Day 63 Serbia 20/11/2010 Belgrade All on foot.

For a while now we have been discussing the weather and the cost of staying in Europe and considering our options for getting to Turkey. The weather has been very kind to us so far, but we are aware that winter is fast approaching. With possibly about 1000km still to go and some unavoidable hills to get through, we have decided to investigate the train from Belgrade to Istanbul. It would be great to finish the Danube route and the next 150kms are supposed to be very pretty. However possibly jeopardising the trip further down the line for the sake of a bit of Europe would be a shame. We do after all have a very long way still to go and we have already covered over 3000kms through Europe.

Asking at the international ticket office we hit our first potential snag, taking the bikes on the train was going to be down to the conductor. Buying tickets when you don't know if you can take the bikes is a bit of a gamble. Trying again at the 'Wasteels' travel agency, we got a rather more positive answer. The woman seemed to think that we would be able to take the bikes, but Serbian rail doesn't have a ticket for such a thing. It would be up to the Conductor how much it would cost to take them. She seemed to think possibly €10, we left the station with much to think about.

Heading back into the city we strolled through what is the most western city, in terms of shops and facilities, we have encountered since leaving Vienna. The majority of the plentiful book shops have a well stocked English section and there are cafés and restaurants everywhere.

Perhaps it is just that we have visited so many cities, but Belgrade doesn't really appear to have that much to offer in sights.

The Fortress and surrounding Kalemegdan park is very pleasant, but we could think of several other cities that are nicer. I think Belgrade is one of those places that are more about the friendliness of the people aswell as the bar and restaurant culture. It also appears to have a huge amount of clubs and a thriving night life.

During our walk round the Kalemegdan park we made the decision to buy the train tickets to Istanbul. It will be sad to say goodbye to Europe but it seems like the right time to leave. We will worry about the bikes on Monday morning when we get on the train!

Tickets in hand we stopped at the supermarket, got some food for dinner, the obligatory huge bottle of beer and went back to the hostel.

After dinner we got talking to the other hostel guests and consumed rather a lot of beer and šljivovica (plum brandy) in the company of a nice bunch of people. We also had one of those small world moments when it turned out that one of the guests, Paul, comes from Norwich!

Later still, we all left the Hostel (Debs wisely went to bed) in search of bars and clubs. Finding all of the bars closed and not fancying the clubs I had a rather extended tour of Belgrade with two of the others. We eventually got back to the hostel sometime around 2:30am no more inebriated but better for the walk.