off and his chain too, he shows Tai how to fix it and the box of cable ties comes out, they’ve also been dragged around Europe and of course he knew they would come in handy lol!

I wander on down into a field as I can hear a brass band practicing, sitting in the shade listening to them was one of those moments that you come across when your hopping from one place to the next, you never know what’s going to be around the next corner.

Jeanne and Tai had been to a pizza place the previous night so we all decide to go there, the wifi is good so Jeanne catches up on a bit of work, Tais’ phone has been confiscated but he’s happy to accept mine whilst his mums not looking! Pizzas were great and once eaten and work is finished Jeanne shows Dave some more tips for making our blog writing and photo resizing easier and quicker. Dave is very pleased, maybe now we will catch up!

Back at Pogo it’s hot and Dave and I will have all the windows open, our van is higher than Jeanne’s and she’s not so sure about keeping hers open, I can understand that, we say good night as we plan to leave at 7.am in the morning en-route to Hungary.

Bye

Cathy x