Читать книгу Walking in Hungary. 32 routes through upland areas онлайн

58 страница из 60

Regéc Castle, Zemplén, Walk 17

In the early 1980s Pál Rockenbauer walked the National Blue Route with a film crew and the outcome was the very popular television documentary One Million Steps Around Hungary. Rockenbauer took the opportunity to highlight the unavailability of basic walking gear and the lack of budget accommodation along the route for walkers. He was also exasperated by signs of rural decline such as vandalism, litter, the depopulation of villages due to the Communist government’s centralisation policies, and insensitive planning by local authorities.

The political changes in 1988 prompted the MTSZ to suggest a commemoration walk for the 950th anniversary of Saint Stephen’s death and the fiftieth anniversary of the Saint Stephen’s Way. The event was approved and the frontier controls relaxed in order for the two groups of walkers to start at different ends and meet at the middle in Dobgókő as their predecessors had done in 1938.

In 1995 the National Blue Route was officially connected to the E3, the pan-European long-distance path linking Spain with Turkey. Unfortunately the link is broken at the Austrian and Slovakian borders, where it is necessary to come off route and use an official border crossing via the main road. A few Hungarians do walk the entire National Blue Route, which also crosses the Great Plain, and have the badge to prove it. Many of the stages linking the hill ranges can be boring or involve lengthy road bashing, but if you are interested, contact the headquarters of the MTSZ (see Appendix 4) or visit the Cartographia map shop to obtain a copy of the official booklet, Országos Kéktúra: Útvonalvázlat és Igazoló Füzet. It has spaces to stamp the stages, but take your own inkpad as the ones at the stamping points dry out. Cartographia also publishes Országos Kéktúra, an illustrated guide to the whole route. The text is in Hungarian, but its 1:40 000 maps are invaluable for their coverage of all the stages.