Hahaha!

And this was the lovely train to the airport, which sounded as though it was about to disintegrate at any moment as it rattled down the tracks.

It's quite sufficient for horse and carts though hehe.

This was the most interesting-looking thing we could see off in the distance and so we headed in that general direction hehe.

Random stuff on the roadside for purchase - interesting.

This is what we found while wandering in that general direction. Kecskemet is home to just over 100,000 and is considered to be one of the most well-known and one of the most interesting examples of development among the Hungarian towns.

The most exciting thing happening in town was a Peruvian pipe band playing to, well, one person hehe.

According to Lonely Planet, Serbia is a "misunderstood and misrepresented state". Serbia has had a very turbulent couple of decades with wars and much political conflict. I vaguely remember it being all over the news as a kid, along with Kosovo which was a territory of Serbia until it declared itself independent in 2008 and started calling itself a country. I'm not sure exactly how that works, and it is only recognised by some nations as actually being so. Regardless, we were assured that Serbia is as safe as houses to visit these days, and our one and only stop here was the far-northern city of Subotica, not far across the border.

Serbia is home to 7.5 million, and Subotica is home to about 150,000 of them. Subotica is Serbia's fifth largest city, one of its most multiethnic, and has a lot of art nouveau buildings. The one above right is the town hall, built in 1910.

We wandered around and found the central city square in which a New Year's Eve family concert thing was being set up.

Katie withdrew 1000 of the local dosh from an ATM (worth about €10) and we ate it - yummy!

Since there was really nothing happening, we left after about an hour or so and headed for plan B...

...Romania (the home of Dracula)! Romania is a massive country and home to some 22 million folk. No different to anywhere else around here, it has something of an interesting history itself. Romania's income level remains one of the lowest in the European Union, and the country seems to have a reputation (from what I've heard at least) as being a bit of a dodgy shithole. However, my research of the place suggests this is completely untrue, and I'd really like to see some more of it in the future.

We drove an hour across the border to Timisoara. Lonely Planet says it is Romania's fourth-largest city, Wikipedia says it's the second, so who knows. It's home to 300,000 and in a country of 22 million I dare say Lonely Planet is more accurate at placing it fourth. A New Year's Eve bash was already well underway here.

This is Piata Victoriei, a beautiful pedestrian mall with shops and cafes, and of course, Christmas markets.

What we didn't realise at the time is that Romania is an hour ahead of Hungary! So all of a sudden at what we thought was 11pm, the fireworks and celebrations started hahaha!

Pop, bang, fizz, pow!

Ooooo, ahhhhh, wow!

Apparently it is customary to smash glasses and wine bottles and such all over the floor as well. Just after midnight it started torrentially pissing with rain so we made a dash for the car.

So yeah that was our rather impromptu and random New Year's - very cool! On the way back to Budapest (a three-hour haul) we found this idiot near the border stuck fast in the mud after coming off the road, and his mates hurriedly trying to pull him out hehe. I just took photos and watched - it's not like I could speak their language ;)

It's not obvious here but we were getting hammered with some of the heaviest rain I've ever seen! And like I said before, drainage is non-existent so the roads were soaked. Be that as it may we made it back safely at about 3am after a total of 730kms of driving for the day and multiple border crossings. I was exhausted!