A short adventure down the Danube
It was a rainy night in late September last year. I was spending some time tucked away in a corner of Waterford, with a fire and a glass of wine going, trying to do some writing. Pulling together into a coherent whole the strands of research which were the basis of the penultimate chapter of my thesis was a task best done in absolute silence and in solitude, away from the library and the desk in my bedroom in Bray where I do most of my work.
That evening I was up working late. So, when the digest of University of Liverpool’s Classicists mailing list came through at midnight, I was only too happy to take a moment to read through the various announcements. One of them caught my attention immediately. It was a call for rowers to power a reconstructed Roman river patrol vessel (a 4th c. AD lusoria) as part of the EU-funded Living Danube Limes project. The vessel – the Danuvina alacris – was due to begin the final stint of what had been an ongoing epic adventure totally unknown to me prior to that moment. Its mission was to trace the entire Danubian frontier on an authentic Roman vessel, reconstructed as faithfully as possible by the Friedrich-Alexander University. This was the kind of thing, I thought, that some fortunate group of individuals who had no theses to write against threatening deadlines would be able to enjoy.
Reading further out of curiosity, I saw the enticing detail that travel expenses were on offer, and that accommodation and food were also being organised. All I would need, therefore, was the time. I’d have to depart for Bulgaria in just two weeks, but there was also the more distant concern of finding my way back from a remote part of Romania in time to pack and head off again to Switzerland for a research trip in mid-October, just two days after detaching from the group following a week of rowing. All this theoretically possible, all my dates checking out, and feeling enthusiastic (thanks to the wine), I sent off a quick application and forgot about it until the morning.
In fact, I really did forget about it. It wasn’t until I checked my emails and saw an abrupt message from one of the logistical coordinators that I, initially confused, remembered what it was I had done the night previous!
‘Thank you very much for your interest in our Living Danube Limes connecting cruise. We have registered you for team 8 […] Have a nice and enjoyable trip!’
And so, having thrust this unexpected journey on myself while I really should have been writing about the Carthaginians and their own (sometimes disastrous) naval enterprises, I started immediately to plan a way out to Bulgaria. My first thought was to call Ben, one of my closest friends from childhood, who was back in Ireland for a while after spending years in various parts of Greece. To my delight, Ben was as exhilarated by the thought of such as bizarre adventure as I was, and so we began our planning together.
Fig. 1: Ben in Sofia, with the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral behind
We arrived in Sofia off a Ryanair flight in early October and spent a day exploring the city. It was not until the following day, arriving at the bus station from where we were to travel to the Danube itself, that we encountered some of our fellow voyagers. Two men, Geza and Jean, were particularly conspicuous – dressed as they were in convincing late Roman military apparel.
Fig 2: Jean, Geza, Aleksandar, and Kalin (left to right)
We were to start from Nikopol, the ancient (originally Roman) fortress where the Ottomans had beheaded the last Bulgarian tsar at the end of the 14th century. Yet we received news that the Danuvina alacris and its outgoing crew were to meet us some way further downstream at a place called Belene instead. It was a strange sight to see the slender galley, for the first time, making its way steadily downstream. They hailed us in Latin with a heave-ho of vir – virtus!
Fig. 3: First view of the ship (centre under the treeline)
Our captain was an experienced Viennese sailor called Thomas. Among the other experienced members of crew were Kurt, another Austrian who had captained the vessel on a previous stint, and two rowers, Melanie and Franz, who had also taken part in previous stages.
Fig. 4: Decamping on the first morning
Waking up in the cold and clambering out of pop-up tents, it wasn’t too long before we were hauling heavy gear down a precipitous path to where the Danuvina had moored. Straight into the deep end, as it were, and with no formal training, we faced the immediate danger of launching the boat against a heavy current which threatened to pull us into a grounded steel river boat of some size. Pushing off from the port side with long poles with the prow facing upstream, the starboard side had to row hard to turn us into the river before there was room enough for both sides to have their oars out and begin concerted and coordinated rowing out into the centre of the river before we could turn about.
The seat I took up was the position at which I remained for the duration of the trip: second from the back on the starboard side – Ben was on the same position on the port side (to my right). Rowing with our backs to the prow, the most important thing was timing. For myself near the back of the vessel, this meant only mirroring the movements of Franz seated in front of me, yet everyone had to take equal care to stay in time with the lead rowers lest the oars bash off each other and throw everything out of sync. Good form was essential if you wanted to row consistently for long periods without becoming fatigued. An initial challenge which took some getting used to was keeping the long and heavy oars snug against the wooden pegs which acted (in conjunction with a loop of rope), as an oar lock. Oars could easily shift, slide, and displace themselves, and some days they needed to be grappled with repeatedly until they finally settled into a position that felt secure.
Fig. 5: Captain Tom in black
The rowing was more pleasurable than arduous in the fine weather – though at times the heat and the continuous melee of oars on water would get tiring. Yet, all-in-all, the going was often relatively easy. There was certainly time to appreciate where I was, at any rate, coursing down the liminal avenue which has so often been a natural border between states and empires. To my right Romania, and on the left Bulgaria: Alexander had once crossed these waters at a location somewhere nearby before his battle with the Getae to establish a northern frontier in 335 BC.
Stopping for breaks, we could expect the river to bring us downstream some 2 miles per hour. If the wind was blowing in the right direction, we could even pull in the oars and unfurl the sail. With between 15-25 miles to achieve depending on the day, we knew we were in no danger of not getting where we needed to eventually, despite having only (at around 15) half of the rowers which would ideally be needed to power the vessel. The only problem was we were usually working to arrive at an agreed time for a reception party before the afternoon was too far advanced.
Fig. 6: Sail unfurled
Arriving at Svishtov, a legion of reenactors welcomed us, saluting and lining our path out of the port (all to the bombastic sound of Hollywoodesque Roman trumpets blasting out of amplifiers). Later, we were given a tour of the ruins of ancient Novae, the 1st c. AD base of the VIII Augustus Legion, at which prime location the local reenactment group hosts a festival each year.
The following day we reached Ruse, the ‘Little Vienna’ on the Danube, where we took up quarters in a ‘yacht club’ which was rather less luxurious than it sounds but was miles better than a tent in a field. Here we had time and space to tour the town, go to dinner, and try out bars.
Fig. 10: Ruse courthouse
We had had a great reception in Ruse, and the morning of our departure was a truly strange and wonderful experience. A news crew conducted interviews with the more Roman looking bunch while a brass band prepared to play us off. Soon the music and the rest were behind, and it wasn’t too long before we were under the great Danube Bridge connecting Romania with Bulgaria and coming alongside the vast industrial works lining the shore.
Fig. 11: The Danube is still a major highway for the transport of coal and other industrial goods.
The river was not always easy going. We were entering into less inhabited regions now where less help would be available in the case of emergency (though we had tugboats in touch in any event). Whirlpools abounded in this part of the river, and our small boat in places felt quite vulnerable amidst the chaos of our Austrian commanders bellowing at each other (unintelligibly for some of us) from prow to stern in disagreement on the approach to some obstacle or another. ‘Smile and row’, Ivan, the talkative and charismatic bearded Bulgarian military retiree would tell us, tongue in cheek, as we continued to strike the water. In any case the pressure of captaining the Danuvina was a privilege most would not be envious for, and Tom managed wonderfully. In one of the more tense moments of our adventure, we were nearly downed by a half-submerged (allegedly) Nazi river boat which had been dynamited after becoming stuck in the water at some stage in the war. Our overly zealous tugboat operator, who was pulling us along at high speed through this dangerous stretch of water, brought us (accidentally) within centimetres of the wreckage, and we all expected to be frantically manning the water-pump or scrambling for lifejackets.
Fig. 12: The ‘Nazi’ war boat
At the town of Tutrakan, dancers awaited us on arrival. We were offered salted bread, and we each in turn tore off chunks of the impressively large, fluffy loaf sitting on a large plate held out for us by a girl in traditional dress.
We were welcomed to a sit-down meal, we tried local wine, and we were sung local songs. What I thought was most impressive, however, (I was perhaps more pliable having also been offered a little of something that smelled like poitín,) was the fineness of the handmade nets used to catch large fish on the river, some of which a few of us were invited to look at in the workshop of a particularly friendly net and boat maker.
Fig. 15: The friendly net-maker
The final stop before myself and Ben departed the voyage was Silistra (ancient Durostorum where Flavius Aetius, the defeater of Atilla the Hun, was born!). Arriving on the bank, we could see from some way off that large crowds were gathering as we approached. It was a surreal moment when, disembarking, I heard my name being called and saw an arm waving. It was Diana! A woman who had overheard Ben and I on the plane over, talking about our route. She had told us that she lived in Silistra, but we didn’t expect her to show up with her family, all smiles and hugs, welcoming us onto dry land.
The next day, we (somewhat unwillingly) took our leave of the Danuvina and its remaining crew who were one more week from the very end of the voyage. It was an emotional farewell.
Crossing by ferry to Calarashi in Romania, it was one night in Bucharest and then back to Dublin. A few days later it all seemed like a dream. Sunburnt, I arrived at the idyllic Fondation Hardt in Vandœuvres near Geneva where I cracked back into work in earnest. It was the perfect place to make up for a week away from research, and my library chair was a fine and appreciated contrast to the hard wooden bench of a Roman lusoria.
Fig. 20: The Fondation Hardt, near Geneva
Andrew Hill
Andrew is an early career researcher in the Department of Classics, Trinity College Dublin, and is also a member of Trinity’s Centre for Environmental Humanities. He has, recently, successfully defended his doctoral thesis entitled The Libyan Wars: Crisis, Climate, and Conflict in Carthaginian North Africa, an innovative project which investigates the relationship between volcanically induced climate forcing and periods of rapid societal change at Carthage.
Cover photo of the Danuvina alacris by Boryana Stancheva