6th August - Big Day (Hungary to Romania)

Woke at 6am to the sound of cars and trucks passing. Managed perhaps 5hrs sleep. Strangely, as Felix and I were cleaning ourselves up and completing our morning ablutions, a Romanian guy asked if he could take us to Budapest. But hey, could have been a worse proposition. Felt pretty weird in the car and we weren't sure if we were going to be asked for money. But had some great views of the city as we drove in, it has a sort of dilapidated, majestic air to it. The driver dropped us off with smiles and it was all good. Wandered to the Main Station to have a shower. After a lot of mucking around, we found that they had no shower. Some woman was trying to get money out of us for some charity, looked dodgy to me. We were feeling pretty tired and hungry at this point, somewhat disheartened. Not quite the easy adventure that I had planned in my head. However, using the HitchWiki tips, we caught a trolleybus (electric bus) to the outskirts of Budapest. After a bite to eat, felt much better. Then we manage to get a lift for a hundred kms or so with a couple of young Romanian guys who spoke pretty good English. They were old friends and just borrowing parents car to go and see the country side. So we had a good chat and they dropped us off at the last gas station before they turned off. Unfortunately for us, it was closed. No fuel for sale, nothing. Wandered around, asking everyone, but they were usually full or not really going in our direction. Rather disheartening stuff and I tried sitting on a crash barrier to increase visibility. To no avail. But of course we did get a lift in the end, Felix managed to get a truck to stop. We hopped, the guy was heading to a town called Debrecen in the far east of Hungary, which was great. Got the same old instructions about ducking down in case of police. However, did get pulled over by a roadside check by transport police, which didn't seem to concerned about the two of us in the cab, more worried about his paper work. Continued on our way and the driver even shared some chocolate bars with us (he just went to the back of the truck, he had about 4 tons worth!). Got dropped at the outskirts of Debrecen and filled up on food from a LIDL and an ALDI, I ate some amazing Hungarian yogurt, was sooo tasty! Then made our way to the south of the city via a wrong bus, which led us on an interesting walk through the suburbs, past plum trees laden with fruit. I did my best to relieve them of their burden. Got a lift pretty quickly with a van with 4 hippy German dudes.

They were on their way to some sort of festival in Romania and could take us as far as the border, as we were just kinda lying in the stuff in the back of the van. There was also some talk about things that had that perhaps they shouldn't. Was a pretty good lift and we ended up doing our first border crossing on foot, we enjoyed. Whilst standing at the service station with a sign for Cluj-Napoca just after the border, was asked again by a guy if he could take us along. They couldn't speak a word of English but there was a nice lady behind him that could speak very good English and she translated a bit and I had a good conversation whilst waiting for the guy to pay for his fuel. They guy somehow managed to fit Felix and I in the car, even though it was completely full. After a fair few wrong turns, we were on the highway! Then we stopped at a roadside restaurant with great views of the valley, and they bought us dinner. First some soup, and then some sausage things made from goat, very tasty. They dropped us in Cluj-Napoca and after wandering for a while asked some people, one of which turned out to be fluent in German, and gave Felix the directions for a youth hostel. Checked in, had a glorious shower and somehow had some energy for a beer and conversation with a few guys still up at 1am, after around 18hrs of travelling. Slept easily...