Day 7...

Just under 700km clocked in so far and we crossed from the austrian border to slovakia today... Just passed Bratislava and camping outside a hotel to have our first shower in about 3 days and internet since the beginning of the trip! Dozens of stories to tell so far... Today my Sally nearly died on me as my back tyre ripped and the inner tube kept popping out and getting punctured. This was only at 10km of today's ride, we managed to patch it up with some tape and swap it with the front tyre so it wouldn't strain so much with the weight and cycled another 10km towards Malacky in Slovakia where we arrived just after 12pm and all the shops were closed... Desperate for solution we walked around town for half an hour already pondering a train into bratislava... we were facing losing 2 days of cycling because tomorrow is sunday and obviously everything is closed... But that was not to be, we found a closed bike shop were I went and knocked, from inside came a shadow and as he approached the glass I put my hands together and almost got on my knees for him to open. It didn't take much for Gustav to let us into his shop and soon, with miraculous enthusiasm and passion he started work on my sally. By this point my bike stand was broken, one of the brake pads was off (to reducing rubbing on the tumoured tyre), as well as the front mudguard.. Finally all our bikes got a proper patch up and we were again on our way! Gustav was a godsend... someone really is looking out for us!