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Total ride: 150km in three and a half days, total ascent: approx. 3550 m
Just come back from a great little camping and mountain-biking trip to the Valjevo mountains. We’ve been to this area a fair few times before, but there is plenty still left unexplored, and the area we opted for, around the “mountain” (1244 m) of Medvednik, so-called (medved means ‘bear’) because from some angles the west end looks like a bear’s snout and the other end its rump. No bears there though, that we know of. See the gallery from this trip here. Also, below you should see a Google Earth window where you can see all four days riding, with the terrain covered in fairly high resolution.
You can open the file in Google Earth here, too.
I won’t go into great detail - it’s another one of those trips where you just had to be there. Fantastic nature, great camping experience and lots and lots of unexplored mountain tracks to follow.
Highlights:
- picking wild strawberries, blueberries and sremuš - a plant that has a very strong garlic taste and is also known as Ramsons, or, funnily enough, ‘bear garlic’! Also, loads of raspberries - this is a major growing region, and we made sure we didn’t miss that.
- more of a lowlight: Darko falling on Day One. Not a major fall (they rarely are), but a slip on gravel and no gloves on, so he ended up with a couple of nasty cuts on his hands. That’s a reminder of why cyclists should wear gloves - it’s not just for fashion value.
- riding in the pouring rain on Day Two, with lots of mud to boot. You get used to it after a while and it didn’t bother us at all! Even Zoran, who tried to keep his bike clean the first day soon got into the spirit of it!
- lots of great climbing, 3500 m of it, which was good for training! And there’s nothing like getting to the top of a peak like Jablanik or Ranjenica and seeing the world at your feet!
- lots of downhill runs too, not many of them very extreme, just right for practicing safe descending. I think the skill I got to work on most was reinforcing the habit of keeping an eye NOT on the road beneath my wheels, but the next 5-10 metres ahead, which gets you simply flying over everything and in a much safer way.
Too much to mention here, check out the rest of the pictures and next time, come with us mountain-biking in Serbia!
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Posted on July 8th, 2009 by markowe
Filed under: MTB Serbia (All)
sounds like a great trip!
cheers!
Hi Mark,
Congratulations on your blog. I have been enjoying reading about your mtb adventures in Serbia. I lived in Belgrade for three yrs and am now trying to make a better use of my old mountain bike than riding in Ada. Used to ride quite regulalry with friends in the Washington DC areas but that was some time ago. Need to work on my fitness to get out again and enjoy the hills. I hear Fruska Gora has plenty of trails. Are any of them marked ? Would you have any suggestions on where/how to get started?
Cheers,
Giovanni
Hi,
Cool - yes, riding circles round Ada I guess gets a little limited after a while
I guess if you haven’t ridden hills much recently then it will be quite tough to get back into it to begin with. Fruška gora certainly comes recommended - maybe one idea would be to start off riding the paved roads on Fruška gora first? If you have a car you could drive up to the very east end of Fruška gora, which you can reach from the “old road” to Novi Sad via Stara Pazova, and drive up the ridge as far as you feel like. That would be a nice ride to start with - it is a very gradual uphill, not too demanding. There are not that many asphalt roads on Fruška gora, so if you get a map, you can see that you cannot really get lost - there is the one long ridge road called the Partizanski put, and pretty much all the rest head downhill to either the north or south side of the hill range.
That’s the slight problem with Fruška gora - it is mostly either long climbs or long descents, but fortunately it’s not too high, so you can always climb back up in 20 minutes or so if you end up down the bottom!
If you want to ride trails, there is more potential there for getting lost and some of the trails can be quite demanding because of their steepness (and a few quite technical parts). Trails are marked, but not in detail. The main markings are the red heart symbol (in a white circle) which marks all the main trails (the marathon trail which covers a large part of FG), but they don’t really tell you where you are going! However, if you stick to them you can ride around as long as you want and you will always come out either at the top or the bottom of Fruška gora eventually!
I hope that’s a start, maybe I can help out more if you decide to come this way for a ride.
Hi Mark,
sounds like a decent spot to do some nice mtb trips. will be moving to belgrade soon (coming from switzerland), and after a first transalp last month i would like to carry on cycling in serbia. any recommendations are most appreciated…
cheers,
benno
Definitely - well when you get here we can get in touch and I can give you some ideas. I don’t know if you use GPS, but you can check out the Freebiking site at http://www.freebiking.org/Atlas/atlas.html - you probably can’t follow the Serbian, but the maps are clickable, and when you find an area you are interested in you can click the icon at the top left that says “vožnje” and download a GPX file, or more than one. Even if you don’t use GPS, you can convert these to a Google Earth KML file (free online converter here - http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/map?form=googleearth) and check the routes out in GE.
Wishing you a safe and smooth move to Belgrade!
Greetings:
I am working in Serbia and would like to participate in a hiking/MTB gathering during the weekends. Any suggestions? Thanks.
Kenny
where about are you working? i wil arrive on Monday next and work in belgade, but first without my bike. should keep in touch for future occasions…
Working in Belgrade. Give a call when you arrive and we can schedule some MTB trips.
Kenny
063/361-663
Hi guys. Always happy to do some biking so stay in touch! Bear in mind that winter is approaching and once it starts getting cold and wet, that’s pretty much the end of it for the year. Also, my wife and I have a wee little mountain-biker arriving in November, so I won’t be taking any more trips far afield this year. However, I am always up for a ride around Fruška gora, which is plenty for starters!
If you happen to be into MTB XC racing then there are a couple of Open events planned in October which you could take part in, no problem.
As for hiking, probably a good bet would be to hook up with one of the “mountaineering” societies, who often plan one- or more-day trips to various locations that are a bit more mountainous than Belgrade! Try http://www.zeleznicar.org.rs/ - hope that helps, and feel free to contact me via the site if you are up for a day’s ride somewhere nearby!