2025-01-03 46 21

Location

Just south of Dénesmajor

Participants

MyrtleGlacy

Expedition

Having been in Hungary for a week, I’d been eyeing one achievement specifically. I wanted to unlock a graticule. Living in the Netherlands, most graticules around me have been unlocked years ago. But Hungary has not been as active as western Europe.

And on January 3rd, there was finally a good hash for me. Close to Gyula where we were staying. Apparently next to a path in a field. And according to my girlfriend the region was somewhat safe. Also very cool, the hash was very close to the Romanian border. So yeah, definitely grabbing that.

We drove to Dénesmajor and I got out. We parked the car at the edge of town at the end of a road. My girlfriend stayed behind to knit in the car as she didn’t feel like going with me this time. I made sure to wear my hiking boots as I felt this one might get messy. And I was sooooo right.

The first part was walking on a grassy embankment. However, it had been very wet the days previous and the ground was more mud than anything else. Every step I took went at least 10 cm lower than the grass would indicate. And the mud clung to my boots like crazy so every step was heavier the further I went. Going down the embankment was a challenge as well, as the mud made every step more slippy and footing was very unsure.

After the embankment, the path was even muddier! There were ditches on both sides and at the edge it was unclear where the mud ended and the ditch began. The middle of the path wasn’t much better as it was clear that heavy vehicles used the path often. This left me 2 very thin bands of slightly steadier mud. I tried to step on clumps of grass as they tend to be firmer ground, but this was just a comfortable illusion. After the first 100 meters the path got better, if only slightly. The mud on my boots was still a problem but at least the sides of the path now had reeds and other plants to both grab and to provide some safe ground with their roots.

On my right there was either swampy forest or very wooded swamp. On my left there were wide open fields that would never exist in the Netherlands. I saw a couple of deer run around on the fields, taunting me with their speed and their ease of movement. A couple of large black birds started circling above my head. It seemed that they were expecting me to just give up and fall over in the cold Hungarian mud. But this muddy path, on the edge of Hungary and Romanian, was not to be my end.

I kept trudging along. I made sure to talk to myself and make loud noises once in a while to scare away animals, or at least let them know that a human was here. I’m pretty sure I heard sounds coming from the swampy foresty swamp-forest, but nothing attacked me, which was good. I don’t know what animals could have attacked me, but this close to Transylvania I would not have been happy if my expectations were met.

As I got closer to the hash, the path improved. It was still dreadful to walk here, but the mud was not quite as thick. I started to think about reaching this hash and unlocking the graticule. Should I leave something? I didn’t bring anything special to leave behind. I decided to make a small monument to my own greatness. My ego in this moment, tired, cold, far away from home and covered in mud, astounds me. What made me think that I should make a monument when all I had to do to reach this place was make my way along a muddy path?

I finally reached the hash. It was about 3 meters off the path, seemingly in between some trees, right at the edge of another (dry) ditch. I took my pictures, let my girlfriend know of my glory and started to collect some bricks and stones. I stacked them so that they might not fall immediately and figured that was about right for this monument.

I started to make my way back to the car. I was not looking forward to having to navigate between lumps of mud again. On the way to the hash, I had avoided the field as that was obvious someone’s property. On the back, I didn’t care anymore. I hadn’t seen anyone around since leaving the car and the field looked unsown. The field was still wet and earthy but the mud wasn’t quite as bad. It was still quite a walk back. Luckily I could stay in the field until the spot where the ditches met the mud. I saw a small path on my right that looked better than the mud and decided to try it. I knew that I had seen a bench on this side of the ditch when I first walked the embankment. I assumed that the path I found would continue all the way to the bench and then let me come up, letting me avoid most of the mud. The path was clearly used once in a while, as there were plastic bottles and other signs of modern humans next to it. Possible some Hungarian farmers came here to fish, or their kids came here in summer to swim. It also occurred to me that, this close to the Romanian border, this spot might have been used by Romanians to cross into Schengen before 2025 when the border was opened.

I kept going and the path, as they so often seem to do on my expeditions, came to a stop. It wasn’t clear if people just stopped walking and turned around or if the winter had removed the obvious markers of a path. I tried to go closer to the field and found some high grass with obvious animal trails that seemed to go every way but the way I wanted to go. The trail I decided to follow kept going for a bit and then ended with a deer carcass. It was mostly bones at this point, but some flesh and fur was still left. This was the point where I, once again, decided to go back and take the path that I at least knew was safe and without major predators.

I walked back on the fishing path and reached Mudland again. My former safe zones were even less safe now, because my own steps had caused a disintegration of the few bastions of muddy grass. I once again trudged on. My boots kept getting heavier. I was surprised at how much mud just clung to my boots without falling off or staying behind after a step. I climbed the embankment and saw a semblance of civilization again. On my right there was the bench that I had so foolishly tried to reach. Who was I to assume that there would be path to a place of comfort and piece? When I reached the car I took stock of the state of my clothes. My boots were covered in at least 2 cm of mud from top to bottom. The attempts of cleaning them off with water from a puddle and some grass helped, but some heavy cleaning would be necessary when I reached home. My jeans were muddy up to my knees but even my coat and my sweater had gotten mud on them. There was mud on the seat of my pants, under my coat. How did it get there? I can only wonder.

I took off my shoes before getting into the car. I hugged my girlfriend and celebrated the unlocked graticule. I started the car and drove off. This expedition was a special one for me, and the memory will remain fresh in my mind for quite a while. And who knows, maybe we’ll go back in summer to visit the monument to my muddy travel at the start of 2025.