Prekmurje: Slovenia's flat corner, for the days you don't want a climb

Every guide to cycling in Slovenia is about climbing, including ours. Prekmurje is the exception. It is the north-eastern corner of the country beyond the river Mura, wedged between Austria, Hungary and Croatia, and it is flat in a way nowhere else in Slovenia is: the regional tourist board's longest route, 124 km along the right bank of the Mura, has 60 m of elevation gain in total. It is also the driest and sunniest part of the country, which matters more than it sounds.

This is the post for the days you do not want a climb: a recovery week, a family trip, a winter block when the passes are shut, or the first long ride of the year. Here is what the riding consists of and what it is honestly like.

The Mura

The Mura cycling route follows the river across the whole of Slovenia, from the Austrian border to the Croatian one, on asphalt, and the Prlekija tourist board describes it plainly as a flatland route suitable for all ages. The Pomurje board's route list splits it into two: the left bank (the Prekmurje side) at 59 km with 40 m of climbing, and the right bank (the Prlekija side) at 124 km with 60 m. The national tourist board puts the Mura section of the long-distance network at 90 km through the Prekmurje plains, inside the Mura–Drava–Danube biosphere reserve.

It is a river path in the central European sense: flood embankments, riverside forest, villages a kilometre or two back from the water, and a surface that is tarmac throughout on the signed route. There are sections on the embankment top where the wind has nothing to stop it, and this is the region's one real difficulty. On a plain with no hedges and no hills, a 25 km/h headwind is the climb. If you are not used to that, read a wind forecast properly and ride out into it so that you come home with it behind you.

The plain, and the 600 km network

The Pomurje board's cycling pages list more than 600 km of routes across 27 signed itineraries and 10 marked trails, all on asphalt, from an 11 km field loop to the 124 km Mura ride, and a 66 km section of EuroVelo 13, the Iron Curtain route, along the former border. The difficulty ratings run from 1 to 5, and most of the region is a 1 or a 2. Villages are close together, the roads between them are straight and lightly used, and there is a bakery or a shop in most of them.

That makes it the best place in the country for a specific kind of training: long, steady, uninterrupted hours at one intensity, which the hills make almost impossible everywhere else in Slovenia. A four-hour zone 2 ride here is four hours of pedalling, not two hours of climbing and two of coasting. Base miles and a first 100 km both belong here rather than in the Alps. It also makes it a good place to ride with someone who is much slower or much faster than you, because nobody gets dropped on a hill.

Goričko, for the day you change your mind

North of Murska Sobota the plain gives way to Goričko, a rolling upland of vineyards, orchards and small villages that runs up to the Austrian and Hungarian borders. It is a nature park of 46,200 hectares, the largest in Slovenia, and part of a three-country protected area with the Raab and Őrség parks over the borders. The board's Goričko route is 34 km with 540 m of climbing and is rated 4 out of 5, which in this region counts as hard. Nothing in it is steep for long, but the road never stops going up or down, and it adds up.

The other lump in the landscape is at the opposite end of the region: the Lendava hills on the Hungarian border, where the Vinarium observation tower stands among the vineyards at 302 m above sea level, with its viewing deck 42 m up and 240 steps to reach it. From the top you can see into Hungary, Croatia and Austria as well as across the whole plain. The climb up through the vineyards to the tower is the only proper hill on the Prekmurje side of the river, and a pleasant one.

What the weather does

The ARSO climate station at Murska Sobota, at 188 m, is the lowest and driest in this series of posts. Set against Bovec in the Soča valley, the contrast is the reason to come here out of season.

Two readings. The summers are the warmest in the country: a July mean maximum of 27 °C on a plain with no shade means early starts in July and August, and the storm season is June to August, when monthly rain roughly triples from the winter figure. The winters are dry and cold rather than wet: 39 mornings of snow cover a year, a January mean just below freezing, and the lowest winter rainfall of any station in these posts. A clear, still January day here is a genuinely good ride in a way that a January day in Ljubljana's fog is not; see our guide to designing winter routes for how to build one around the short daylight.

The honest caveats

• It is flat, and flat is not the same as easy. There is no freewheeling. Four hours here is four hours of work, and the wind decides how much.
• It is far. Murska Sobota is at the opposite end of the country from the Alps and the coast; from Ljubljana it is a couple of hours by motorway. Plan it as a destination, not a day trip.
• Straight roads carry fast cars. The signed routes keep you on the minor lanes, and you should stay on them; the main roads between the towns are straight, open and quick.
• Border crossings. The Austrian, Hungarian and Croatian borders are a few kilometres away and some routes cross them. Carry identification.

Where to base, and how to build it

Murska Sobota is the centre and has the train; Moravske Toplice, on the edge of Goričko, has the thermal spa, which after a week of flat kilometres is not a frivolous consideration. Lendava works for the Croatian and Hungarian side and the tower.

Build the days as loops rather than out-and-backs, so the wind is only ever on one side for part of the ride; our loop-versus-out-and-back guide covers why that matters more here than anywhere hilly. Moveee's route builder will build the loop and show you that it really is flat, and a route saved there can be ridden indoors in Moveee Indoor on the days the wind makes the plain unrideable, which happens.