That night we arrived in Prague with enough time to have a beer and then pass out in our very posh hostel, Miss Sophie’s. I’d been to Prague once before in 2008, and after probably five hours of searching for affordable and delicious pizza, I ended up at this 24/7 pizza and donair place. (Sidebar: why has no one opened a kebab shop called The Prince of Don’Air?) I’d been craving it ever since, but some things, unfortunately, aren’t the same the second time around. Traveling, it turns out, has more to do with what you bring with you and the people you’re with than the place you’re visiting; a trip is an ephemeral thing that you can never reproduce twice, even with all the same ingredients. Bring the same people to the same place you’d once gathered, and I guarantee it will be every bit as weird as Hot Tub Time Machine. You’ll feel every bit as trapped by the past as they did in those scary 1980s. Trapped by the past, and yet unable to shake the fact that things are not the same.
That being said, we had a tremendous time with a friend of mine we met up with there, and after wandering the city we made our way to Klenova Castle – the site of the official Adventurists Czech-Out Party. It bears repeating: we partied in a castle. Every room had something ridiculous in it – a hookah lounge, a dance cave, a giant orb of music, the many gin dispensaries, and the most eclectic collection of live music on the main stage.
A team called Beer Bongolia had bought a somewhat pricey piece of artwork – basically, a full-sized ceramic pig – and had put it on top of their ambulance as a sort of monument to ridiculousness. My teammate Spencer was walking back to our campsite and heard a crashing sound, and today, after having heard the story of the acquisition of the pig (bought from a reputable art gallery, nonetheless), we found out that it was the pig he heard smashed. I repeat this anecdote only to impress upon you the ridiculousness of the whole evening, and I didn’t even have to mention the naked Danish guys or, for that matter, the great diversity of the not-birthday suits (the theme was characters from Jules Verne’s books, and that turned out to include Batman, Wonder Woman, Mario and Luigi, and Amelia Earhart).
The next night we camped at Apetlon, which is by the Neusiedler Lake UNESCO World Heritage site in Austria. What a place – and possibly the only location more windy than Saskatchewan.
Makes you wonder why we don’t rock wind power more in SK, no?
A day and a night later put us within reach of the Transfagarasian Highway, which Jeremy Clarkson and the Top Gear crew have declared to be the world’s best driving road. Here’s a neat little clip from the show:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7L44WPScBGg (that could definitely be the wrong link; unfortunately, Turkey has censored Youtube so I can’t check to make sure. (If you Youtube “top gear Romania’s best road” then something of import should show up).
It was awesome, though. Here’s a picture of the view:
After conquering that mountain pass (built in the Soviet era as a contingency route to and from Bucharest), we found an excellent little campsite and hung out in utter tranquility. Except for the techno music, and the feral dogs. The dogs happen to be another reminder of the communist era. People were displaced from their homes into apartment buildings (the ugly likes of which still encircle medium to large sized cities in Romania and other post-communist states) and were forced to leave their dogs behind. The dogs got on fine without their owners, and are now found wandering the streets, fields and mountains of Romania and Bulgaria, and also a bit into Turkey. They’re also occasionally rabid, and some roam in packs that prey on people – a friend met someone who’d been the victim of an attack. But whatever. We were beside a stream and if I tried hard enough, I could let the trickling water drown out all the weird shit that Eastern Europe had to offer.
So there we are, nearly done our first week. Friday got us across Bulgaria in record time – 8 hours from Bucharest to Kapitan Andreevo on the Bulgarian-Turkish border. How we did it, I’m not too sure. There was a section of road that was literally the worst Spencer or I have ever seen. It would have been far better to simply rip it apart and replace it with gravel; not even the worst washboarding could have compared. There were potholes as wide as me and as deep as Nas’s rhymes. Here’s a little sample, not too far from a giant nuclear power plant:
That wasn’t too bad; there were just bumps instead of giant holes. That’s what she said?
But alas, by Saturday morning, we had made it to Istanbul. We walked around for a long time in the oppressive heat, and after a light supper we made good on our promise to ourselves that we would get out of Europe within seven days. So hello Asia. Nice to meet you here on the east bank of Istanbul.
And that’s where the heat started. But you’ll hear about that next time.
More to come from the adventures of Andrew and Spencer!