Tales From The Road

We arrived now in Prague which although, involved driving round the city on the ring road which was very hectic - against all odds, we found the site with relative ease. I was talking to some Danes when we got there who got got lost even using their SatNav. There's something to be said for using a map (compass comes in handy occasionally too). Back to good ol' city camping with the joys of cramped pitches and road noise. Its not too bad though. We headed into Prague centre yesterday and were able to the things we didnt get to do last time which was nice. We got the bus and Metro in, then went to the old town square for mulled wine and traditional pastry (drinking before lunch..tut tut) then we headed to the Museum of Communism for an enlightening and somewhat moving experience. A video showing the run up to the Velvet Revoloution in Czechoslovakia was brutal and obviously still strikes a nerve with the local population, as one Czech lady starting crying during the video. We then had lunch at vegetarian restaurant which Chloe loved, naturally. We headed then to Josefov - The Jewish Quarter, where we went to the Jewish Museum, consisting of several Synagogues and the cemetary. This also made for a moving experience but also very informative as there was lots of information about the Jewish faith.

Last night was pretty cold in the van with temperatures reaching zero! I wasnt cold, only when I got up to go to the toilet did I get chilly.

Now we're sitting in an Internet Cafe in the Wencelas square and this is the first entry I've written ina while that is completely up to date! After a lay in this morning we headed again into the centre. We're going to go again to the Vegetarian restaurant then for drinks and then to a traditional black light show.

From Cesky Budeovice we headed off to Plzen. When we got there we got a bit lost & drove around the city for a while. The road that we needed to go down was closed due to road works so this caused us a bit of problem. Eventually we found the campsite we wanted to go to but it was closed! We decided the Plzen didn't look so good after all our driving around. Very dirty & nothing very different to any other city we have been to so we decided to move on to a Frantiskovy Lazne which is on the far western side of Czech, reasonably near to the German border.

The site was nice with it's own private lake for swimming in the summer & it had lots of fish. It would have been quite a quiet site if it wasn't for the two dogs that the owner had locked up near the gate. Who were very noisy every time another dog or person walked by - which became quite annoying. We liked it anyway & the site had some old alloys wheels on legs which you could use to build fires on which was fun. We decided to stay there for a week & relax without the time limit to get to Munich before Oktoberfest finished! The local town was quite quiet in the morning but then later on was full with old people & had nothing but shops selling clothes for old people & spas. The spas were ok & we tried water from most of them but it didn't taste that nice! We only spent an afternoon there.

The next day we had to take a bus trip to the next nearest town called Cheb to look for a bucket as we ran over our other bucket for our waste water whilst we were putting the van on to chocks! We found one & Matt managed to find a guitar something he has been whinging about for ages! He didn't bring his guitar to save on space & just took his ukelele which we are both getting sick off! So now he has his guitar he is happy! There was nothing else to do in this town other than shop, but we did get the train from Cheb to Karlovy Vary - an other spa town. The buses in Czech are very old & on this train we had our own private cabin - Matt said it reminded him of James Bond!

Karlovy Vary is a more upmarket spa town than Frantiskovy Lazne with loads more tourists. We tried some of the spa water which was hot this time so was a bit nicer & just looked around the town. It had some nice architecture but loads of shops selling rubbish souvenirs. We only spent an afternoon here. The rest of the week was spent hanging around the campsite. We went for a couple of walks & hired bikes from the campsite which were really uncomfortable! We spent one day at the Aquaforum which was a big swimming complex with Jacuzzis, a flume, a couple of outdoor pools, one of which was really hot & was really nice.

Again its been a while since the last update, we just dont seem to be getting regular internet access at the moment. Its not too bad though as it's a welcome break no being on the computer day in day out, at work and at home. We crossed into the Czech republic about two weeks ago with little hassle. There are border crossings into the eastern states, whereas with holland and Germany there are none. The guard at the border pulled is in and we had to wait for about 5 mins whilst he checked our paperwork. He then came over and us me if we had any drugs, guns or knives then let us go. As if I was going to say 'yes actually I've got 10 Kilos of coke in the back and some uzis under the bed, you've rumbled me, if only you hadn't of asked..damn.....'

Then we were on our way again and what a difference, noticible immedietly. Run down villages and houses, poor rutted roads and rather crap signposting (so much so we had to by a new map, fully detailed). It really felt as though we had gone back in time. and it felt good. Quaint villages and beautiful scenery were order of the day en route to Cesky Krumlov. Unfortunately we never made to Cesky Krumlov as we didnt take the turning we needed as neither of us even saw it. We settled instead for Ceske Budejovice, the next big town north of Cesky Krumlov, which turned out to be another stop on the beer trail - they brew Budweiser Budvar there, which is infinetely superior to Amercian Budweiser! We stayed there for 4 nights, explored the town centre, went up the black tower and wandered around the local markets. Everything is so cheap here, even in Prague where its the most expensive, its cheaper than the UK. Out of the the big towns though, its peanuts. Oh and the beer is uber-cheap, and is actually cheaper than soft drinks in bars and cheaper than juice in the supermarket!

From Ceske Budejovice we got the train into Cesky Krumlov. It was a fair old walk from the campsite to the station so we were glad to get our tickets without too much trouble. One problem we have encountered in Czech is that it can be very, very difficult at times to understand notices, signs and train times etc and virtually impossible to understand announcements. The train was pretty old with old fashioned conductors, with whistle stop go conducting at each station and some of the stations were very run down , others just a signpost and others, what appeared someones house. It took about an hour to get there and the town itself was quite nice, nice old fashioned eastern European houses, cobbled streets, Vlatava river all with a castle backdrop. It would have been even more beautiful if it weren't for all the ......yep you guessed it - the tourists. There were hundreds. Coachload upon coachload of Germans, Americans and Japanese. We walked about the town for a while then, went to the museum of torture and an excellent National Geographic photography gallery. We also went into the castle grounds but didnt pay for a guided tour around castle. We opted for the bus back to the station as it was a pretty hefty walk, which is always an event in itself - the buses dont often have numbers or anything to indicate where they're going and the driver never seems to understand where you want to go. after a few hairy moments of 'is this the right bus?' we got back to the station.

Although Cesky Krumlov being the UNESCO world heritage site is probably the 'nicer' place, Ceske Budejovice seems so much more real. It was mostly locals, harldy any tourists and parts of it were very gritty and urban, yet most places are accompanied by a warmth and welcome you dont always get elsewhere.

by Matt

We arrived in Munich on the Sunday after a fairly uneventful drive. When we arrived it was packed - people everywhere, campervans everywhere, I really thought we weren't going to get a pitch. I qued up anyway in the enourmous que but it seemed to be that everyone was leaving - 'bonus' I thought. I asked if it was ok for us to camp and the girl behind the desk said yes and gave me a look of 'like of course it's ok to camp - why wouldnt it be?' we pitched up next to yet more Aussies who were also travelling through Europe in a VW. They came and chatted as soon as I put the Ben Harper on the stereo as they were mutal fans. We were going to have some beers with them but we were going into the festival & they were leaving the next day so unfortunately it didnt happen. We headed out into Munich at about three for the festival.

Munich...Oktoberfest....what can I say? its absoloutely crazy, i've never experienced anything quite like it in all my life. For those people who've been to the Pompey beer festival - imagine that - then multiply it by a thousand then you're close to how massive this thing really is. We went on the Sunday and it was absolutley rammed, I cant imagine what it would be like on a Friday or Saturday. The place has stalls everywhere selling every kind of souvenir you could ever want, stall selling all sorts of foods, stalls selling spirits and hundreds of fairground rides from walzters to rollercoasters. We grabbed a shot each, tequila for me, cherry schnapps for Chloe. We decided before we would kick off the proper boozong we'd go on the ferris wheel to get a decent view. The view at the top was amazing it really gave you a bit of perspective of how massive the place was. After that we headed into the first tent and I got a beer and Chloe got a wine. A wine that cost eight bloody Euros! After that it was beer for her! we went out for some food, Chloe got a pretzl and chips and I had two different types of wurst. We qued for a bit and went back into a tent. Thats when the fun began and the memory gets a bit hazy.

To be honest I didnt really expect to get that drunk going with chloe. I thought it would be a few drinks, get a bit merry then go home. When we got inside the atmosphere was amazing and the litre glasses started flowing and we were drinking with Aussies, Italians, Spanish and Germans! it was crazy and I got very very drunk. Apparently I was being a bit of twat on the way home but I can hardly remember anything.....all I can remember is throwing up several times in the night and feeling very very rough the next day.....

We left Munich the following day after a very sobering visit to Dachau. The first Nazi Concentration camp. The whloe day was very interesting and utterly moving. The place would be like a ghost town if it weren't for all the tourists. You can still imagine and picture the horror of what went on there when you stand in the cells or in the crematorium where they burned all the bodies. I wont linger on that for to long but it was definitely a highlight for me so far.

After that we drove to Passau on the Austrian border for a nights stopover before heading into the Czech Republic. The next morning we headed off early for the next country on our tour!

Right then! thats us almost up to speed. Hopefully i'll get some Czech entries up soon. Maybe when we get to Prague.

By Matt

We left Holland on Thursday 22nd Sept & headed into Germany. We drove through the border without really noticing, there was no border control at all. The only difference was in the signs on the motorway. We started to notice that we were in Germany when we headed towards the Rhine Valley - the scenery was amazing. Masses of mountains and green trees. The river itself wasn't that great and was very dirty & busy with boats going down it all day. We stayed at a campsite up in the vineyards which surrounded the river. It was nice & quiet.

After a rest we took a walk down to the local town of Lorch, which turned out to be further than it had seemed. It was 8km up and down hills in the hot sun (It was still like summer in the Rhine Valley) and when we got to the town everything was shut for lunch between 1 and 3.30! not that there was that mcuh to see anyway. We left this campsite after 2 or 3 days and spent one night under a bridge by the side of the road which was very noisy. We stopped in a very touristy village called St Goar which had some castle ruins.

Next we moved on the Freiburg which Matthew told me was in the Black Forest. It turns out it was on the edge so we didn't get to see much of it whilst on that campsite. We got the bus to the town and it was ok. It had a nice church and lots of lovely shops but you get bored of looking round shops with no money quite quickly. After we left this site we saw more of the Black Forest whilst we started driving towards Schwangau.

We got to see more scenery than we expected though as one of our tyres had a blowout on the way. This turned into more of a problem that it should have been though as when we tried to put the spare on we discovered that the nuts for our normal wheels (which are mercedes alloys) did not fit the spare volkswagon wheel so we could not fix it on! We called our insurance company and they arranged rescue & said it would be approx an hour. After about 2 hours we called to check the progress & were told that they couldn't find us but they hadn't called to tell us this! I had a difficult conference call with the lady from CIS & a german lady who said they had been down the road we were on & couldn't see Scooby. I am not sure how as it isn't exactly hard to miss a camper with orange flowers down the side blocking one lane of a dual carriage way!

After several more conversations with the German office on the ADAC (RAC equivelant) the man arrived. He didn't speak a word of English & tried to put the tyre on before he realised the problem. He called his English speaking colleague who proceeded to argue with Matthew about whether or not I had said we were missing the nuts or not! The man went to get the nuts in the end & we were on our way after about 4 and a half hours & just before it got dark.

We didn't have time to get to our intended campsite so we stayed in one in Markdorf near Lake Constance. We had to stop there for 2 nights whilst waiting for a replacement tyre. The incident cost us about 60 pounds for a new tyre & 25 pounds on phone calls! We moved on to the next campsite in Schwangau near Fussen & the scenery there was amazing. We stayed at this campsite for a couple of nights. We went to Schloss Neuschwanstein which is the castle that Walt Disney based the Disneyland castle on apparantly!

We then walked from the castle to the top of the Tegelberg which is part of the Bavarian Alps & is 1700 metres high.

We got the cable car back down & then had to walk back to the campsite as there was no bus! We also went to an evening of traditional German music & comedy at the campsite but we couldn't understand a word of what was being said! We would have liked to have stayed in this area a lot longer as it was the nicest place so far but we had to move on to get to Munich before Oktoberfest ended!

By Chloe