A web of peaceful channels banked by willows and reeds housing more birds than you can count on either side... We'd made it. In beautiful sunshine and with a sunset chorus we took a boat to the pristine lakes of Cotete and Nebunu in the heart of the Delta where the great Danube dissolves into the Black Sea.

Our companion for 19 days, the roads along the Danube did not give us an easy ride though. With one of the hottest days yet and with a surprising number of hills we had to struggle for even the last few kilometres. And an average of 150km a day during the trip was taking its toll as injuries to knees and ankles hindered progress and our total road side wheel repairs hit double figures.

But it was worth it. The serenity of the delta surpassed our expectation and it felt like we were entering alien territory as we looked around and saw life filling every square foot of space. From the electric blue dragonflies whizzing this way and that, to trees literally filled with birds sunning their wings, like the Cormorant adapted perfectly to this habitat and few others. When swimming in the cool waters we were surrounded by fish and lilies. It felt like we were on a wetlands safari. Before reaching this point the main Danube channel passes through 8 countries, a host of cultures and travels 3000km. Exactly as we had just done. We beamed with satisfaction and reflected on the grand scale of this river: the Amazon of Europe.

With a bump back to Earth we now find ourselves cramped up on an overnight train through Romania as we begin our return journey. We've got a good couple of days' travelling ahead of us to get home, but in that time we also feel we have a lot of different learning to digest around our central question "What has biodiversity ever done for us?". We'll share our final thoughts once we're back, so stay tuned, but in the meantime we'd love to hear from you if anything we've seen or done has grabbed your attention. Post us a comment!