Vamos

Twenty-nine days ago today I decided the year was getting on a bit and it was time to do something. So I booked a flight to Munich, Germany, returning in pretty much exactly six months out of Madrid, Spain. This gave me an eight day window in Tasmania to sort out everything I needed; decide exactly what I'd use over six months away, have a couple of check-ups and all those other small, routine things that I had put off. I packed a small amount of casual clothes and pretty much filled the rest of my pack with gear; a pair of climbing shoes, approach shoes, a tent, sleeping bag and an assortment of outdoor clothing with the intention of being suitably prepared for camping out in the Lofoten Islands in the Norwegian Arctic. The week went pretty slowly considering it was my last week at home in six months; most people were absorbed in their usual busy weeks and the typical dull, sporadic Tasmanian weather strictly limited what time I had left to enjoy the outdoors and get a few last climbs in at my favourite spots. 

When Saturday came around the notion of being on the other side of the world in forty-eight odd hours still seemed completely surreal. I think it only really sunk in the next morning when I frantically started looking for an evasive item or two, slightly impaired by the seediness from the night before, realising that if they weren't located I was going to have to find them on another continent or make do without. Actually that's not really true. Even the destination of the plane trip didn't feel real. I remember sitting there thinking, “In 9hrs this plane will deposit me in southern Germany...”, almost as if to doubt the plane's capacity to do so. It felt entirely surreal.

Just because it felt surreal didn't mean I didn't act on its significance. That Saturday night Dan and I organised to head out with a few good mates. We thought we'd have a barbeque which soon evolved into a campfire in a public park; the night was off to a good start!

Anyway, after possibly one of the greatest nights in town ever it was soon time to leave for the airport. I didn't feel the weight of saying goodbye to everyone for six months as much as one might expect at all, it just simply hadn't sunken in. I don't think the length of time I will be away has sunken in now, almost three weeks after landing on this continent.

On the flight out of Melbourne I received two wines and a big Armagnac, courtesy of a very liberal flight attendant on Qatar Airways and followed it up with a sleeping tablet, ensuring I was subdued most of the way to Doha. After landing we soon discovered what happens when three international flights land in quick succession and are funneled through the same four poorly divided security checkpoints.

The flight from Qatar to Munich went by relatively quickly, feeling like a mere domestic leg in comparison to the 14hr flight that preceded it. German customs felt like a joke in comparison to the experiences I'd had before entering America and returning into Australia. After barely 15mins an immigration officer seemed to just glance at our passports before asking if we were here for a holiday or business and ushering us through. We quickly grabbed our bags and stepped outside into Germany proper to be greeted with mild, sunny spring weather.

We had come here with almost no prior planning and soon found out that like in most major cities the airport is well beyond the city limits; we were 40km out! After navigating a very confusing ticket purchasing system we were on a train bound for the city. As it grew closer I noticed a car yard on the right hand side and we got off here and began browsing cars. From quite a contrived conversation with the Algerian owner it soon became apparent that buying a car in Germany would be quite a futile task; although there were plenty of cars within our budget it would be extremely expensive to register any as a foreign national and Germany requires quite a comprehensive mechanic's check and emissions test before any car is allowed on the road. It was going to be extremely unlikely to be able to purchase and register a car in such a tightly regulated country.

So the following morning, after checking out the historic city center and finding somewhere to stay, we made the decision to head east. We popped across the road to the train station and bought two tickets to Prague, leaving in the early afternoon. To be honest, I was glad to leave. Germany, or Munich at least, just had this unusual feel to it, a certain austerity, each person we passed seemed so purposeful in what they were doing and everything simply seemed too clean and orderly.

I remember sitting down at a park about a kilometre out of the city center. The park was completely ringed by tulips and in the middle about five different games of soccer were going on. I saw so many examples of similar things, society seemed to be rather reserved. In Australia those tulips wouldn't even get to flowering stage in an unfenced garden bed, they would be trampled in no time in such a high traffic park.

I found Munich rather frustrating. Entering other European cities with no prior planning has been a welcoming and fulfilling experience, but not there. It seemed to be near impossible to find local places to eat, the city centre's prices and eateries had been adjusted to meet the needs of and exploit the copious throngs of western tourists flowing through the city every year. By no means the kind of travel experience I was looking for.

As we crossed the Czech border things quickly began to change. The towns we passed through teemed with life. Some buildings stood in disrepair, others were immaculately upkept, just like anywhere else. But the areas of Bavaria we traveled through. Graffiti lined the train tracks in places and the train lines themselves were tensioned by rudimentary-looking concrete weights. Children sat on a platform, their feet dangling over the tracks. The architecture also began to change, not dramatically, but its effect was dramatic in contrast to the sterile eveness and consistency of German streets despite the buildings themselves being quite similar. 

Nearing Prague the tracks began following a river-carved valley of growing depth and we saw our first rock of the whole trip, a cause for excitement in itself. In Germany and the western Czech Republic there was literally no rock. Simply fertile growing lands for as far as the eye could see. I felt Czech awakening something within me, that kind of spark I had experienced with travel in the past, the sense of complete freedom coupled with uncertainty induced excitement, something I had been craving for a long time.

Czech to me seemed so much more accessible, a place where I could really to know the nation, its culture and people. We soon began hitting vast areas of houses, so vast that they could be no Czech city but Prague. Before long the train crossed the Vltava on an antiquated iron bridge, making that timeless clickity-clack sound and shortly after pulling into central station, a mere stone's throw from the historic city.

The station had a completely different feel to Germany. Being a western with poor eastern awareness and no grasp at all on any Slavic languages, except for a few phrases of Russian, it took a few goes to find someone that could effectively direct us to information. The hospitality was great from the very start. The attendent helped us find a great, centrally located, ultra-modern hostel for a reasonable 14 euros a night and when I told him I wanted to eat and drink in local places he pulled out a map and marked five or so places on it that he would eat at himself. I already felt much love for this city.

After a quick walk we were at out accommodation, located in a strategic position on a classical Prague street, merely a few minutes walk from the main boulevard with a palace crowning its upper end. Reception happily helped us out with a conversion plug to charge our devices and we were soon up in a second-story corner room. I opened up a window and like in most historic buildings the window sills were wide enough to sit on. I climbed up, swung over and sat with my feet dangling over the cobble-stoned street below. 

It was only seven o'clock and despite it not even being summer yet there was two hours of daylight left this far north. We headed out for a walk around the city which was pleasantly devoid of English speaking tourists like ourselves. I heard other Slavic languages and a considerable amount of German, Spanish and Italian. We wound our way through a inticrate series of small alleyways, linking up squares and larger boulevards, soaking up the sheer grandeur of this classic city. I had been to iconic cities such as Paris, London and Rome before but could never remember being as impressed with the refined style and sheer volume of it I saw in Prague.

The city is simply amazing despite not being the quite eastern capital it once was was. Nowadays the city is drowned by western tourists who have driven prices up, making the city unaffordable for all but wealthier Czechs. The following day I walked into a shop, looking for information on a good, cheap, local place to eat in that part of the city and stumbled onto this Czech economic dilemma. The woman simply replied, “I don't know...”. At first I thought her English might be poor and she didn't understand but she elaborated, saying, “I don't eat in the city. I can't eat in the city.” Prices in Prague are so heavily inflated in relation to the salaries of the majority of Czech people. 

Still, sad as it is, the raised prices are no big deal as a tourist. Local beer sits at around two Australian Dollars a pint in some of the most famous spots in the city and even less if you hunt around! The local generic pilsners put our biggest breweries to complete shame. I'd even go as far to say the quality of a beer from a big brewery like Pilsner Urquell trumps some of our pseudo-craft beers like Squires or Coopers.

Many local youth have adjusted their attitudes to making money to take advantage of the city's huge backpacker turnover. “Coke? Weed? Marijuana? Bud?” and multiple other descriptions of various drugs resonate from the just about everywhere. We also had numerous Nigerians and Ghanians approach us on the street, regurgitating sales pitches and trying to entice us towards various strip joints, advertising solely Russian and Ukrainian girls.

The first morning at our accommodation we went downstairs to ask about breakfast and was told it was on the house. The complimentary breakfast was cooked especially for us and was pretty much gourmet quality. The next morning we found out it was a mistake and should cost ten Euros! It was rather disappointing that the accommodation asked for payment for everything in Euros rather than Koruna, obviously geared towards the convenience of the multitude of Europeans on weekend getaways. The Euro tends to drive prices up and kind of feels like its compromising a part of each nation's individuality.

That morning at breakfast I asked a waiter about where we could look for cheap cars in the city and if he knew anyone that would register a car. He didn't respond, calling, “Michael!”. Another waiter turned and came over. “These boys want to buy a car.”

“Ah! I See!” He began. “Now this very difficult if you do not have Czech residency. I know this because I have import export business.”

It turned out this waiter, an immigrant from Nigeria, actually had a car he could sell us. He took us for a drive, showing us such things as how to take a phone call when driving. Basically you stop no matter where you are for as long as five minutes and put your hazard lights on. He was possibly the most aware driver I have ever seen, getting within metres of cars at 120 odd before quickly merging with absolute precision.

That night we toasted the prospects of securing a car deal with a few pilsners and a cigar each. Neither of us usually have a particular fondness for tobacco but we just thought, “Why not?!” For some strange reason I became a little sick later that night.

He asked for 30,000 Koruna plus 7,000 Koruna for “insurance” that we very well knew was a fee for keeping the car registered in his name and sorting everything out for us. He expressed the fact that whenever you leave the car you have to take the “big technician paper” with you because its the only thing proving ownership if the car is stolen literally tens of times in every way imaginable. He took a similar approach to informing us about fuel, which he pronounced “fwel”, repeatedly drumming into us that you “always get the 95”, as if we'd get sloppy and decide to fill the thing up with diesel.

On our second day we decided to head across town to check out a local bouldering gym. We never suspected there would be two on the same street and mistakenly went to the wrong one at first, walking in through a decrepit and graffiti laden archway and following several small dirty alleys that resembled something out of a generic movie promulgating eastern stereotypes. We got to a heavy metal door and buzzed ourselves in. Rope was sitting on the ground by the climbs, showing you could lead with no induction whatsoever. Dogs ran around inside. People were using ice axes on the campus wall. I was loving the east more and more with each new experience.

I went to talk to the guy at the desk who was very helpful despite me making clear that we had come to the wrong place. He recommended an outdoor bouldering area, writing down notes and gave me the link to Czech websites for both bouldering and climbing in general. After saying our goodbyes after about half an hour we headed to the place we had found on the internet that we wanted to climb at.

For the Koruna equivalent of about five Australian dollars we got all day entry with access to showers and they even provided water, certainly a step up from what you receive in Australia for three times the price. The climbing was great and the local climbers were extremely hospitable, showing us the ins and outs of the local route system and even extending an invitation to go route climbing outdoors if we were staying in Czech. The weird thing was most of these guys would have been twenty odd years our seniors, some of them even had kids. The outdoor sport culture is entirely different in Europe, it transcends age and background, having a much greater acceptance and standing in society. We even saw several parents with toddlers, lifting their kids up the walls and letting them feel the holds. 

After having such a solid session that I tore open my hand we headed over to check out the Slalom Course via a brand new, yet to be open bridge. We sat enjoying the sun for close to two hours before walking back to our accommodation via a rather long route, taking about 2hrs.

Two days later we were sitting in a small coffee shop in a mall with a substantial amount of cash on us. It felt like something out of a movie. We went to the bank that morning and extracted 37,000 Koruna, a huge looking amount of money in 1000 Koruna denominations. We shook on the deal, passing Michael the money in exchange for the very official looking and intricate “big technician paper” and I signed a paper in Czech, entering into the contract.

We would pick it up sometime in the morning the following day, our fourth or fifth in Prague. We had a car!