Eger to Szilvasvarad May 6-7

Despite all the tourism we did in the afternoon, the main thing we wanted to do in Eger was taste the wines. We figured evening was an appropriate time for wine tasting but later learned that any time is fine. Even before noon.

We had some confusion about where to go. The guide book just said to try number 16 or something like that. We didn't quite understand. Eventually we caught on though. The cellars are really not much more than holes in the ground with a door in front. There were no signs at all, not even in Hungarian, just simple two digit numbers.

We walked past them several times without noticing. Finally we looked in one and saw some barrels and realized this was really the place. Part of our confusion was due to the fact that almost all of them were closed for some reason.

But we found one that was open and spent an hour or so testing the wines of a man named Zultan. Inside the cellar was just a cave that was dug 222 years ago. Zultan told us his family had made wines and used the cave the entire time. But Zultan did not just learn wine making from his family. He studied it at a university.

We tried several wines, at the whopping price of about 13 cents a glass. I liked them a lot. We told Zultan we'd like a liter and a half. He sorted through a pile of used 1.5 liter plastic water bottles and finally let me choose one. Then he used a peculiar glass apparatus to extract the wine out of a barrel and fill the bottle.

The apparatus looks like a three foot straw with an egg-shaped tank near one end. He stuck the straw in the top of the barrel then sucked the wine up the straw into the egg-shaped tank. Then he put a finger over each  end of the straw, carried it over to the bottle, stuck the end in and removed his finger to allow the wine to flow. I think he had done this before.

I carried the wine in the bottle cage of my bike just like we had done in France.

The next day we had just a 28 km ride to Szilvasvarad. But just a few km out of town we passed a few more hole-in-the-ground wine cellars. We couldn't help ourselves, we stopped in. It was about 11:30 a.m.

Inside a woman named Ida poured us a couple glasses of her red wine. Meanwhile some other folks came in and filled various two and five liter containers. A couple guys had seen our bikes and spoke a little English so they asked us about our trip. They translated our answers for Ida. Ida was very interested and went outside to look at our bikes herself.

After we payed, she said, "Itsy-bitsy..." and filled our glasses again. There was no way to turn down Ida. We drank the wine and tried to talk to her some more. Then we saw she had some pastries so we thought it would be polite to buy some. But she wouldn't let us. She filled a bag with bread rolls and gave them to us. Then when we tried to leave again, she said, "Itsy-bitsy" and filled our glasses again! Just before we left she told us to be careful of the traffic. We wobbled down the highway anyway, hoping none of Itsy-Bitsy Ida's other customers were behind us.

For once the strong wind was BEHIND us. We made it to Szilvasvarad in no time. It was like a day off. We set up the tent in a campground at around two o'clock then walked off to find the narrow gauge railroad.

An old logging railroad runs a few kilometers up the mountains then turns around and comes back. We walked past a small station where about 50 kids were waiting. The adult in the group told them something and they let out a cheer. We continued walking about 300 meters further to the main station and got on the train with about 300 kids and parents. The train was packed to the brim. Then the train backed towards to the other station where the 50 cheering kids were. We got there and there was no room for them. I felt so bad for those previously happy kids. We had to leave them. Of course, the train would be back in an hour.

The ride was crowded and short so from the top we just walked back. It was a beautiful walk too. Very much like the mountains in Pennsylvania. There are trails all over the hills and we were tempted to stay and hike some of them but we wanted to save our hiking for the Tatras Mountains in Slovakia.

On the way back we stopped at a little cafe for Cappucino (you can't just get a cup of coffee in Hungary -- its always got to be an espresso or cappucino). There was an enormous bear sized man wearing a big brown coat with pockets big enough for his huge bear paw hands. His face was like an oversized caricature of a fat man. He rode off on a motorcycle looking like a bear at a circus.

That evening a caravan of four cars pulling small trailers surrounded our campsite. They were all Dutch couples on their way to Romania.

In Eger we had bought a frying pan so I could cook scrambled eggs for breakfast. So that evening we walked around the town in the evening looking for a grocery store (grocers are labelled "ABC" in Hungary). But the town pretty much closed up at 5 p.m. This is the case with most small towns in Hungary.

Next: Hungary Chapter 4 - Mountain Pass
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