Judeţul Brăila

Worst thing today:
Aggressive tall dog bit a hole in Jos bag (a tiny one from his tooth BUT still!) The best deescalation strategy, we experienced so far, is to stop and wait until the dogs get bored and then walk past them instead of cycling. This did not work today as Jo saw the dog too late and the dog saw Jo too late and Jo was already fully in 'the dogs territory'. So he attacked the bag. At least only the bag!

Weirdest feeling today:
We crossed two quarantine areas with disinfection carpets when entering and leaving villages. The police made sure that any horse, any car and anybody crossed the carpet. Reason for this is the "African svine fever"(ASP). This virus started to infect wild pigs and is an epidemic that ends mostly deadly for the animal. Infected pigs have been found in Poland, Latvia, Hungary, Ukraine and Romania in 2018. Already 45.000 pigs had to be killed on a farm nearby. Several infected pigs have been found in villages in this Romanian area. End of June 2018, infected pigs have been found in Braila itself. It's an akward feeling and a high economic risk for the pork industry. That it why officials are very alarmed and take preventive controls with the disinfection carpets.

Best three things today:
First, landscapes are beautiful again! Many sand dunes, lakes, animals everywhere, Danube Delta starts to show its best side. Second, we had the perfect timing to just hit the ferry to Braila. Third, we found a large and nice apartment so far and had homemade Risotto. Award for 100km tour :)

Most unpleasant experience:
Doing one's business in nature is one thing. But I'd not recommend to decide for a place next to stagnant water... After 10 seconds, around 200 mosquitos were all over my body. When I was looking down my leg, it was covered by mosquitos!! After a panic attack and the fastest business ever done, I fled to the bike and to the sun and after killing at least 20 mosquitos, I still was left with more than 50 stitches. Aaarg.Read more