Day 46: Follow, follow the sun

Isaccea to Maliuc (60km)

I had been told to meet the police back down at the river at 8am to “make sure I left Isaccea”. I arrived shortly before them, but when they did, they opened the station and helped carry the kayak down to the river. The benefit of keeping the kayak in the station overnight meant that once again, nothing was stolen, reducing the percentage of Romanian days where something has been stolen to a very respectable 50%. Kayaking the Danube.

It was a gorgeous morning on the river. My day started with a long straight section with the morning sun directly in front of me, leading the way. My aim for the day was to get through Tulcea, the last town on the river, and then continue into the Delta, setting up a shorter day to finish tomorrow. I was told by the police to stop in Tulcea where I would receive the official entry form for Romania. There was barely any wind all morning and I made good progress to Tulcea, the river leaving Ukraine shortly before I did so. I stopped in Tulcea and was quickly met by a couple of policemen, who again were extremely nice. I am starting to resent how nice the police have been; it is making it harder to keep up my ‘I hate Romania’ attitude.

I used my wait in Tulcea to visit the supermarket and stock up for the last day and a half. At this stage, I have abandoned any sort of health initiative, my shopping basket now resembles that of someone planning a children’s party, filled to the brim with chocolate and sweets. I returned to the kayak just in time to be met by the police who gave me the necessary papers and wished me well. They were a little confused by the issue date on my passport and as to how I’d gotten from the UK to Romania so quickly. Fortunately, most people don’t know how long it takes to kayak down the Danube, so their confusion remained nothing more than that.

Leaving Tulcea was not the most pleasant, the place was crowded with little speed boats that flew past every couple of minutes, creating waves that slows progress considerably. Soon though, I was entering the Danube Delta. The Delta is a series of channels running all the way to the Black Sea. There are three main arms; the northern arm which eventually meanders its way into Ukraine, making it the least appetising route. The southern arm, which is meant to be the most beautiful but not the most direct and the middle arm, which is the busiest route, taking an almost straight line from Tulcea to the Black Sea. Due to its directness, I decided to take the middle route, keen to finish as soon as possible. This middle route, which would later be described to me as the ‘highway’ is certainly not the most pleasant route. Without any boats, it would’ve been lovely, although still not quite as lovely as I’d expected. However, to describe this route as a highway, is incredibly accurate. Boats ranging in size from fishing boat to large ocean tanker passed by with frustrating frequency. The river was now only about 50m across in most sections, meaning that the waves created by any boat that came past not only impacted once, but then again when they rebounded of the river bank and came back to you. In the brief interludes between boats, the paddling was excellent, the current remained surprisingly strong and my speed was good.

I covered a further 35km from Tulcea, arriving in Maliuc as the sun was contemplating setting, leaving a very exciting 40km to go. I have been battered and burnt, sunk and swum, robbed and saved, I’ve survived it all and tomorrow, I will finally paddle into the Black Sea.

Kayaking the Danube. Kayaking the Danube. Kayaking the Danube. Kayaking the Danube.