Biggest lake in the Balkans, half an hour from Podgorica and apparently a must-see. How does one get there? “Take the train!” said the hostel staff. I enquired about buses but was told that they’re more expensive and less reliable. Oh well… train it is.

And what a train it was! Clean, modern, could have cruised the rails of Germany. My opinion on train travel in the Balkans got a bit better.

At the lake it was a 10-15 minute walk from the station to the village centre (across the train tracks, through the shrubs and there you are).

The recommendation I got for experiencing the lake was to go kayaking. It’s reasonably cheap with just 3 Euros per hour and I was in need for some exercise.

Twenty minutes of paddling later and I’m still in some form of canal, on my way to the actual lake. It did look beautiful.

Once I had reached the open lake, it was a fair bit to the next landing point. Almost an hour into the journey

As in almost every city on earth, the area near the train station in Belgrade is not the nicest. When I arrived yesterday, short on sleep and covered in stale sweat, I thought I had arrived in some super-dodgy third world country.

That changed though with every meter walked and by the time I was at my hostel (10-12 minutes), I had already come past some nice buildings and people in the street looked normal (i.e. not homeless).

The government buildings are made to show off and are kept in good shape.

At least most of them. Some still show the signs of 1999, when

Vaguely I remember Deutsche Bahn’s advertisement for overnight trains: “Arrive refreshed at your holiday location”, “Save one day of travelling”, etc.

Those reasons and a good experience on a trip to Denmark years ago probably made me decide on the overnight train option.

The journey started well. Turns out when you pay a little extra (and book early enough), you can make the trip from Balaton to Budapest in an airconditioned, reasonably new car. It’s only one car in the whole train but yes, that’s how I like my 21st century!

In Budapest I had about four hours of stopover and with the temperatures once again pushing 40°, I spent quite a bit of it in a mall not far away from the station. Needed to buy a towel anyway.

Fifteen minutes before the scheduled 22:25 departure, the waiting crowd was let onto the platform. Lots of backpackers, some older folks with small luggage. The seater cars we walked by where all in good shape but once we arrived at the 30-40 years old “couchette”, I started to have doubts

That’s hopefully something I’ll be hearing early in the morning tomorrow. The plan is to leave Révfülöp in the afternoon, arrive in Budapest without too much of a delay and then catch the overnight train to Belgrade at 22:30. Should be interesting one way or another.

Balaton has been relaxing and I got a lot of work and travel planning done. When I arrived I thought about leaving the next day but once I had found a few quiet corners, I stuck around for a bit longer.

Not sure about how representative for the whole of Balaton this village is, but if the rest is anything like it, then most of Lake Balaton’s shores are fenced off and only available to paying customers. The fees are low enough (€1.50 a day) but the whole setting is something that would make me not come back any time soon.

Again, that shouldn’t sound too negative. The Lake is really nice and the “hinterland” is pretty much devoid of tourists.