Introduction
This is a self-made route of 1148Km covering three countries (Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary), three rivers (the Vah from Bytča to Liptovský Hrádok, the Hron from its source in the Nízke Tatry mountains to Esztergom, the Danube from Ezstergom to Budapest) and five mountain ranges (Moravskoslezke Bezkydy, Mala Fatra, Vysoke Tatry, Slovensky Raj, Nizke Tatry).
Our plan was to cycle the distance in 18 days (average 64Km/day) and to rest for 4 days in Varín (near Malá Fatra), Tatranská Lomnica (in Vysoké Tatry), Dedinky (in Slovenský Raj) and Esztergom. In reality, we cycled 1156Km in 18 days (average 76Km/day).
The Good, the bad and the ugly
- good: excellent rest days in Slovakia (especially at Dedinky climbing ladders in the national park and exploring ice caves (Alexis)
- good: well-planned route; five mountain ranges but only three days of uphill cycling (Alexis)
- good: beautiful towns of Kutna Hora and Stary Smokovec (which looked like Grand Hotel Budapest) (Suzie)
- good: many supermarket lunches sitting in beautiful Czech and Slovak village squares (Alexis)
- bad: lack of dedicated cycle paths (Suzie)
- ugly: road 18 from Zilina to Liptovsky Mikulas was busy with a lot of trucks (Suzie)
- ugly: got robbed in our sleep at the Tatranec campsite by someone who came through a hole in the campsite’s fence (Alexis)
Map
Visible on the map are our day trip cycling around Mala Fatra, immediately followed by a small kink from Parnica to Ruzemberok to avoid the very busy road 18 and our diversion to Komarno necessitated by the chaos at Budapest’s main railway station caused by the European migrant crisis at the beginning of September 2015.
Photos
Downloads
- GPX data for the campsite waypoints: cz-sk-hu-waypoints-camps.gpx
- GPX data for the entire route: cz-sk-hu-route-complete.gpx
- GPX data for our track (what we actually cycled): cz-sk-hu-track-20150813TO20150904.gpx
- XLS file of the itinerary: cz-sk-hu-itinerary.xls