Sighet to Eger

It's not raining at the moment, but who knows how long that will last. We're off to Eger in Hungary. Then 2 days in Vienna and hit Munich Monday night. Michael has decided I am going to drive the mountains today back to Baia Mare. ooookay. We'll see how that goes. He did do screen captures of Satu Mare so we can avoid wrong turns there - I hope.

I hope those of you who are following along are enjoying the trip as much as we are. Feel free to post comments of ask questions.  More later from Eger.

Here  are a few pictures I took on the road. As you can see, they are still using the fences with the "roofs". Note the bright red house.Oh, and it did start raining again as we left.
I'm not sure what denomination the tall spire is, except is it not Eastern Orthodox. Probably Catholic. These tall spires are very typical and the "witches hat" shapes.

I chickened out on driving the mountain road from Sighet to Baia Mare. Turned out there was no fog on the other side and not a lot of traffics so it was not too bad a drive. As Michael said, it was hard to believe we had done it in the dark in the fog. So many hairpin turns. In this photo you can see the road below as we start to make the turn. 50 km takes an hour to an hour and a half.

And here are a few Romanian haystacks. Shot through the car window so not the greatest photo.

The road from Baia Mare to Satu Mare is a string of small towns. You have to slow down to 70 kph or even 50 in town - unless you own an Audi, in which case you use the towns as a means to pass those of us obeying the speed limit. I was scared to death someone would try to cross the street while these crazy people were zooming around us. I found the towns much more interesting than driving on the motorways. Oh and we did make another wrong turn in Satu Mare following the GPS instead of the google map. Ugh.
The sun fiinally came out this afternoon and we actually had the a/c on in the car. We crossed back into Hungary with minimal hassle - the Romanians waved us through. The Hungarians took a little longer. I'm convinced it's the car.
The Hungarian homes are arranged similarly to the Romanian with beautiful front gardens. As I think I noted before, the Hungarians appear to really like iris as many of the homes had a lot of them planted in front of their walls and they are in full bloom.  No where to pull over and take a picture!
Google has been underestimating the time required to get from place to place, but we picked up an hour traveling west. We got to Eger about 5. GPS got us close, but Michael ended up walking down the very narrow street to verify we were in the right place. The street they are on is even narrower. Old town where the local hero held off the Turks in 1552. Popular school trip - there are a lot of kids on the plaza.
For those of you who are getting tired of the synagogue pictures, there is a very nice Basilca in Eger. Built 1831 to 1838. Here's a couple of pictures of the inside. The columns are 3 different colors of marble - gold, brown and red. The second picture is the ceiling. The first was taken halfway down the aisle - which should give you some idea of the size.  

We're staying at another Rick Steves hotel. 11 rooms. Ours is a good sized room on the corner. It's in an old townhouse, but with all the modern "conveniences". This is the first night we have been able to eat outside. Enjoying watching the locals stop for a glass of wine or a beer before heading home for dinner. Here's a picture of my trout dinner. (I know you foodies have been waiting for a picture of the food I've been describing). Oh and it started raining again just as we finished the apple crepe we had for dessert.