Day 28: Hail to the fisherman

Stari Banovca to Smederovo (67km)

Today was one of the hottest days so far and a bit of a slog from start to finish. I was on the river nice and early and made good, yet unspectacular, steady progress all the way till lunch. Before reaching my lunching spot, I passed through the fourth and final capital city of the trip, Belgrade. Belgrade is built almost entirely away from the river, only the outskirts are visible and quite unspectacular the outskirts proved to be. The current was painfully slow through the city, in fact at one stage, it honestly thought I was going uphill. Impossible I know, but at the time, it genuinely felt like that.

The afternoon continued to be blisteringly hot, only cooling down as the hours ticked on towards sunset. I have found that the period from about 5-7pm is the best for kayaking. It has cooled down by this stage and the river glistens beautifully in the evening sun. Once again, this period was the best of the day and I rolled into Smederevo shortly before sunset. As has become customary, the kayaking part of the day is only half the story, unlike with most other forms of transport, the day doesn’t end when you arrive at the destination. With kayaking, the real challenges usually begin once the kayak is pulled onto the bank.

I arrived in Smederevo and pulled the kayak onto a boat ramp, I had pulled the kayak about half way out the water and then went for a quick search to see where I could leave it for the night. I found a good spot and headed back to the kayak. As I was approaching, I got chatting to one of the local fishermen. Whilst chatting, I caught out of the corner of my eye, the kayak slowly drifting away from the edge. I immediately began to strip, ready for a swim, a feeling that is becoming depressingly familiar. The fisherman told me to wait and after a small stumble, reached for his fishing rod. He was to heroically hurl his line into the kayak and save the day. It reminded me of a scene from a film where the hero impossibly launches and arrow into a retreating opponent. Unfortunately, this was not quite movie quality, with his first effort, he sent his fishing line directly into a tree and then spent the next 10 minutes trying to untangle it. I again began to strip off, but he again stopped me. He rallied the surrounding fishermen, who all turned their aim and their rods to my kayak. All were extremely unsuccessful. With every passing moment, the kayak was drifting further away. Finally, just as I removed my top, a fishing boat came passed and rescued the kayak, another close call.

A couple of hours later, I was relaxing in the hotel, when the owner came down and asked if I wanted to join him for a Rakiya. I didn’t, but I thought it rude to decline, so I joined him. He spoke that perfectly annoying level of English. Enough so that he felt we could communicate with each other, but not enough to really have a proper conversation. Thankfully, I was only offered one drink and was then allowed to retire to bed.