Day 1
Wien
Architect's apartment | woolly leggings | -10ºC | Strauss and Mahler | Wurst und bier
Day 2
Schönau an der Donau >> Hainburg
15 miles
Herons | two buzzards | three people | frozen water | silence and snow
Day 3
Bratislava >> Esztergom
6 miles + train
Slovakian train | walked the border | St Stephen's Basilica | the Black Gate | restaurants closed | Hungarian heavy metal | New Year's Eve abandoned
Day 4
Esztergom >> Visegrad
17 miles
Basilica domes across the fields | river walk | Hungarian runners | valley of the dogs | bells across the water | blood on the snow | walking into Visegrad as the sky grows dark | strange drumming from the Danube
Day 5
Visegrad >> Szentendre
16 miles over the Pilis Hills
Castles in the mist | medieval fun | hoar frosted forest | ridge walk | man with walrus moustache | hundreds of Hungarians out for a jolly | sunset over the Danube | the temperature rising
Day 6
Szentendre >> Budapest
16.5 miles
Morning bells | early start | river path | leftover leisure | entering the city | car engines, crowds | St Margaret's Island | footsore and triumphant
We dubbed Charlotte Kingston 'Charlotte the Explorer' for her relentless curiosity and her voracious appetite for a challenge. Last December, while most of us were watching re-runs of Only Fools and Horses, she hiked for seven days from Vienna to Budapest inspired by the words and walks of the legendary Patrick Leigh Fermor, returning footsore but triumphant.