Our arrival in Prague was marked by droves of impressed onlookers taking pictures of Mary (Alex's name for the car), and by the discovery they it is very easy to get lost driving around. Also, cobbles and the car don't mix particularly well. We spent a few hours searching for a campsite, any campsite, following the rather crap directions provided by our 'Europe on a Shoestring' book. After ending up in a part of town that looked like the Soviets never left, we gave in and paid the extortionate roaming charges to check where the hell we were on Google Maps. Soon enough we managed to make our way to a road packed with sites, all squeezed in together. Each one was effectively someone's back garden that had been converted into a small campsite. As there was only one toilet (which strangely had a sit down toilet and urinal in the same single cubicle) and one shower, we were quite regularly confronted by mostly naked old men. Lovely.
Prague is a beautiful city... Except where it's not. The center is breath-taking, with ornate churches, cosy cafes and bars, wide squares, and live music at every turn. However drift a little too far from the center, such as where we were camped, and there are plenty of run down buildings, encrusted with years worth of poorly drawn graphitti tags. Also, if you're walking down the main street at night, expect to be surrounded by promoters for the various strip clubs and sex clubs. Some are so persistant that they'll come up and tell you that the two guys already talking to you are full of shit and you must come to their club. Beer deals! Vodka deals! Come! Come! It's a bit of a drag. Takes the fun out of browsing...
On our first night out, true to form, we started in an Irish pub. A few beers and a vodka redbull later we were ready to hit the town! As we left we bumped into a young fellow called Stanny, who promised to take us to a place where we could have a lot of fun and get some really cheap beers. He wasn't wrong. The pub he took us to was filled with local Czechs, a fair few of which were his friends. While there was a cheerful atmosphere, I don't hesitate to say that I'm glad we didn't walk into there without our little guide. Apparently there's a fight there most nights of the week. It was just after he told us this that Greg and I were challenged to a game of table football by two local skin-heads, with the wager being a beer for the winners. Neither of us are very good, and we were effectively hustled. But when the price of a round of four beers is about four pounds, you buy the big bastards a beer and don't complain. Fortunately, denying them a rematch didn't end up with our noses being spread across our faces. Another patron was a buff chap called Paul, who spent most of the evening whaling on a broken punching-strength testing machine. He was very friendly, thank god, because he punched like Tyson.
A few hundred beers later and we were once again weaving our way down the main street, trying to avoid the promoters, but we could only resist for so long. And that is how I ended up going to my first strip club. I must say, it was rather fun. Well, actually, the first one was a bit less fun. It was filled with rather agressive and rather fat women, who pounced on us as soon as we walked in the door. Apparently one of them was undoing Stanny's trousers by the time we managed to drag him out of there. But once we got away from there, we managed to find a more reputable establishment, and settled in for boobies and beer. Sadly our youthful friends weren't able to join us in this one, because it turned out that they were only 16. Didn't stop the first club... The strip club was a lot of fun, although the appeal of a lap dance is still somewhat of a mystery to me. If you can't get involved, where's the fun? This part of the night was a bit less cheap, but considering that by the end of some of the dances they were fully nude, I'm not going to complain too much.
The next morning I was feeling somewhat the worse for wear, and stayed sweltering in my tent as Alex and Greg headed into town to see some more sights. A few hours dozing and a shower later and I was ready to head in and join them. I caught the tram into the center of town, and gave Alex a call, only to discover that they were over the other side. However it was a lovely day, and I didn't mind taking in the sights as I tried to find them, to very little success. Apaprently they were queueing for a tram that would take them up a big hill over the river, but there's more than one bridge, and the hill is quite big. I saw a large number of people coming and going from one hill, so I headed towards them. Turning a corner past a small park, I was confronted with a huge staircase, topped by a castle, which is called Prague Castle apparently. Original! I was one of the few people walking up it, and by the time I got to the top I found out why. As I recovered my breath and looked out at the excellent view over the city, I was lucky enough to see the changing of the guards at the castle gate. It was all fairly standard, with marching, stopping, turning, and marching, but one bit that was odd was whenreplacement guard entered his point, he spent about a minute staring at the back before he was allowed to turn around. How that contributes to their guarding of the gates I'm not entirely sure, but it did give the tourists some good pictures. By now I was fairly sure that I was up the wrong part of the hill, but just to make sure I headed further into the castle. Here I found the Basillica of St George, and another imposing church, but still no tram. I was fairly sure that it would now be easier to just meet them when they came back down, so I made my way back to the center of town, via a little kiosk where I bought some fried camembert in a bun and a beer.
As I came back across the bridge I heard Frank Sinatra coming from a bar on the riverside, and as I had time to kill, I popped down and spent a very pleasant half hour enjoying the sun, good music, and a Tequila Sunrise. Eventually the CD started to repeat itself, so I moved on, heading back to the center where I'd passed a string group playing classical music a few hours previously. I was about to settle down and enjoy some Mozart, but then I spied a stage in the square nearby. It turns out there was a live Jazz festival on, and so I grabbed a beer and sat on the warm cobbles among a large crowd. As I relaxed and enjoyed the music, I smelt a whiff of a spliff. Looking round, I saw a pair of guys a few meters away smoking up. I rolled a cigarette, asked them for a light, and they promptly invited me to join them. We chatted for a while, and they told me how they're travelling from Germany for a few weeks, and they were on their first stop. We chilled, drank some beers, and had a few smokes. One of them mentioned how he had been going to change some Euros into Czech Crowns, and was stopped by a woman outside the Bureau de Change who told him that she needed the Euros and that she'd give him as good a rate as he would get inside. Being a nice chap he agreed, only to find that she'd given him some kind of money that the people inside had never seen before. The lesson of that story is don't change money in the street. I had to laugh, as when I was off buying more beer I'd seen a police sign with various tips for tourists, number one of which was "Don't change money in the street."
Not long after, I got a call from Alex, and went to meet my erswhile friends by a long, historic bridge. When I met them at the far end, I found that they had made friends with two Russians while at the tram. It was quite fun trying to talk to them, and more fun being able to talk shit and not have them understand us. They knew the city a bit better than us, and at their suggestion we went to a traditional restaurant that apparently is famous. Inside we were confronted by strange but tasty smells, rowdy singing Czechs and a brilliant mural. By this stage I was pretty drunk again, so I couldn't tell you what everyone else had, but I can say that my pork knee (yes, literally the knee of a pig) was absolutely delicious. The accordion player was pretty good too.
The next morning the rain had returned, and we agreed that it was time to move on. What's the point of getting out of England if you're still going to be soaked? Also, we had been telling Greg's Dad that we'd be there at some point over the weekend, and what with this being Sunday we sort of had to head off. So we found ourselves on our way back to Germany. Destination: Nuremburg!
Greg's Dad, one friendly accommodating chappy going by the name Viktor Hayko, lives in, as previously mentioned, a suburb of the city called Katzwang. Much hilarity ensued. Once we'd arrived, and Greg and his Dad had a big hug, we were ushered inside their beautifully appointed house. We were ensconced in the attic, and were shown a fridge full of all sorts of beers. Good times! Apparently we weren't done with beer just yet. The strangest of them was a smoked beer that apparently had won awards for its taste years in a row, and which to me seemed to be like drinking a bonfire. There was also a wheatbeer mixed with grapefruit juice, which I quite enjoyed, but was also Meike's, Greg's Step-Mum, favourite tipple after work.
That evening we borrowed the bikes that were in the garage, and after being too slow on the shotgunning I ended up on Meike's lady bike. Fortunately for me, it had duel suspension, a padded seat, and seemed to be faster than the other two. On the downside, I was riding a girl's bike. Swings and roundabouts. We rode in the direction of a pub that Viktor suggested, and as we went we heard some loud music from nearby. Investigation revealed a small local beer festival, and that seemed like a good spot to stop. Inside I had my first Mass, which is a litre of beer. That's a lot of beer! We, as far as we could tell, were the only people in the tent who weren't locals. It was very entertaining to watch a big crowd of Germans stood on their benches, swinging their beers about, and singing to a loud and decent band. The ride back to the house was a bit dicey after another of those huge beers.
The next day we thought that we should have a look at the city, seeing as we were there and all. So we headed in, and had a wander about town. It's another good looking city, with an impressive castle at the top of a hill in town. Unfortunately the rain once again had caught up with us, and we were stranded in a bar just below the castle drinking beers and watching the multitudinous sparrows hop about. As we drank, a bowl of stale pretzels was placed on the table, and thanks to our burgeoning hunger we tucked in. It was a bit of a surprise to be charged for them at the end, considering we didn't ask for them. Cheeky buggers.
Once the rain had abated somewhat, we headed back down the hill for more booze, and ended up at a bar called Alex. Drinking inside Alex... He enjoyed it, I can say that much. However the over-comfy sofas and the slightly expensive drinks caused us to move on to, surprise surpise, an Irish bar. While in there we met a few interesting types, including a few local girls that I bought some drinks for and chatted to, and some cool Italians fellows from Milan who were on their own road trip, and were heading to a reggae festival in Benicassim. Sadly, despite their suggestion, it wasn't possible for us to get there and to do everything else we wanted to, but a good night was had by all, ending as it did in our customary drunken haze.
A few nights later we were invited by some old friends of Greg's to a beer festival in the nearby town of Altdorf. Obviously we accepted the invitation. And so began a night filled with a horrendous amount of Jaegermeister and hell of a lot of beer. I also managed, while quite quite drunk, to spend 15 Euros shooting. I won a crappy Zippo knock-off. It doesn't work very well. Apparently I also won a whistle somehow, possibly by throwing darts. I gave it to Alex, and he dubbed it his rape whistle, though whether it was to be used to defend himself from being raped, or as a warning to potential rapees is uncertain. During the course of the evening we made friends with some people, one of whom, Catherine, owned her own hairdressers, in which we ended up after the bar closed. As I was pretty much hammered by this point, I was rather confused and surpised to find myself in a darkened salon with a large group of people I didn't know. After an afterparty there, we were invited back to Catherine's house, and carried on drinking. At this stage things get very hazy. The last thing I remember is playing with some cats as Alex was chatting with Catherine and Greg was passed out on the sofa. It wasn't, however, the last thing I did. Apprently, an hour or so later, there was some concern as to my whereabouts... After deciding that I had probably gone outside, Alex went to the toilet, and opened the door to find me asleep on the porcelain throne, head in my hands, and a rather unpleasant smell in the air. Suffice it to say that I won't be going back to that house any time soon... After a harrowing journey home in the morning, involving two fourty minute waits, a McDonald's breakfast (which Greg promptly splattered back over their toilets), we spent the rest of the day recovering. At least, I did.
At this stage it's worth mentioning Meike's incredible cooking while we were there. We ate sumptuous meals every day, from Schweinebraten (roast pork) to Pfannkuchensuppe with Leberknoedel and Butterkloesse and Griessnockerl (Pancake soup with liver dumplings, bread dumplings and semolina dumplings. Lots of dumplings!). Everything was delicious and very filling, and also happened to give Alex some of the most disgusting farts I have ever smelt in my life. Apparently traditional Frankonian fare (Frankonia being the region of Bavaria we were in, as Viktor liked to constantly remind us) didn't combine too well with Alex's stomach. There was always enough for roughly double the number of people round the table, and I felt somewhat bad that I couldn't always finish my plate. The food was so damn good. At least there were leftovers!
Soon, however, it was time to say goodbye to Germany for the second and final time, and to start making our way over the Alps to Italy, via Austria. Next stop: Plansee!
NEXT TIME: Our last night in Germany, Living the dream at McDonald's, and lots of lakes!
