I have always wanted a bicycle but somehow I never got around to getting one so when we decided to retire to Hungary we bought ourselves a new bicycle each. England is not really a good place to cycle because of the weather, unless you are a hardened “all weather” exercise fanatic. At our time of life a warm sunny day is the ideal condition to go for a bike ride.

When we came to Hungary 2002, to look for a house, we bought the bikes with us on a carrier on the back of the car. We spent a couple of weeks in Szigetvar, in the south of Hungary, near the Croatian border, before we started to look for a house to buy and we biked for hours in the sunshine down leafy lanes, by fishing lakes, across fields of corn, through woods and along roads. What a wonderful experience. We got much fitter and we saw places we would never have noticed or would not have been able to get to if we had been in a car.

During the time we were looking for a house & purchasing it we rented a flat in a Lakas haz (block of flats), in Budapest, that was situated about 50 meters from the Danube. On the days we had no business to attend to we carried our bikes down several flights of stairs and we cycled along the side of the Danube, along streets of the city and around the Margit Sziget (Margaret Island). It was absolutely fantastic cycling around on warm sunny days and evenings.

The fact that there is an ever expanding network of cycle paths in Budapest is mainly down to an organisation called Friends of City Cycling (VBB)* that was started 10 years ago. It is they who have campaigned to improve conditions for cyclists in the city. Their achievements include expanding the cycle paths to 10 times their original distance and cyclists being able to take bikes on suburban railway, the cog-wheel railway and state railways and encouraging an increasing number of people to use bikes in the city. In fact it is estimated that around 35,000 people cycle in Budapest from March to November, it is only in the coldest months that their cycles are abandoned in favour of cars and public transport.

Since moving to the town of Ercsi, in Hungary, in May we have biked around the whole town, along the Danube, over the fields, through the woods and around the fishing lakes. We picked fruit from trees along the way during the summer and we hunted for walnuts in the autumn. We would have never discovered everywhere if we’d had to walk.

Next summer we plan to take the bikes to a number of places in Hungary and discover more about the country we have chosen to live in.

If you don’t happen to be lucky enough to live here and you enjoy cycling, there are still ways in which you can enjoy cycling in Hungary. There are plenty of organised cycle holidays or tours. Your local travel agent will have details of what is on offer and I have listed a few web addresses below where you can find out more information:-

www.hookedoncycling.co.uk/Hungary/hungary.html
www.sherpa-walking-holidays.co.uk/countries/hungary.htm
www.cmefortravel.co.uk/hungary_cycling.html
www.hfholidays.co.uk/cycling/spatour/index.asp

Alternatively, you can bring your bike with you to Hungary, purchase a book of cycle routes and plan your own tour of Hungary.

www.frigoriakiado.hu/eng.html

Happy cycling!

*For more information on VBB, which has several expat members among its ranks, call István Kôhalmi on 06-309-227-064 or 318-5265.