Three sentences on Kovin

IN HUNGARIAN

Szent Ábrahámtelke, now Ráckeve  as of autumn of 2020.

According to medieval Hungarian charters, after Smeredovo fell to the Ottoman Empire in 1439, a group of Serbians fleeing from the royal free town of Kevevára, an important Danube crossing point on the southern border, wandered for months around Pest and the Szentendre Island, until they finally settled in Szent Ábrahámtelke, in what is now Ráckeve, on the island of Csepel, Hungary, a place where a ferry crossed the Danube, similar to their former home.

The fort of Kovin and the Dunavac (source)

The formerly fortress of Keve, which was originally located on a Danubian Island, was not only threatened with destruction by the Turks (it was invaded in 1552 at the latest), but also by the condition of the southern walls of the fortress and, according to Frigyes Pesty's writing on the disappearing counties, by the Danube, or more precisely by its branch called the Dunavac, which was constantly being washed away: '"In 1879, a fall of more than a hundred metres occurred, and a considerable part of the fortress fell victim to the river again. On this occasion, several objects from the barbarian period are unearthed and news of the ancient antiquity of the settlement is brought to light."

Keve county in the Kingdom of Hungary (source: C. Tóth Norbert)

After the peace treaty of Passarowitz liberated Temesköz, now known as Banat, from Turkish rule, the world changed so much that the southern Hungarian counties, such as Keve County, like Bodrog County, were searched in vain by experts in the revival of the contemporary administration, who, based on military considerations, finally turned part of its territory into a military frontier, and its seat was no longer called Kevevára, but Kovin.

The Belene Archipelago

IN HUNGARIAN

Nature can create hell on Earth, but a volcano emerging from a cornfield is different from a man-made communist correctional labour camp on an island in the Danube. The Belene prison island in Bulgaria wants to forget the horrors of the communist era, in some ways too well underway, but the black stain of the past is probably indelible from the green island.

Marshes on the eastern part of Belene Island © Александър Иванов (source)

I first read about the history of Belene Island in Nick Thorpe's book "The Danube - A Journey Upriver from the Black Sea to the Black Forest". Its history is quite unknown, but perhaps the story of the Soviet Gulag Archipelago can be paralleled. Belene Island is also unique in that it is the largest island in the Danube in Bulgaria and is located close to the southernmost point of the Danube. We are closer to reality when we talk about the Belene as an archipelago, because sandbar and island formation is still active in this stretch, not only in the main branch but also in the smaller Danube riverbeds. Here, the islands die a "natural death", attached to the larger islands or to the riverbanks. 

The Belene archipelago consists of a main island, also known as Persin (Персин) Island, joined to the north by Kitka (Китка) Island (elsewhere Golyama Barzina), with only a narrow Danube-branch marking the thinning boundary. By the shapes of the floodplain, we can discover several smaller islands hidden in this backwater. To the north of Kitka there is the beautifully named Milka (Милка), in this case not a chocolate, but a female name. Calvados (Калвадос) is the only island in the Danube to my knowledge that is named after a type of alcohol, Calvados being a distillate made from cider from northern France, which some local with a sense of humour must have edited Google maps. There are also a few unnamed Bulgarian islands that have merged with the Romanian or left bank, some that are real islands on the Romanian side of the fairway, and extensive bars in the Danube at lower water levels.

There are three other islands in the southern Danube arm, near the settlement of Belene, namely Magaritsa (Магареца), Belitsa or Štureca and the lowest downstream, Predela (Предела). They also have a descriptive name, and in the same order they are translated in English as Donkey-, Cricket- and -Frontier island. The latter takes its name from the fact that it lies on the border between the Bulgarian provinces of Pleven and Veliko Tarnovo.

The Belene archipelago covers an area of about 54 square kilometres, roughly the size of Szentendre Island in Hungary. It is 14 kilometres long as the crow flies, 16 kilometres according to river kilometres and has a maximum width of six kilometres. In contrast to Szentendre Island, the entire area of the Belene archipelago lies on the floodplain and is basically unsuitable for permanent human settlement.

The Belene Archipelago (edited from Googleearth)

Until the spring of 1949, Belene was a relatively poor village with a Catholic Bulgarian population. Its poverty was due to the fact that much of its land lay on the flood plain of the Danube, and not only the islands but also the land on the right bank was flooded almost every year. And the flooded land was not suitable for wheat, only for maize, so white bread was considered as a luxury. The population of Belene used the islands for floodplain farming, mainly for animal husbandry. In the spring, cows, pigs and sheep were driven across the Danube and then driven back to the village in the autumn. The islands provided timber for building and firewood, the low-lying wetlands were full of fish, and the extensive flower meadows were a great source of bee-keeping. This idyllic land use ceased overnight in May 1949. 

The pontoon bridge at Belene (source)

On May 1, 1949, just four days after the Bulgarian Interior Minister's decree approving the construction of the correctional labour camps, two officials appeared in Belene and the islands were effectively seized on behalf of the Interior Ministry. This involved the arrival of guards who drove the 20,000 livestock of the locals, hives and all, off the island at short notice. Until then, the communists had not had much support in the village, but sentiment reports this summer indicated that the dissatisfaction of the population was so great that the investment was in doubt. 

Later, as time went on, this animosity slowly faded as many of the villagers found work and a good living as camp employees. Among them were most of the guards and administrative staff. Some prison guard later became mayor of Belene.

The situational map of the Belene Island's forced labour camp sites (source)

The first group of inmates arrived on the island in the summer of 1949. The arrivals were difficult to keep secret, as the only pontoon bridge to the island was via the centre of Belene. The first 300 inmates were still living in branch-covered pits, and it was their job to build the camp and barracks. A wide variety of social groups were gathered here, including former members of parliament, members of opposition parties, prominent members of the middle classes, including the former mayor of Sofia, singers and church people of all denominations. There were intellectuals, military officers, kulaks, anarchists, monarchists, social democrats, agrarians and later even communists. In the 1950s, even listening to western music or dressing in western style was enough to get you into a forced labour camp. The only thing they all had in common was that they were all sent to Belene without a conviction. Initially, it was only possible to send someone to a correctional labour camp for six months, but in 1951 the duration was increased to three to seven years. Nevertheless, it was not uncommon to be imprisoned for 14 years in various Bulgarian forced labour camps, as Belene was not the only one, although it was the largest and longest-running. The other equally notorious place was Lovech, in the Balkan Mountains, but there were at least 40 other labour camps, although this is not an exact figure either, as there were temporary labour camps.

There were five camps scattered on Belene Island, marked with a Roman numbers. Site I is still in operation as a prison, since 1953. Currently, 500 prisoners are serving their sentences here. It is the closest to  Belene settlement, with a straight road leading from the pontoon bridge. What distinguished it from the work camp was that the prisoners were brought here by court order, which did not mean that there was no overleap between the camp and the prison. In 1953, when following the death of Stalin amnesty was granted to political prisoners sentenced to forced labour in Bulgaria, many were not released but transferred to the prison. In 1957, the supervision of the prison was transferred to the Ministry of Justice. Site No. II was the actual forced labour camp, enclosed by barbed wire, moats and watchtowers. It was far away, in the eastern part of the island, surrounded by marshes, 10 kilometres from Belene. Here political prisoners were overseen by guards with machine guns. Because of the island's great distances, these guards were mounted on horseback and equipped with whips. The prisoners here did hard physical labour, building dykes, draining swamps, agricultural work and deforestation.

According to camp residents' recollections, the barracks had no heating, there was no medical care and contact with the outside world was restricted. The camp was designed for 3,000 people, but between 1949 and 1953 a total of 12,000 people stayed there. If we take the whole period between 1949-1989, this number could reach 30,000. The food was most often diluted soup, with dry and/or mouldy bread, and sometimes the soup or tea was frozen in winter. Most died of starvation, freezing, lack of medical care and torture. According to survivors' recollections, the bodies of prisoners were sometimes fed to pigs, but flogging was a common punishment, after which the prisoners were tied up naked in a swampy place where the mosquitoes carried out the rest of the torture. The people who died on the island were buried in mass graves, but their location has not been discovered to date. 

Site IV was located on the island of Shturets, where the women prisoners were housed. Camps III and V were working places for prisoners, one was an agricultural facility and the other a brick factory. On Belene Island, a total of 2,000 hectares were farmed after the Danube floods were eliminated by a system of dykes built by forced labour.

Belene Site II. (source:  Krum Horozov)

Despite being the longest running and largest forced labour camp in Bulgaria, Belene was not permanently in use. Such camps operated in Bulgaria from the communist coup of 9 September 1944 until the fall of socialism, despite Bulgaria's public denial. Even at the very end, in the summer of 1989, people were interned in Bulgaria without trial. Belene was first operated as a labour camp from 1949 to 1953, with a 3-year break until 1956, but the Belene prison continued to receive detainees. In the autumn of 1956, after the failed October revolution in Hungary, the camp reopened and operated until 1959. According to memoirs, this period was the most brutal period of Belene. In 1959 the camp was closed and the prisoners were transferred to the quarry of the Lovech forced labour camp. However, the bodies of the victims who died there were transported back to Belene Island by trucks until 1962. There were two rounds a day, one in the morning and one in the evening. The bodies were sometimes dumped in the Danube, but most of them were buried in unmarked mass graves on the smaller islands. The simultaneous operation of the prison and the labour camp blurred the boundaries in the memory of the locals. Very few of those who recalled the events could tell the difference between the two, so the two institutions were often lumped together. 

Site II. reopened in 1985, when the national-communist government began forcibly assimilating the Turkish and Pomak minorities. You could get to Belene just by refusing to change your name to Bulgarian. Typically, resistance leaders were interned on the island. These measures lasted until the fall of state socialism, and when the borders were opened 300,000 Bulgarian Turks emigrated to Turkey.

The Belene Island memorial (source)

The fall of state socialism in Bulgaria should be put between quotation marks, because in 1990, in the first free elections, the Bulgarian Socialist Party, the successor to the Communist Party, won an absolute majority in the new Parliament. Although there were trials against the people who supervised the forced labour camps, none of them were convicted. On the one hand, most of these people were no longer alive, some of them died during the trials, but they were not fully prosecuted because the official documents were mostly lost or destroyed. In other words, in the absence of official documents, it could be said that such camps never existed in Bulgaria. It is therefore difficult to come to terms with the past, based solely on the accounts of guards and prisoners. The documents have disappeared, there are no traces of old mass graves, and the survivors are slowly dying out. In Bulgaria, survivors feel that there is a lack of confrontation, that there is no institution to deal with the crimes of the communist period.

And on the Belene Island, nature is slowly reclaiming what was once taken away. The eastern half of the island has been a protected area since 2000 and is home to many bird species. Four of the island's former large marshes are being revitalised; the dykes, built up from the inmates' blood sweat and tears, are being dismantled by conservationists to allow the Danube to reclaim its floodplain. This is why the Belene archipelago is now known as both "Bulgaria's Dachau" and the "Pearl of the Danube". 

Monographies, images and memories on Belene for further reading:

• https://beleneisland.org/history/?lang=en
• https://www.businessinsider.com/my-visit-to-the-gulag-where-my-grandfather-was-tortured-2021-9
• https://vagabond.bg/dark-tales-belene-3275
• https://us4bg.org/news/belene-2019/
• https://webcafe.bg/report/483133946-belene-syakash-nikoga-ne-e-bilo/gallery
• https://belene.bg/en/tourism/belene-memorial-park/
• Daniela Koleva: Belene: remembering the labour camp and the history of memory. 2012.
• Lilia Topouzova: Reclaiming Memory: The History and Legacy of Concentration Camps in Communist Bulgaria. 2015.

The lost Danubian park of Paks

IN HUNGARIAN

There are several bad examples form riverside settlements, just like qays in Budapest, on how to isolate the inhabitants of a municipality from the Danube with transport infrastructure. On a smaller scale, this has happened elsewhere in Hungarian rural towns. In Paks, this is still a sore point, despite the fact that the investment in question, the construction of Route 6, took place seventy years ago. 

The opening ceremony at Paks, with the Soviet monument still standing on the left.
(Fortepan / UVATERV)

The above picture was taken sometime in late 1952, at the opening ceremony of the Paks section of Route 6. The exact date is uncertain and the event was not reported in the press of the time. The Tolnai Napló also only wrote on 2 November 1952 that "the workers of the Paks Concrete Road Construction Company collectively undertook to connect the Route 6 between Szekszárd and Budapest by 22 November, the time of the 3rd Hungarian Peace Congress." In fact, it is even possible that the pening ceremony was postponed to the following year. According to press reports, the entire route connecting Budapest with Pécs was opened in May 1953, and there were inauguration ceremonies in the villages concerned. The construction work did not go smoothly, with workers often absent without justification or arbitrarily leaving the roadworks, presumably because of the cruel and forced working conditions during the communist era. It was not only the road that was built, but also the ancillary facilities attached to it, such as bridges, overpasses and road crossings. These workers were locked up for months on end in education camps. According to local memories, the road reached Paks from the north, from Dunakömlőd, where the local section was completed in 1951.

Certain geographical conditions at Paks also made the road construction difficult. The Danube floodplain widens for several kilometres north of Paks towards Bölcske and south towards Fadd and Tolna. However, at Paks, the tilted loess blocks of the Mezőföld rise directly above the Danube, for example, at the Brickworks section, more than 60 metres above the zero level of the Danube, but also at the roman-age Lussonium fortress (later Bottyán fort) at Kömlőd, part of which was eroded laterally by the Danube. Paks owes its advantage over other settlements in the area mainly to its location directly on the Danube, which is free of flooding. At the same time, the steeply sloping edge of the Mezőföld and the erosion of the Imsós bend made transport along the Danube impossible. On older maps, the road to Kömlőd was marked on the loess plateau west of Malomhegy. The situation was improved by the cutting of the Imsós bend in 1841, which deprived Kömlőd of its Danube bank, but at the same time deprived the Danube of a hairpin bend particularly suitable for the formation of ice dams. 

The almost vertically sloping embankment and the huge cost of securing it was the reason why the Pusztaszabolcs-Paks railway line was not completed as originally planned as far as Tolna. The Paks terminus of the railway, which was opened in December 1896, was far north of the town centre, at the brickworks. 

At that time, the major transport line of Paks was the Deák Ferenc Street-Szent István tér-Dózsa György út-Tolnai út, which passed through the city centre. This artery was moved to the Danube bank in 1952. Route 6 was built from the Rókus Chapel to Kölesdi út on a new route, with a significant section of the road being built directly alongside the Danube. The southern section of the new route also required the construction of an embankment, as it crossed a low-lying area (around the cannery) where maps a few hundred years ago had indicated a lake and marsh. Paks was thus separated from the Danube by an increasingly busy road, which also served as a flood protection embankment, and the new road meant that the Danube park, which is immortalised on countless postcards, had to be demolished. Once the main community space of the city, the Danube Park was created from the land of János Flórián. The rose garden with its pergolas and rose beds was later joined by a Japanese garden, and in 1898, the year Queen Elizabeth was assassinated, a chestnut grove was planted along the Danube. All this was lost in the road construction, and only the Elizabeth Promenade was saved. 

In 1976 another investment made the connection of the village with the Danube more difficult. The construction of the nuclear power plant made it necessary to extend the railway line, abandoned in 1896, but only as far as the construction site. After 80 years, the construction of the railway resumed, parallel to Route 6 on the Danube side. The Pusztaszabolcs-Dunaújváros-Paks railway line also used to carry passengers, but the service has been closed since 2009.

In Paks, there is occasionally discussion of improving the city's connection to the Danube, but this is unlikely to happen without relocating the road and railway. We conclude this post with a look back at what life on the Danube was like in Paks before the road and railway were built, with its water park and boat mills. We use postcards from before 1945 and photos of Paks dated 1937 by János Kenedi from Fortepan. 

Paks, Danubian park, demolished during the construction of Route 6.

Danubian panorama at Paks. In 1861 there were 56 boat mills in operation.

The Haga Danube pool next to the chestnut grove.

The Danubian pool at Paks and seven boat mills.

Full house in the pool.

Paks, ship station. The first steamboat arrived in Paks in 1846.
The scheduled passenger traffic ceased in 1964, after this time the Fishing cooperative used it.

Paks, Danubian detail

Boat mills of Paks

The ship station.

The ship station from the different angle, whith the chesnut promenade.

The chestnut alley planted in memory of Queen Elizabeth.
This is all that remains of the Danube Park today.

The trees of the Elizabeth alley.

Steamboat on the Danube at Paks.

The ship station with the chesnut alley.

Twilight of the boat mills. (Fortepan / Kenedi János)

River crossing. (Fortepan / Kenedi János)

Women washing linen at the ship station. (Fortepan / Kenedi János)

On the bank of the great river. (Fortepan / Kenedi János)

Drying fishnets. (Fortepan / Kenedi János)

Waiting. (Fortepan / Kenedi János)

First image of the newborn Kis-Háros Island

IN HUNGARIAN

There are still a lot of people in Hungary who are older than the Kis-Háros Island near Nagytétény, Budapest. 

The Kis-Háros Island emerges from the Danube in 1940 (source: Hadtörténeti Múzeum, section: 5062_1)

Recently, an educational video about the island of Kis-Háros was uploaded to BudapestVideo.hu, showing the hidden natural values of the island. The nearly three-hectare area was protected in 1999, six years after the declaration of the neighboring "big brother" Háros Island. The video takes us back to a story we wrote 8 years ago, which raised a seemingly intractable question that has remained unanswered ever since: when exactly did the Kis-Háros Island form?

"The Kis-Háros Island was born as a gravel bar as a result of river regulation sometime in the 20th century. It is impossible to pinpoint the exact date of its birth, as the gravel bar gradually rose from the Danube." 

Before the above aerial photograph was found, the only answer to the question would have been sometime before 1967, as this is the earliest aerial photograph of the island on the fentrol.hu website. Earlier maps usually omitted the Kis-Háros Island. It is not on the 1941 military map and is also missing from the 1958 town planning base map of the Nagytétényi section. However, it could have been on the 1941 map, next to the last houses of the Baross Gábor district, which stretches down to the Danube, as far as the aerial photo was taken in 1940 is concerned. Unless it is a flyspeck on the map, the black spot is the Kis-Háros Island and its first reflection in the history of the islands in the Danube, which are constantly being created and destroyed. 

The Kis Háros Island during the autumn of 1968 (fentrol.hu)

That black spot cannot be a flyspeck for several reasons. If you compare it with the 1968 aerial photo, you can see that its location is correct. In the 1940 photo, the river color and the flooded bank make it look very much like they were flying over Nagytétény during high water level. Only the canopy of freshly sprouted trees on the gravel reef is sticking out of the water. This gravel reef is where it is because the sister island of Háros was annexed to the right bank of the Danube in 1911 (interestingly, Háros and Hunyadi Islands were probably administratively part of Szigetszentmiklós until 1950 and only became part of the capital through the Greater Budapest concept.

The Kis-Háros Island was therefore already an island in 1940, and the few meters of trees that settled on it suggest that the island's origins are not far off the mark if we put its origins in the second half of the 1930s. In this case, the age of the island would be around 80-85 years. 

To conclude, here is the educational film about the island that inspired this post:

Thanks to the crew for their thought-provoking work! 

Sources:

• https://budapestvideo.hu/video/a-kis-haros-sziget?fbclid=IwAR1kWxrr1mxnWbeqa842zmt2qLR_XAEF9XyIfwMIsrZGfIsxw9RXfRICD2I
• http://www.termeszetvedelem.hu/index.php?pg=pl_20-54-TT-99

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

The two bridges of Ada Kaleh

IN HUNGARIAN

The island of Ada Kaleh was famous of many reasons; its Turkish inhabitants, its rose petal jam, its cigars, its minaret, its fate and history. And it was famous for its fortress, the survivor of many sieges. This fortress was not only built to hinder the Turkish forces sailing up on the Danube, but it also guarded a river crossing. This crossing has been witnessed by two bridges in the 18th century.

Ada Kaleh in the 18th century

The first fortress of Ada Kaleh was started to built in 1691 by Veterani, a general of the cavalry of the Habsburg monarchy. This general gave the name of the famous Veterani caves nearby. Due to its strategic position the fortress witnessed many sieges. At the end of the 17th century the fortress was built up by weak earth ramparts so a Turkish counter attack captured it and the peace treaty of Karlowitz (1699) left the island in Turkish possession. In 1717 Habsburg troops besieged Ada Kaleh and after months of encirclement eventually they captured it in August and two years later the Treaty of Passarowitz confirmed the conquest. 

After the peace treaty a new fortress has been constructed with twenty year's effort. The rectangular shaped fortress was made up by stones and bricks, positioned in the middle of the island, but ramparts and bastions protected the entire area. On the right side of the Danube (then Turkey, now Serbia) a watchtower has been built and named fort Elizabeth. This tiny outpost was connected to Ada Kaleh through a pontoon bridge — according to a contemporary drawing. Fort Elizabeth has been demolished by the independent Serbian government in 1868. 

The new fortress on Ada Kaleh remained in Austrian possession until 1738, when a new war broke out between Austria and Turkey. After several month of siege, the Turkish army managed to capture the island with the just finished fortress. The seriously damaged Ada Kaleh was rebuilt and the German settlers has been ousted and replaced by Turkish people. 

Ada Kaleh in 1790. (source)

After a half century's peaceful period a new Austro-Turkish war broke out and the fortress changed its owner once more, however only for a short time. In 1790 Austria captured Ada Kaleh, but they were forced to leave after the peace treaty of Sistovo. 

This short Austrian rule is represented with another pontoon bridge, which can be found on mapire.eu, the map of Wallachia in year 1790. The bridge connects Ada Kaleh with the left side of the Danube and obviously served military purposes. This second bridgehead was situated near a gap on the ramparts seen on the 1737 situations plan. There is no such gap on the other side, facing Fort Elizabeth, this pontoon bridge might have a bridgehead near one of the bastions. I found no evidence if these two bridges co-existed, but it might have happened during times of war or when Fort Elizabeth and Ada Kaleh has been built at the same time. 

The two bridges of Ada Kaleh

After 1790 a peaceful era started on the island lasting with only one period of war (1916-1918) until 1972, when the whole island submerged due to the construction of the Iron Gates 1. dam. The Turkish military did not maintain the two pontoon bridges, as the fortress slowly lost its military importance (and garrison as well). With the decline of the Turkish rule on the Balkans Turkey has first lost the left side of the Danube, and later the right banks as well. But Ada Kaleh itself remained in Turkish possession until 1912. The inhabitants had to use boats and regular Danubian passenger ships to leave the island. But that is another story...

Dissolving - Horsepower in the Danube

IN HUNGARIAN

Horses in the Danube. Waggons in the Danube. The past comes alive on pastor Gergely Hörömpő's old pictures from Vác.  Technology might develop from time to time, but human habits remain the same. Decades come and go, and vehicles return to the river. Where they no longer belong. The waggons of modern times no longer drink the river's gray water. 

Dissolving. Cars, quads and sometimes motorbikes. Although the environment has changed, specific parts of the river have became protected by environmental law. National Parks, World Heritage Sites, Ramsar Sites, Natura 2000 territories has been established. No motor vehicles are permitted to enter any of them. Not even at one place.  

Rangers of national parks, foresters, members of the local trainband are unwilling to answer the question: what can a law-abiding citizen do in this case?  

It is simple: as an ordinary citizen you can do almost nothing... Of course you can take a photo (illegal) you can stop him (illegal) etc., etc. Anything you try, you won't succeed. We also have poor results, that is why they are everywhere, although it is clearly illegal. This is the situation, sorry...

So that is why it is important to make a disclaimer: The "Dissolving" post name has been taken from the Poemas del río Wang blog, the author of the pictures only photographed the landscape, the unfitting items noticed only at home. We apologize for taking the pictures of any individual on the last two images...

Danubian Island of the year 2017

HUNGARIAN

This is the fifth time the Donauinseln blog starts its poll for the Danubian Island of the year. You can vote for the three nominated islands between 13th October and 31th December 2015.

The aim of this poll is to focus attention on the mostly unknown islands of the Danube. Most of you probably visited the Seychelle Islands before any Danubian Island. As we stated this is the fifth poll, and we hope we have started a tradition and more-and-more people will learn about these islands across the Globe.

The winners so far (you might noticed this is a Hungary-based blog):
2013. Kompkötő Island, Vác
2014. Helemba Island, Esztergom
2015. Kismarosi Island, Kismaros
2016. Szalki Island, Dunaújváros

This year our readers have selected two islands in the qualifying rounds. Through our choice, the Babakai-rock we expect a David and Goliath struggle between the largest Danubian Island, the  Slovakian Žitný ostrov/Csallóköz. We start the introduction in alphabetical order, with the island we thought worthy enough to participate in the poll.

Babacai-rock, Coronini, Romania

The Babacai rock is not only the smallest among the three nominees, but the smallest of all Danubian Islands. It is located at the entrance of the Iron Gates gorge, near Coronini, Romania, facing the Serbian Golubac castle. There are only a few other places along the Danube which captures the human imagination so much. The locals, the soldiers passing by and the travellers also poetized this piece of rock with griping tales and legends.  Most of the legends have been lost, but some of them are still with us.  The purpose of the nomination was a recent article by the blog on the correction of its height on wikipedia. 

Žitný ostrov/Csallóköz, Szlovákia

The largest inland island of Europe is also known as the Golden Garden of the Danube. It has an area of 1886 square kilometers and contains 150 settlements out of which Komárno is the largest at the confluence of the Váh/Vág river. The Žitný ostrov is located in Southern Slovakia, but exept for a minor western part it has a majority of Hungarian population. A future enviroment protection cooperation between Hungary and Slovakia to create a joint national park in the region can be a good purpose of the nomination. 

Prímás Island, Esztergom

It is quite hard to catch the essence of the Prímás Island on a photograph. The northern side of the island, under the castle is urbanized with parks, bridges, recreational areas, and a concrete-torso of a hotel, while the other side towards Tát is a flood plain wilderness with unaccessible riverine forests. A famous feature of this 2.7 km long island is the reconstructed Maria Valeria bridge to Párkány/Stúrovo. Originally it was two islands, named after the archbishops of Esztergom. The Prímás Island is a floodplain often flooded by the Danube. 

survey service

The poll will be closed at midnight 31th December 2017. The results will be available in the first post of the year 2018.

Operation Danubian Mayfly

HUNGARIAN

After four decades, 2012 was the first year to see the Danubian mayfly (Ephoron virgo) swarming above the Danube as an indicator of the significant increase in water quality. Millions of swarming mayflies has been reported in late July and August from many places between Budapest and Tahitótfalu since then every year. They have also been observed on one of the tributaries of the Danube, the Rába. But what is the reason for a nature film, dubbed Operation Mayfly? From what do we need to save them, are they already in danger?  

Since we would recommend to learn the answers from the film in brief the situation is the following: Ephoron virgo usually swarms after dusk, so all sources of artificial light on the river banks is a light-trap for them. Heading for these light sources, the female mayflies are dropping their batch of eggs on the ground instead of the water surface. These eggs will never hatch, so new generation of millions of mayflies will never be born. Lights on bridges is a more serious problem. While mayflies lay their eggs on the asphalt, they are perishing under the vehicles. In Hungary the ecological value of one Ephoron virgo mayfly is 10000 HUF, equivalent of $38USD, it is easy to calculate the ecological loss of the dead mayflies and their eggs. They are working on solving this problem, the Operation Mayfly film is about this struggle. 

So far I have no idea why there are beavers and coypues in this film, if anyone knows please let me know. Operation Mayfly has won the prize for the best document movie in the Ecological values of the Carpathian basin section on the third Internatonal Nature Film Festival in Gödöllő. We would like to take the chance and congratulate for the authors, Filmdzsungel Stúdió and  TZSM productions! 

If the subtitled (please press CC) youtube video is not working, you might find Operation mayfly on the below links:

• http://teka.filmdzsungel.hu/dunavirag_mentoakcio/
• http://www.mediaklikk.hu/video/a-dunavirag-mentoakcio-2/
• https://vimeo.com/ondemand/adunaviragmentoakcio

Eight gravel banks

IN HUNGARIAN

It wasn't cheap, the two almost aerial photographs taken from the Visegrad castle costed 1700 HUF (~5 €). But totally worth it to climb up there to take a look on the upper tip of the Szentendrei Island and the new islands of Kismaros and Nagymaros. 

I would like to start with the least obtrusive thing: there is a recent archaeologic excavation on the Sibrik hill, Visegrád. If somebody is not familiar with this place there was a late Roman fortress on this hill and later it became the center of the Pilis county in Hungary. 

But let's go further:

Date, water level: 10.04.2015 Nagymaros 15 h -27cm

From the left there is the treeless river bank of Nagymaros, a long island and further right the Marosi Island. In the foreground there is the Szentendrei island and the vast gravel bank on its northern tip. And those small white dots aren't motorboats... 

...but gravel banks, eight in number. There are curious people on them. If a curious person has the height of 17,7-1,8 meters the furthermost gravel bank extends 60 meters into the Danube counting from the end of the Szentendrei Island. 

This end of the Szentendrei island is continuosly groving against the stream. More and more gravel bank emerges from the river. Without any human impact these gravel banks will join the body of the island. 

Danubian Island of the year 2016

IN HUNGARIAN

This is the fourth time the Donauinseln blog starts its poll for the Danubian Island of the year. You can vote for the three nominated islands between 13th October and 31th December 2015.

The aim of this poll is to focus attention on the mostly unknown islands of the Danube. Most of you probably visited the Seychelle Islands before any Danubian Island. As we stated this is the third poll, and we hope we have started a tradition and more-and-more people will learn about these islands across the Globe.

The winners so far (please note this is a Hungary-based blog):

2013. Kompkötő Island, Vác

2014. Helemba Island, Esztergom

2015. Kismarosi Island, Kismaros

This year our readers have selected two islands in the qualifying rounds. We start the introduction in alphabetical order, with the island we thought worthy enough to participate in the poll.

Former Fürdő Island, Budapest

Our first nominated island is really unique. This is the first nominated island from Budapest, and the first one which no longer exists. This tiny Danubian island could be found just north from The Árpád bridge, close to the left river bank. In the 18th century an icy flood devastated its trees. Since then it was only a gravel bank, rarely emerging from the river. Just before its final disappearance József Szabó visited the island and collected samples from more than 50 hot springs coming from the limestone hundred meters below.  He also sketched some Roman ruins, possibly remnants of a bath and archaeologists found an altar devoted to the god of the Danube. The Fürdő (Bath) Island has been dredged completely in 1874 due to river regulation works.

Szalki Island, Dunaújváros

The Szalki Island is located next to Dunaújváros, an industrial town in the middle of Hungary. This section of the Danube often changes course. On its predecessor there was a military camp in the beginning of the Roman era, 1st century. Out of its stones an abbey was built on this Island dedicated to Saint Pantaleon, who later gave the name to the nearby village: (Duna)Pentele. This abbey has been swallowed by the Danube in the 16th century. The Szalki island was later attached to the right banks of the Danube and in its side arm they built the ports of the city. Today the Szalki Island is a park, there is a campsite, famous for the rock festival called Rockmaraton. 

Zebegényi Island, Zebegény

Zebegényi Island can be found in the Danube bend. It is a real island on the Danube, which means it is uniquely surrounded by water all year. It is a rather young formation, not long ago it was only a gravel bar without plants on it. By this time this inaccessible strip of land became a popular place for the locals and the tourists as well in summertime. In wintertime it is a shelter for birds. This island was almost excavated during the construction works of the nearby Nagymaros hydroelectric dam, fortunately they stopped the construction, so this island could remain in the Danube Bend.

online surveys

The poll will be closed at midnight 31th December 2016. The results will be available in the first post of the year 2017.