After Iznik we took another bus to Selçuk. Here amongst other things, we would visit the ancient town of Ephesus. The ruins of Artemis temple were also nearby. It was once one of the seven wonders of the world but since there is now only one pillar left, it has become little more than a very tall home for a family of storks.
When we arrived in Selçuk we were immediately (at 9pm) approached by a man offering us a double room for 50 Turkish Lira (25 Euros). For 5 minutes I was adamant that we could get a place for 18 Turkish Lira (9 Euros), and told him so, until Maritza pointed out that I had mistaken the Turkish price for Euros. Even so, in response to my fierce disapproval of his offer, he had lowered the price to 30 Lira (15 Euros) for a double room just 80 metres from the bus station. We took it.
We stayed 3 nights at the Dreams Pension. We spent most of the time visiting Ephesus and Artemis, and taking walks about the town centre. The two historical sites were full of bus-loads of fat I'm-too-tired-to-walk-about-in-this-heat-can-we-get-back-on-the-bus? tourists. Along with them, the locals trying to sell shit and fake souvenirs.
One thing we were soon to find all over Turkey; there is not a lot of places to buy vegetarian food. We went to one or two 'vegetarian restaurants', where all they had on offer for cabbage crunchers was vegetarian Turkish pizza. Maritza managed to find a fish-bone in hers.
Friday 8 May 2009
Friday 17 April 2009
Skopje
Took a night bus at 20:13 (15 minutes late) from Budva, Montenegro to Skopje, Macedonia. Although it was a long one, the journey was pretty pleasant. We had plenty of food and even some wine from the supermarket - luxury! - and for the last part of the trip we had two seats each which added to the comfort.
We awoke to scenes of Macedonian towns and countryside rolling by. Stray dogs on the streets, old women ın headscarves, men and young boys rattling past on exposed engines and wheels (automobiles completely without shells or framework), snow-topped mountains , litter-drenched rivers. Our bus arrives bearably late at 9am.
We have no arrangements for a place to stay, but we realise we have all day for findıng a place so there is no sense of urgency about it. Ignoring the taxi touts we head in the direction of the centre and even stop for potato bürek with yoghurt and a coffee. At a travel agency at the bus station we discovered this weekend was Catholic Easter weekend. Hopefully this wouldn't mean that everything would be closed all weekend as it was in Split the previous weekend (regular Easter holiday).
After breakfast we continued towards the centre until we came across a sign indicating 'Art Hostel 1km on Tome Arsovski Street'. After getting a little lost we eventually find the place and promptly pay for 2 nights. Great and cosy hostel with very friendly staff.
Today being the 2nd day, Maritza and I went out to explore the city, since we barely left the hostel the previous day. We climbed the shabby fortress, which was half a building site under reconstruction, and took a seat on the fortress walls to get a view of Skopje from a higher angle. We then ambled down into the Old Bazaar. What an amazing place! Alluring sounds and smells were everywhere. Locals playing chess in teahouses, withered old ladies selling spices, endless assortments of absolutely anything available for sale in the stalls- including small, plastic, lip-sticked Batman figurines on motorbikes; raw chicken legs sharing table-tops with mammoth blocks of goat's cheese. Pliers, batterıes, socks and blood pressure measuring instruments. We were constantly amused by the way the market sellers will try to sell you absolutely anything (and would later see so much of this in Turkey, might as well get used to it). We attempted to take a few candid shots in the fruit and vegetable market, much to the annoyance of some local sellers. Then, a loud wailing began from a loudspeaker somewhere, which I soon realised was coming from a minaret across the street (this is also something we would very quickly have to get used to in Turkey).
After a few more tantalising rounds around the bazaar we walked across the stone bridge to the centre of town. What a contrast it was here to the bazaar (bizarre) side of the river. Back to Western civilization and trendy cafe bars. It's amazing how you can get contrasts as large as these over such a small area.
We awoke to scenes of Macedonian towns and countryside rolling by. Stray dogs on the streets, old women ın headscarves, men and young boys rattling past on exposed engines and wheels (automobiles completely without shells or framework), snow-topped mountains , litter-drenched rivers. Our bus arrives bearably late at 9am.
We have no arrangements for a place to stay, but we realise we have all day for findıng a place so there is no sense of urgency about it. Ignoring the taxi touts we head in the direction of the centre and even stop for potato bürek with yoghurt and a coffee. At a travel agency at the bus station we discovered this weekend was Catholic Easter weekend. Hopefully this wouldn't mean that everything would be closed all weekend as it was in Split the previous weekend (regular Easter holiday).
After breakfast we continued towards the centre until we came across a sign indicating 'Art Hostel 1km on Tome Arsovski Street'. After getting a little lost we eventually find the place and promptly pay for 2 nights. Great and cosy hostel with very friendly staff.
Today being the 2nd day, Maritza and I went out to explore the city, since we barely left the hostel the previous day. We climbed the shabby fortress, which was half a building site under reconstruction, and took a seat on the fortress walls to get a view of Skopje from a higher angle. We then ambled down into the Old Bazaar. What an amazing place! Alluring sounds and smells were everywhere. Locals playing chess in teahouses, withered old ladies selling spices, endless assortments of absolutely anything available for sale in the stalls- including small, plastic, lip-sticked Batman figurines on motorbikes; raw chicken legs sharing table-tops with mammoth blocks of goat's cheese. Pliers, batterıes, socks and blood pressure measuring instruments. We were constantly amused by the way the market sellers will try to sell you absolutely anything (and would later see so much of this in Turkey, might as well get used to it). We attempted to take a few candid shots in the fruit and vegetable market, much to the annoyance of some local sellers. Then, a loud wailing began from a loudspeaker somewhere, which I soon realised was coming from a minaret across the street (this is also something we would very quickly have to get used to in Turkey).
After a few more tantalising rounds around the bazaar we walked across the stone bridge to the centre of town. What a contrast it was here to the bazaar (bizarre) side of the river. Back to Western civilization and trendy cafe bars. It's amazing how you can get contrasts as large as these over such a small area.
Wednesday 15 April 2009
Kotor, Montenegro
We arrived in Montenegro by another bus. For the first time since I'd left Prague, I was experiencing bad weather. Torrents of rain were falling as we entered the bus station at around 7am. We were knackered, and not in the best of moods. We quickly walked in the direction of town to look for a place to stay, when a taxi driver driving past on the other side of the road shouts something at us, and swiftly manoeuvres onto our side of the street. He jumps out, and accosts us in the street: 'Would like a ride? Do you need a place to stay? I can show you a place to stay for a cheap price!'
'No!', we shout at him and dive into a nearby bakery. Great. Shelter from the rain and warmth. We stumble around trying to work out what to do and eat, and we're quickly introduced to the local food on offer by a large friendly man in blue overalls, who recognises us as tourists instantly. He points out bürek (already a favourite) as well as a pretty big selection of other meat/potato/cheese filled pastry delights. The owner shows us to a table and we quickly warm up from the bakery and wait for the rain to pass while we tuck into a cheese bürek each.
We eventually stayed for 3 nights in a pension that was located and recommended us by the people at the tourist information centre. The place was cosy, but a little odd and the bathroom smelled of mould. It felt a little like we were intruding on somebodies home... which in fact we were, for a price.
Kotor is a small town by a lake surrounded by beautiful and huge dark mountains. The water was a brilliant turquoise and was a temporary home for many yachts and ships from all over. In the mountains were a couple of monasteries and other hidden secrets. On our second day there we decided to make the climb and check them out. It seemed not many people were interested in taking the same climb that day, we only passed a couple of people. We got a magnificent view of the surrounding area and got to see the monasteries and some farmhouses way high in the mountains.
After a few days we left, deciding to (unsuccessfully) hitch-hike to another town in Montenegro. We didn't do very well, and didn't get any further than Budva (terrible town), but we did manage to save four puppies that had been left by the side of the road in a cardboard box, much to Maritza's delight.
'No!', we shout at him and dive into a nearby bakery. Great. Shelter from the rain and warmth. We stumble around trying to work out what to do and eat, and we're quickly introduced to the local food on offer by a large friendly man in blue overalls, who recognises us as tourists instantly. He points out bürek (already a favourite) as well as a pretty big selection of other meat/potato/cheese filled pastry delights. The owner shows us to a table and we quickly warm up from the bakery and wait for the rain to pass while we tuck into a cheese bürek each.
We eventually stayed for 3 nights in a pension that was located and recommended us by the people at the tourist information centre. The place was cosy, but a little odd and the bathroom smelled of mould. It felt a little like we were intruding on somebodies home... which in fact we were, for a price.
Kotor is a small town by a lake surrounded by beautiful and huge dark mountains. The water was a brilliant turquoise and was a temporary home for many yachts and ships from all over. In the mountains were a couple of monasteries and other hidden secrets. On our second day there we decided to make the climb and check them out. It seemed not many people were interested in taking the same climb that day, we only passed a couple of people. We got a magnificent view of the surrounding area and got to see the monasteries and some farmhouses way high in the mountains.
After a few days we left, deciding to (unsuccessfully) hitch-hike to another town in Montenegro. We didn't do very well, and didn't get any further than Budva (terrible town), but we did manage to save four puppies that had been left by the side of the road in a cardboard box, much to Maritza's delight.
Monday 6 April 2009
Showered for the first time in 3 days, and finally arrived in Ljubljana. It was suppose to take us 1 - 1 and a half days to get here, but it took us 2 and a half.
We left Prague around 10am (after an hour or two of rousing Teo out of bed by telephone), and made our steady journey out of the city. We got our first (and my very first) ride out of the city by a chap in a Vodafone-coloured red car who was heading for Ostrava. Our first destination was Brno. All was going well, until the driver stopped at a petrol station to get petrol or refresh himself or whatever, and soon realised he couldn't find his drivers license or wallet. We emptied our things out of his car to help him look, but he never found what he was looking for. We mused that he could have dropped his things as we were putting our gear in the car in Prague. With a pretty grim face he decided he would turn back and left us standing at a petrol station 40km from Prague.
The day continued pretty well, reaching Brno, Bratislava and the edge of Vienna by the evening. It was beginning to get dark and we figured a ride into Vienna city centre at this time wouldn't be any help. We ended up spending a night in my tent in the parking lot by the petrol station. We rolled out our sleeping bags and soon got to sleep on the soft lumpy ground. In the middle of the night though, we both woke up freezing our balls off. Teo fully dressed himself in extra layers in an attempt to reheat his body, while I cocooned myself in my sleeping bag and coiled myself into a foetal position. The cold was coming straight through the ground beneath us and through the thin plastic sheeting of the tent. A polystyrene roll-mat would have been a big help. I'd barely used them before and always found them an unnecessary bulky burden until that night.
After the rough night our spirits were still high for the day ahead, but we were to have hardly any luck that day. From around 9am until 5pm we were practically stood in the same spot. We were too close to Vienna and the majority of the traffic was going towards Bratislava and Budapest.
Much later in the day around 5 a young couple pulled up eating recently-bought ice creams and offered us a lift to Vienna. They was a bit of confusion though and they explained that there wasn't a petrol station in the direction of Graz for another 20km, and so had to drop us in the centre of Vienna.
Next ride:
-Young couple going towards car crash. There was a car crash that had just happened on the road to Graz, so our ride had to pull into a petrol station there. We ended up sleeping at another petrol station somewhere in Austria, this time a little more prepared, but still fucking cold.
Day 3:
-Slovenian girl took us to Slovenj Gradec
-Big Slovenian guy drove us all the way to Ljubljana
Teo in Slovenj Gradec
We left Prague around 10am (after an hour or two of rousing Teo out of bed by telephone), and made our steady journey out of the city. We got our first (and my very first) ride out of the city by a chap in a Vodafone-coloured red car who was heading for Ostrava. Our first destination was Brno. All was going well, until the driver stopped at a petrol station to get petrol or refresh himself or whatever, and soon realised he couldn't find his drivers license or wallet. We emptied our things out of his car to help him look, but he never found what he was looking for. We mused that he could have dropped his things as we were putting our gear in the car in Prague. With a pretty grim face he decided he would turn back and left us standing at a petrol station 40km from Prague.
The day continued pretty well, reaching Brno, Bratislava and the edge of Vienna by the evening. It was beginning to get dark and we figured a ride into Vienna city centre at this time wouldn't be any help. We ended up spending a night in my tent in the parking lot by the petrol station. We rolled out our sleeping bags and soon got to sleep on the soft lumpy ground. In the middle of the night though, we both woke up freezing our balls off. Teo fully dressed himself in extra layers in an attempt to reheat his body, while I cocooned myself in my sleeping bag and coiled myself into a foetal position. The cold was coming straight through the ground beneath us and through the thin plastic sheeting of the tent. A polystyrene roll-mat would have been a big help. I'd barely used them before and always found them an unnecessary bulky burden until that night.
After the rough night our spirits were still high for the day ahead, but we were to have hardly any luck that day. From around 9am until 5pm we were practically stood in the same spot. We were too close to Vienna and the majority of the traffic was going towards Bratislava and Budapest.
Much later in the day around 5 a young couple pulled up eating recently-bought ice creams and offered us a lift to Vienna. They was a bit of confusion though and they explained that there wasn't a petrol station in the direction of Graz for another 20km, and so had to drop us in the centre of Vienna.
Next ride:
-Young couple going towards car crash. There was a car crash that had just happened on the road to Graz, so our ride had to pull into a petrol station there. We ended up sleeping at another petrol station somewhere in Austria, this time a little more prepared, but still fucking cold.
Day 3:
-Slovenian girl took us to Slovenj Gradec
-Big Slovenian guy drove us all the way to Ljubljana
Teo in Slovenj Gradec
Sunday 13 July 2008
Fucking Győr.
A couple of 'road' entries from my journal, 2007:
Friday 14th September
I am sat at the Apostel restaurant in Győr, Hungary. I am eating mushroom soup, and will be having stuffed "Kiev" turkey as a main course. I wasn't planning on splashing out so much, but then again I wasn't expecting to be in a town so without cheaper alternatives. It's a bit too posh if you ask me, but obviously it has to throw a McDonald's in the vicinity, too. Anyway, I plan to sleep rough here tonight. I went looking for a campsite which was supposedly at one end of town by the river, but it wasn't to be found. Not by me anyway. An old lady tried to help me, but the communication barrier was just too wide. Bless her though. I then found a penzion after searching the streets for a hostel or similar cheap accommodation, and found that the price i would have to pay would be 8000 HUF, which worked out to be about 1000 Czech crowns [which was about 40 euros then I believe]. I'm not paying that much when I wasn't even planning on staying in this town. There's not much to do here, it seems, anyway. It seems to rely mostly on rich tourists: a few posh restaurants and wine bars and some floodlit churches. Oh, and a sports centre park by the river for the aging toffs who want to ram a few balls at eachother.
I was hoping to hitch straight to Lake Balaton when I arrived here but the sun had almost set and I didn't want to be stranded by the side of the road in the darkness [I didn't realise then that to be 'stranded' by the side of a road in a field would have been more preferable, especially since I had a tent with me]. There's plenty of parks around I should be able to find reasonable comfort in with my sleeping bag.
- I finally left Prague on Wednesday 12th September and took a bus straight to Bratislava. I spent two nights there, spending a whole day with Ewa, a Slovak friend, exploring the city.
It was while I was in Bratislava that I decided to head South to Lake Balaton to spend some time camping by the lake outdoors.
Saturday 15th September
And what fun sleeping rough turned out to be. That night I finished the soup and turkey and paid, then thought I'd walk around town until I got tired and found somewhere suitable to sleep. The small park I thought of sleeping in initially turned out to be no good, since it was next to the recreational holiday camp and there were young kids (I say kids, I mean young adults) walking past the whole night to and from town. Plus, a pair of young lovers seemed to be making good use of the secluded park, from what I could hear. I eventually found another park close to the train station by the main road which wasn't too brightly lit, so I found the darkest area I could and laid out my sleeping bag and crawled snugly into it. It was starting to get quite cold at this point, but the sleeping bag kept me more than warm enough along with my trousers and woolly hat that I kept on. It took me a while to get to sleep at first, because of the noise of the traffic and the sound of the odd person walking past on the main road. After perhaps 20 minutes of sleeping lightly, I woke up with a man crouching next to me, and his bike leaning against a nearby tree. I'm not sure whether I awoke from him trying to wake me, or whether I coincidentally (or instinctively?) happened to wake up in time. He was attempting to ask me what I was doing there and why I was sleeping on the cold ground. I tried to explain to him that I was warm and dry enough in my Norwegian sleeping bag. "It's OK, I'm on holiday", I said. His English was limited to a very few words and he couldn't speak any German, which I found surprising considering everybody else I had spoken to in this town had spoken German as a second language. I then realised that he was offering to let me sleep in his house. Although I thought it was a nice gesture, I wasn't going to sleep in a complete stranger's house, especially one I could barely communicate with. He eventually left after many more attempts to fathom why I was happy sleeping in the park, shrugged his shoulders, shook my hand and left. Although the incident wasn't particularly strange I found it hard to back to sleep. What if he was to return with the intention of robbing me when I was fast asleep again? It was about 00:30 at this point, so I thought I'd take a walk and see if the first park had become quieter and more suitable for sleeping in. My legs were knackered at this point from walking so much all day and sleeping on the ground. It took a while to get the joints working smoothly again.
I reached the other park again which was at the other side of town over the river. The area was just as busy as before, so after walking around for another hour or so I decided to return to the spot where I had managed to sleep earlier. Maybe the chap had returned to the spot while I was gone hoping I'd found somewhere better to sleep or hoping to steal my belongings. Anyway I fell asleep again, this time for longer, until I actually got quite hot in my sleeping bag. Less people were passing by on the road behind me by this time so I wasn't woken that often. At one point I was woken by a couple sat on the wall behind me at the edge of the park. They were apparently oblivious of me so I just led there watching them wondering when the night would be over. Then, in between myself and the couple who steps into view directly in front of me? The same man, again! He crouches down in front of me with a gesture that seemed to suggest "what are you doing?" I replied with the words "Oh, hello... what?" still half asleep. Perhaps he was being genuinely sympathetic and wanted to help? Perhaps he had gone home thinking "I shouldn't have left that poor young man freezing to death in the park." So he gestures for me to sit on a nearby bench with him. I go ahead with it since any chance of getting back to sleep now seems futile. I put my sleeping bag away and put my shoes on, then follow him to the bench. I begin to get a chill from the sweat I'd accumulated in the sleeping bag. He starts asking me where I'm from and what I'm doing here. I tell him I'm English, I live in Prague and I'm on my way to Lake Balaton to do some camping. I tell him that my tent and other belongings are locked away at the train station and I intend to pick them up in the morning. He asks me if I have any money and I tell him -yes, I don't need any money. He asks "many?" and I tell him I have 1,000 forints. I actually have 10,000 forints but I see no reason to tell him I have it. He asks me to show it to him. It's at this point I start to think he's not looking out for me at all. Why would he want to see my money? He asks me if that is everything I have, and I tell him "of course, I have more in the bank". All I want to let him know is that I don't need or require anything, I just want to get to sleep until the morning. He starts to ask me if i would go to the bank with him to get some more money out, presumably to pay for a room or something. I try to explain to him that even if I did get more money out there is nothing I can do with it since there is no longer anything open at this time of the night. He is blatantly waiting for me to expose some cash so he can nab it and do a runner, I thought. I continue to refuse going to the bank with him and eventually leaves reluctantly with another shrug of his shoulders. Fuck, all I wanted to do was get some free kip [sleep] for the night.
It's now 05:00 in the morning and I'm sat at the train station. It's still dark but the first trains are coming into Győr. Fucking Győr.
Friday 14th September
I am sat at the Apostel restaurant in Győr, Hungary. I am eating mushroom soup, and will be having stuffed "Kiev" turkey as a main course. I wasn't planning on splashing out so much, but then again I wasn't expecting to be in a town so without cheaper alternatives. It's a bit too posh if you ask me, but obviously it has to throw a McDonald's in the vicinity, too. Anyway, I plan to sleep rough here tonight. I went looking for a campsite which was supposedly at one end of town by the river, but it wasn't to be found. Not by me anyway. An old lady tried to help me, but the communication barrier was just too wide. Bless her though. I then found a penzion after searching the streets for a hostel or similar cheap accommodation, and found that the price i would have to pay would be 8000 HUF, which worked out to be about 1000 Czech crowns [which was about 40 euros then I believe]. I'm not paying that much when I wasn't even planning on staying in this town. There's not much to do here, it seems, anyway. It seems to rely mostly on rich tourists: a few posh restaurants and wine bars and some floodlit churches. Oh, and a sports centre park by the river for the aging toffs who want to ram a few balls at eachother.
I was hoping to hitch straight to Lake Balaton when I arrived here but the sun had almost set and I didn't want to be stranded by the side of the road in the darkness [I didn't realise then that to be 'stranded' by the side of a road in a field would have been more preferable, especially since I had a tent with me]. There's plenty of parks around I should be able to find reasonable comfort in with my sleeping bag.
- I finally left Prague on Wednesday 12th September and took a bus straight to Bratislava. I spent two nights there, spending a whole day with Ewa, a Slovak friend, exploring the city.
It was while I was in Bratislava that I decided to head South to Lake Balaton to spend some time camping by the lake outdoors.
Saturday 15th September
And what fun sleeping rough turned out to be. That night I finished the soup and turkey and paid, then thought I'd walk around town until I got tired and found somewhere suitable to sleep. The small park I thought of sleeping in initially turned out to be no good, since it was next to the recreational holiday camp and there were young kids (I say kids, I mean young adults) walking past the whole night to and from town. Plus, a pair of young lovers seemed to be making good use of the secluded park, from what I could hear. I eventually found another park close to the train station by the main road which wasn't too brightly lit, so I found the darkest area I could and laid out my sleeping bag and crawled snugly into it. It was starting to get quite cold at this point, but the sleeping bag kept me more than warm enough along with my trousers and woolly hat that I kept on. It took me a while to get to sleep at first, because of the noise of the traffic and the sound of the odd person walking past on the main road. After perhaps 20 minutes of sleeping lightly, I woke up with a man crouching next to me, and his bike leaning against a nearby tree. I'm not sure whether I awoke from him trying to wake me, or whether I coincidentally (or instinctively?) happened to wake up in time. He was attempting to ask me what I was doing there and why I was sleeping on the cold ground. I tried to explain to him that I was warm and dry enough in my Norwegian sleeping bag. "It's OK, I'm on holiday", I said. His English was limited to a very few words and he couldn't speak any German, which I found surprising considering everybody else I had spoken to in this town had spoken German as a second language. I then realised that he was offering to let me sleep in his house. Although I thought it was a nice gesture, I wasn't going to sleep in a complete stranger's house, especially one I could barely communicate with. He eventually left after many more attempts to fathom why I was happy sleeping in the park, shrugged his shoulders, shook my hand and left. Although the incident wasn't particularly strange I found it hard to back to sleep. What if he was to return with the intention of robbing me when I was fast asleep again? It was about 00:30 at this point, so I thought I'd take a walk and see if the first park had become quieter and more suitable for sleeping in. My legs were knackered at this point from walking so much all day and sleeping on the ground. It took a while to get the joints working smoothly again.
I reached the other park again which was at the other side of town over the river. The area was just as busy as before, so after walking around for another hour or so I decided to return to the spot where I had managed to sleep earlier. Maybe the chap had returned to the spot while I was gone hoping I'd found somewhere better to sleep or hoping to steal my belongings. Anyway I fell asleep again, this time for longer, until I actually got quite hot in my sleeping bag. Less people were passing by on the road behind me by this time so I wasn't woken that often. At one point I was woken by a couple sat on the wall behind me at the edge of the park. They were apparently oblivious of me so I just led there watching them wondering when the night would be over. Then, in between myself and the couple who steps into view directly in front of me? The same man, again! He crouches down in front of me with a gesture that seemed to suggest "what are you doing?" I replied with the words "Oh, hello... what?" still half asleep. Perhaps he was being genuinely sympathetic and wanted to help? Perhaps he had gone home thinking "I shouldn't have left that poor young man freezing to death in the park." So he gestures for me to sit on a nearby bench with him. I go ahead with it since any chance of getting back to sleep now seems futile. I put my sleeping bag away and put my shoes on, then follow him to the bench. I begin to get a chill from the sweat I'd accumulated in the sleeping bag. He starts asking me where I'm from and what I'm doing here. I tell him I'm English, I live in Prague and I'm on my way to Lake Balaton to do some camping. I tell him that my tent and other belongings are locked away at the train station and I intend to pick them up in the morning. He asks me if I have any money and I tell him -yes, I don't need any money. He asks "many?" and I tell him I have 1,000 forints. I actually have 10,000 forints but I see no reason to tell him I have it. He asks me to show it to him. It's at this point I start to think he's not looking out for me at all. Why would he want to see my money? He asks me if that is everything I have, and I tell him "of course, I have more in the bank". All I want to let him know is that I don't need or require anything, I just want to get to sleep until the morning. He starts to ask me if i would go to the bank with him to get some more money out, presumably to pay for a room or something. I try to explain to him that even if I did get more money out there is nothing I can do with it since there is no longer anything open at this time of the night. He is blatantly waiting for me to expose some cash so he can nab it and do a runner, I thought. I continue to refuse going to the bank with him and eventually leaves reluctantly with another shrug of his shoulders. Fuck, all I wanted to do was get some free kip [sleep] for the night.
It's now 05:00 in the morning and I'm sat at the train station. It's still dark but the first trains are coming into Győr. Fucking Győr.
Monday 7 July 2008
Still have my thumbs in the wrong place: in my pockets
So, the trip never happened, or at least there was never any hitch-hiking involved. The morning I set off I was completely not in the mood for the trip, I had certain reasons for wanting to leave Prague, but the wrong ones for taking a trip alone.
My first mistake was taking much too stuff. I took a very heavy tent with me that I never used, which made walking for more than 10 minutes hell. At the last minute before leaving I decided to get a bus directly to Bratislava instead. I spent a couple of nights there, hoping to rejuvenate some optimism. I then set off (by another bus) to the town of Győr in Hungary. From here I was pretty much 100% determined to hitch-hike towards Lake Balaton to the south of me. I had a route planned and everything, all I had to do was find the road that would have led me all the way there. There was one problem: the sun was setting. Should I risk attempting to hitch-hike for the first time in the setting sun, until it goes dark and minimizing my chances of finding a suitable place to sleep? I headed off through the town of Győr towards where I thought the road was. It turned out I was walking in the wrong direction. I stopped in my own footsteps, and began to feel the chill of the evening coming on and the points of stars beginning to form in the sky. Shit.
I ended up staying the night there (sleeping in the park, which is another story I'll write about later), before having a pretty similar trip the next day, this time not involving a bus, but a train.
It was only a few days before I was back in Bratislava and then back in Prague. I was definitely not in the right mind for this trip. I had left Prague a little depressed about a problem with a girl, and I think it was this that forced me blindly back to Prague so soon in the end.
Should I have travelled with a companion? Something tells me this would have helped, when I felt like I was defeated I would have had somedy to pull me along. At the same time though, it was something I wanted to accomplish by myself.
I certainly won't take as much baggage with me, especially if I'm not going to use it.
And should I have left with such an absence of excitement? Something tells me that if I'd done as planned and tried hitch-hiking, my face would have been beaming for hours after getting my first ride.
Another year has passed. I still haven't hitched, but I'm planning some shorter trips in the very near future.
Watch this space.
My first mistake was taking much too stuff. I took a very heavy tent with me that I never used, which made walking for more than 10 minutes hell. At the last minute before leaving I decided to get a bus directly to Bratislava instead. I spent a couple of nights there, hoping to rejuvenate some optimism. I then set off (by another bus) to the town of Győr in Hungary. From here I was pretty much 100% determined to hitch-hike towards Lake Balaton to the south of me. I had a route planned and everything, all I had to do was find the road that would have led me all the way there. There was one problem: the sun was setting. Should I risk attempting to hitch-hike for the first time in the setting sun, until it goes dark and minimizing my chances of finding a suitable place to sleep? I headed off through the town of Győr towards where I thought the road was. It turned out I was walking in the wrong direction. I stopped in my own footsteps, and began to feel the chill of the evening coming on and the points of stars beginning to form in the sky. Shit.
I ended up staying the night there (sleeping in the park, which is another story I'll write about later), before having a pretty similar trip the next day, this time not involving a bus, but a train.
It was only a few days before I was back in Bratislava and then back in Prague. I was definitely not in the right mind for this trip. I had left Prague a little depressed about a problem with a girl, and I think it was this that forced me blindly back to Prague so soon in the end.
Should I have travelled with a companion? Something tells me this would have helped, when I felt like I was defeated I would have had somedy to pull me along. At the same time though, it was something I wanted to accomplish by myself.
I certainly won't take as much baggage with me, especially if I'm not going to use it.
And should I have left with such an absence of excitement? Something tells me that if I'd done as planned and tried hitch-hiking, my face would have been beaming for hours after getting my first ride.
Another year has passed. I still haven't hitched, but I'm planning some shorter trips in the very near future.
Watch this space.
Wednesday 22 August 2007
Cyrillicisms
Since the last post I still believe I'm sticking with the same route. I'm basically going to head towards the Montenegro/Croatian coast, via Slovakia, Hungary, and Serbia. I'll probably spend a good few days there along the coast and chill out and meet some people. I'm hoping that I meet enough locals along the way that will give me ideas about places to visit and things to do there and on the way back. Which is where Couchsurfing will come in handy.
I don't feel like I have anything to do between now and when I make the trip.
I don't see the point in planning it, I suppose all I can do is find as much local information as possible that might help along the way. I noticed in Bulgaria (last time I was there) how much more difficult it is to get around and understand in a country that has a cyrillic alphabet, even though I wouldn't have a clue what anything meant if it wasn't in cyrillic! At least the spoken language is similar sounding to Czech in Serbia and Croatia, I might then be able to pick up a few phrases quite quickly that might make getting around a little easier.
I don't feel like I have anything to do between now and when I make the trip.
I don't see the point in planning it, I suppose all I can do is find as much local information as possible that might help along the way. I noticed in Bulgaria (last time I was there) how much more difficult it is to get around and understand in a country that has a cyrillic alphabet, even though I wouldn't have a clue what anything meant if it wasn't in cyrillic! At least the spoken language is similar sounding to Czech in Serbia and Croatia, I might then be able to pick up a few phrases quite quickly that might make getting around a little easier.
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