Cycling among the Zala hills

Itinerary

• From Bázakerettye head towards Lispeszentadorján at the intersection next to the bus turning point.
• At the first (Y-shaped) fork, turn left towards Kiscsehi.
• At the end of the road leading to Kiscsehi, go straight at the intersection onto the forestry asphalt road.
• The asphalt road leads to Tormafölde; you only need to detour to visit the Vétyemi primeval beech forest (to the right; a wooden sign indicates the direction).
• Upon reaching Tormafölde, turn right, then at the first opportunity turn right again; the Szent János Hill, reachable via a steep climb, is this way. (The route returns from the hilltop to Tormafölde on the same road, so the mountain detour can optionally be skipped.)
• Returning to the main road in Tormafölde, turn right, then at the second opportunity turn left towards Kerkateskánd (detour to Szécsisziget).
• In Szécsisziget, turn right at the church, then turn back at the castle, and return to the Kerkateskánd junction mentioned earlier. Turn left at the junction and continue the ride towards Csömödér.
• At the next intersection, turn right towards Páka (the southern Zala bunkers can be accessed from the parking lot just before the intersection).
• In Páka, turn right at the fork after the sports field towards Borsfa/Bázakerettye. From here, a straight road leads through Kányavár and Lispeszentadorján back to Bázakerettye, with no need to detour.
• Arriving back in Bázakerettye, the beach can be reached by continuing straight on Petőfi Street from the starting point of the ride, climbing the hillside opposite (you can return to the bus turning point by the same road).

Detailed description of the ride

Little Azerbaijan among the Zala hills

Bázakerettye is nowadays perhaps best known for its thermal bath, but this was not always the case. The quiet settlement hiding among the Zala hills saw a radical change in its life in 1937 when hydrocarbons were discovered on the village's border. The story began about one and a half decades earlier, in 1923, when geologist Simon Papp persuaded an oil company (the Anglo-Persian Oil Company) to drill boreholes, but no oil was found then. The company withdrew soon after, but in 1935 an Anglo-American company, EUROGASCO, appeared again, starting test drills near Mihályi, close to Budafapuszta. The B-1 well was unsuccessful, and this company almost left as well, but they gave southern Zala attempts a chance, and they did well: the B-2 well produced a proper quantity of oil. The history of the southern Zala oil fields began with these two wells, and during the decades of extraction, another 500-600 wells were drilled in the wider area — the gently rolling hills' rock is often compared to a Swiss cheese.

Historical storms brought many twists to the area: in 1941 the control of extraction was nationalized, but American ownership remained, so in 1944 the paradox occurred that American bombers bombed American oil industry interests in some small Zala villages. (The local B-24 pub's name commemorates this event, and the wall shows it perpetuated in naïve paintings by an anonymous artist.) It was no coincidence that the Wehrmacht tried to maintain its western Hungarian positions to the end, but they were swept away by the Red Army in spring 1945. The communist leadership that came to power a little later obviously disliked that the company then called MAORT was in private (and American) hands, so in one of the most notorious show trials, the company's leaders were accused of sabotaging oil extraction (in vain, no more oil comes to the surface by order). Simon Papp, who continuously tried to maintain extraction as the head of MAORT, was sentenced to death and later to life imprisonment based on fabricated charges — during his prison years, he put his expertise to use working in private confinement...

Bázakerettye had a happier fate (apart from the mentioned bombings), as oil extraction boosted the village's life. In 1938 the thermal bath opened, and a small housing estate was built for engineers in an "American-Zala" style, along with a cultural house, school, bakery, etc. Electricity, gas, and water were introduced to the houses, and telephones were among the first in homes; the oil pump even entered the village's coat of arms. Nowadays extraction only symbolically continues in the area, as the oil field hidden under the Zala hills has mostly been depleted, but wherever you go, you will certainly find an oil pump or a closed well — even among Bázakerettye houses, similar to which the author so far has only encountered in distant Baku. As extraction declined, people began to migrate away, and the village merged more and more into the landscape and other nearby settlements, although Zala oil still provides jobs for several dozen people in the region, and the locals fondly remember the oil industry's (half) past.

Residents naturalized from faraway continents

You leave the village behind with a short but strenuous climb, then first pass a memorial site (appropriately located near a closed wellhead with a marble plaque erected in 1987 on the 50th anniversary of the first successful drilling), then reach the already mentioned B-2 well at the Lispeszentadorján junction. The house facade bears a "museum" sign, but at the end of 2020 the memorial room was moved out of the building so that — presumably in autumn 2021 — an interactive exhibition would open in Bázakerettye. Soon you arrive at the namesake of the first wells, Budafapuszta, where it's worth detouring for the arboretum. The surrounding forests belonged to the Zichy family until 1945 — they also built the hunting castle, and the planted pines around and the nearby small lake still form the basis of the botanical garden. The collection itself was founded in 1954, with 132 species of coniferous and 88 species of deciduous trees planted in the park, partly for public welfare purposes but also to promote the naturalization of tree species from foreign regions and distant continents. Alongside the plane trees and sequoias, swamp cypresses and rhododendrons, plants like hollyhock, false indigo, lily of the valley shrub, Japanese quince, and cotoneaster can be admired in the park, which also includes a hunting lodge, a lookout tower, and even a playground called Makk-Kaland. (Attention! The arboretum operates with rather strange opening hours, so it’s advisable to check in advance if you can enter during your visit.)

After a short descent, you find yourself in the wide valley of the Budafa stream, where you cover just over a kilometer almost on flat ground along the road leading to Kiscsehi. At the fork, continue straight on a forestry road whose start, marked by a small wooden hut and a large timber yard, almost recalls the higher regions of Austria or Slovakia, as does the initial and several kilometers long ascent of the road. Of course, you don't have to expect a major elevation difference, but the seemingly small Zala hills can still put effort on a person. We are not surprised anymore when in the middle of the forest next to the road we find a closed wellhead; we steadily pedal on the asphalt forestry road with occasionally hilly and panoramic sections — also known as the MAORT road. Detouring before Tormafölde is only worth it for the Vétyemi primeval beech forest. A few hundred meters from the road, a forest reserve is accessible along a wide forest road by following the P mark. In the 15-hectare area, beech trees rise almost 100%, with an average height nearly 50 meters, and their age is slowly reaching 200 years. In the strictly protected forest stand, there has been no forestry activity for more than forty years: the "left alone" forest is the site of scientific research but also an interesting sight for laymen. The Ösbükk rest area is an excellent place for eating a sandwich at the foot of the giant trees. Large forests are characteristic of Zala: 31% of the county is forested, and more than two-thirds of the area we traversed (Southern Zala and the Kerka region) is covered likewise.

From here to Tormafölde, it's just coasting downhill; after exiting the forest, you roll past a small settlement section, where at the nearest gate a "Central Park" sign is visible next to the road. The wording, amusing to less-informed tourists, is nonetheless justified: we are in the Centralé district of Tormafölde. The name's origin is particularly interesting: in 1940 a gas-operated power plant was planned here based on German designs, using hydrocarbons brought to the surface nearby. The housing estate belonging to the power plant now bears the Centralé name (meaning "central power plant"), and parts of the finished power plant still exist; at one time, it was also for sale as a "family house for sale".

Glassworks, water mill, water buffaloes

Tormafölde also had industrial traditions: until 1877 there was a glassworks in Vétyempuszta, where bottles in greenish and dirty white colors were made using wood from the surrounding large forests, the ash fat made from it, and quartz-rich sand. Besides various shapes and sizes of glasses and bottles, large storage containers of 4-8 liters were made here, finding markets in Zala, Vas, and Somogy counties, as well as in the Muraköz and Omra regions. There was also a water mill on the Kerka riverbank, of which no trace remains today (the last miller of Tormafölde ceased his activity in the 1960s). However, the village still has a real specialty: on the vineyard hill above the settlement, you will find not only neatly tended vines and pretty wine cellars but also a huge fig plantation. The six to seven hectares plantation can be quite surprising, but on the one hand, anyone who has heard of the Gyékényes fig will not be surprised, and on the other hand, the climate here is very favorable for figs. Those who visit at the right time can pick figs themselves: July and in mid-autumn (September-October) are good months to visit Fig Grove. Next to it stands the lower part of a lookout whose upper three levels were lost in a storm, and it’s always worth climbing here.

Unlike Tormafölde, the neighboring village Szécsisziget has its water mill preserved (although due to renovation it was not visitable until spring 2022). This is significant because the mill on the Kerka is mentioned as early as 1541 (several other water mills also operated in the area) and gained its current form in the 1700s. It operated on the Andrássy family estate in the 19th century and continuously until nationalization in 1952, but — despite developments afterward — it stopped in 1963 because the Kerka’s water was diverted to its current bed. The restored mill will almost certainly be visitable again after renovation. Opposite the mill, on the other side of the road, there is a buffalo reserve, where the large animals can be comfortably observed from the roadside. The reserve aims at gene preservation, presentation, and pasture conservation — the water-loving animals also feel good in marshy areas with acidic, poor-quality pastures; Szécsisziget has a pleasant mud bath for animals weighing up to 500 kilograms. The village also has a castle, last owned by the Andrássy family, but its history stretches back several hundred years. Szécsisziget once had town status and even had a castle, but according to a record from 1636, "the town of Zechi Zigethe was burned down with its palisades, gates, lifting devices, and bridges" — evidently the Turks were involved. The castle was built on the old castle site; the originally U-shaped — now L-shaped — noble residence wing is connected to a granary; the building houses an exhibition and accommodation with a quality similar to a youth hostel (you probably won’t find cheaper accommodation in a castle elsewhere).

Bunker, narrow-gauge railway, local house

In the Kerka valley, we proceed towards Csömödér, but before reaching the settlement, first turn right and delve into the remains of a bunker system. In the forest next to the Csömödér junction, we encounter Cold War-era bizarre traces: the Southern Defense Line was intended to stop the NATO and Yugoslav army attack, protecting primarily the Zala oil fields along the country border. The "Hungarian Maginot Line" stretched for 630 kilometers along the Austrian and Yugoslav borders; traces of this 1950s megaproject can be closely studied in the Zala forest.

Arriving in Páka, we enter calmer waters and can see the birthplace of József Öveges, the famous Piarist monk, teacher, and one of the greatest figures of scientific popularization in Hungary. Here we also first cross the narrow-gauge track of the Csömödér State Forest Railway. Hungary's longest narrow-gauge railway network is 110 kilometers long today, with about 33 kilometers operated by passenger trains from spring to autumn, while the other 77 kilometers serve logging and timber transport and are used only by freight trains. The railway's operation is therefore largely still for timber transport, mainly operated with C50 type locomotives, but there is also a Romanian-origin steam locomotive (manufactured in 1955, named Ábel Tamási Áron after the hero of a novel) and two Mk48 diesel engines, one of which is a true rarity: the unit number 1005 machine is the only operational survivor of the series’ diesel-mechanical models.

In Dömefölde, belonging to Csömödér, we can learn a bit about the area with the help of a local house, while on a game farm beside the road leading to Kiscsehi in the melodiously named Lispeszentadorján, deer can be admired through the fence. On top of the vineyard hill of Lispeszentadorján stands a lookout offering superb panorama over the area, but the road leading up is quite steep, so it is only an optional detour in the route. From here, only one hill needs to be climbed before we return to Bázakerettye, to the already known road from the Budafa junction. Upon returning to Bázakerettye, it’s worth visiting the thermal bath — either by car or heroically overcoming the elevation difference by bicycle. However we get to the beach, beside the pools promising pleasant refreshment in summer, the parking lot has a complete memorial park dedicated to local hydrocarbon extraction, naturally with the bust of Simon Papp, almost revered here. After nearly fifty kilometers of riding, it's nice to relax in one of the pools offering pleasant panorama during the summer beach season.