Steve's Serbian Surprise

The end of a long, hot day's ride in Serbia, 60km from Belgrade, wearily looking for a likely place to pitch the tent. A sleek, black Mercedes pulls along beside me. Window down, the attractive female driver sporting a generous cleavage says,
"Room?"
Did my new beard arrangement and longer hair-do suddenly make me irresistible? My foreign air trigger lusty feelings among the local women?
Flattered, I slow and say,
"Sorry?"
"I have rooms. Ten euros each. Follow me!"
Oh well, I turn and gesture to Julia to get a move on and we tear down the hill to see what's on offer.
Very nice too. And so it was, after haggling the price down a little we spent our first night in 8 weeks without putting the tent up.
Luvly jubbly.

Serbia has been quite liberating. No familiar shops or coffee houses, homegrown fruit and veg sold all along the roadside, horses being used as forms of transport or to pull machinery. Old cars, trucks and motorcycles being employed as useful forms of transport which in other countries would be labelled; collectable, vintage, or an investment.

Combine harvesters are parked regularly on the drive...

Each time we stop for a breather, or to buy some food, very friendly people stop to say hello or offer directions, or just chat. The latter proving a tad difficult as neither of us know what the other one is talking about.

However, as a cycle route, so far, it doesn't work. We've spent 3 days on perilous, narrow main roads. Trying to negotiate potholes, tarmac ridges, broken glass and humps, whilst avoiding being flattened by noisy, noxious trucks, buses and cars is exhausting and stressful. Add 35° heat to the equation, and to be honest...I've hated it and wanted to quit. On the positive side, it seems the route continues off tarmac roads from here.

Right now we're holed up in Belgrade, waiting for it to cool off before we venture out to explore the city and hopefully find some dirty street food!
I love to see what the locals are eating.

Talking of food, I am eating for England, France, Germany and the rest of them, and I'm still losing weight. I've discovered I have ribs and shoulder blades, items of my anatomy which have long since been concealed. The other bodily novelty by the way, is the ridiculous suntan one develops, resembling the same T-shirt and shorts tan of a certain outdoor tennis coach I know.

Julia is a bit like a solar panel and thrives well in the heat, whereas my metabolism is more vampirical - my energy and faculties nose-diving with the sun and its warmth.
So, to be able to continue, I've persuaded Julia that we must have even earlier starts to our riding days if we are to cope with the conditions.
Not sure if I'm going to get her out of the campsite by 6am. I'll let you know...