Weekend off

The last one in "Reynold's Apples", the farm in Óhíd, where I'm staying since August 1st.

This weekend I've been to Tapolca (pronounced "T-a-p-o-l-t-s-a), a well known city near the Balaton lake. I arrived there on Friday evening, and after the huge electric storm, the sky suddenly cleared and I had the chance of visiting on the same evening.

I went to a bakery that Richard had advised me, saying it was the est in town. Well, I can't tell you it was the best, but if it wasn't, then "Oh God!" I'd say! Cheap and nice it helped me to get nourished: 1.01€, 960 grams of pure hungarian bread!




This town has a small lake in the center, just by the church, delimited by stone walls. It has cristal-clear water coming directly from some underground natural caves, and from the lake the water flows into a creek, that eventually will flow into the Duna (Danube).

Since I had my backpack with me, I walked away from Tapolca, towards some castle in ruins at the top of a mountain (much higher than the castle in Sümeg) that was higher than all the mountains for 10km around.
I slept as I could in a field near the bottom of the mountain, and next day at 6 AM I was already walking towards its summit. At 8 AM i was already there, and I can tell you: the best views I've ever seen!

So from there I went back to Tapolca, to take a train to Balatonfüred, touristic city, known by hungarians as "the capital of Lake Balaton".

Not nany things can be said from this town, but i'll try to explain some bits and pieces:

90% of the people were tourists, from which half were hungarians, and most of the other half from Germany. The other 10% were workers there, selling icecreams and postcards and that.

There are some caves, near the mountain, called Lóczy caves. There were discovered by some miners in the XIX century, but were closed two years later because little children came in to play, and since it was dangerous (and there was a lot of CO2) they closed them. There were later opened in 1930, and were named after a geologist.
Inside the caves you can see the different layers from the sedimentation caused by the sea millions of years ago.

There is also a well in the city that provides hidrogenated water. It comes from an underground river (you might have an idea of what I'm talking about if you remember that 'soda' is carbonated water), which water is overmineralized! (and nicely drinkable)...

Bored, I came back home that evening. I must say trains are fun, because you can fully open the windows, lean out and enjoy the fresh air while avoiding the trees!

Monday, Arthur invited me to a Mediterranean restaurant, which was located in a building that used to be Déak Férenc's home.



He was the best (according to hungarians) prime minister of the country. He was offered to be prime minister of the country (actually, candidate for it, but it was known he'd win) but he refused it, since he didn't want to leave the farm and his family working there.

So an Austrian lord that lived in Hungary bought his farm so Déak had no excuse and could rule the country.

Since Arthur knew the owner of that restaurant, and she invited him, I also was invited to a party at her place, a cottage where they go ocasionally (but just during the day, because they don't sleep there).




It was quite international: a woman from Thailand that lives in Canada (Toronto), another man from Thailand, two couples from Germany (one couple made organic wine, that is, whithout any chemical product used neither for harvesting nor fermentation. Little sparkly, but very fruity and wonderful, and sold it in a 5 star hotel in Germany!!), the owner of the restaurant and her parents (born in Hungary but raised in Germany), Arthur, his wife and me.






I have just come back and I'm going to sleep! Remember I wake up at 7 AM!
A funny thing in Hungary is that church bells don't go off every hour, but just to inform of the working hours. That means they bell 60 times at 5 AM, 60 at 12 PM, 60 at 3 PM and 60 at 8 PM. I think it is crazy!



I'm leaving the farm on Friday morning, because I have to go to the other one, at north of Szeged. I will miss the place very much, and especially the huge sweet soft blackberries I can pick here...