Thursday, July 23, 2009

Diary - 22nd of July, 2009 - From the Czech Republic to Hungary


After learning that the suspected Utopian Banking Society conspirators were headed for Trabzon on Monday night, we spent much of Tuesday making last-minute preparations for our journey. Having left the UK so hastily, we still had a number of expedition essentials to aquire - fuel for the Trangia, iodine for water treatment, a tyre repair kit, and a compass.

Unfortunately, neither Peter nor I speak a word of Czech. The fuel for the Trangia and food for our travels were quite easily purchased at the Tesco in Klatovy, but iodine for water purification was to prove practically impossible. After coming up empty handed at the local camping store, we headed to the pharmacy. Some pictionary and broken english later we discovered that the pharmacy didn't sell tincture of iodine anymore, but the woman at the counter was confident that another camping store in the town square would have something for water treatment. With a printout from Google Maps in hand, we headed to the town square.

While Peter waited in the car I headed to the first camping store, paper and pen in hand to explain through pictures what it was we were after. After a number of confused looks and some mutually unintelligible exchanges, a light suddenly came on in the head of the shop assistant, and she ran off excitedly with my water bottle... and returned with it full of tap water. Not exactly what I had in mind, but figuring I might have better luck at the next camping shop.

At the second shop I had much more pictionary success, and through sign language she explained that they didn't carry water purification tablets, but that she thought they might have some at the pharmacy up the road. Feeling a slight sense of deja vu, I wandered up to the second pharmacy, where one of the pharmacists explained that they don't sell iodine at pharmacies in the Czech Republic anymore. Defeated, I headed back to the car. With every second we spend in the Czech Republic, the UBS conspirators are getting further from our reach. We simply must hit the road.

From Klatovy we have driven to Linz, Austria. Though this is not the most direct route to Turkey, we felt we would have better luck getting a solution to our water purification problem here.

On the way to Austria we passed back through Germany shortly, and immediately after crossing the border were pulled over by an unmarked Audi wagon with two plainclothes German police. After checking that we weren't smuggling drugs from the Czech Republic and laughing at the prospect of us making it to Mongolia in four weeks in the Subprime Micra, the wished us good luck and left us on our way.

We spent last night at the Hotel Locomotive just out of town. After walking down to the town center for dinner and a look around, we came back to the hotel to process some photos, charge some batteries and spend a little bit of time on the internet before going to bed. Having constructed a makeshift power plug adapter from an old light cord we'd found on the walk home, I plugged in my US power board... and BANG! The lights go out. It seems that the surge protection circuits in my board cause serious issues for 220v supplies.

After stashing the offending gear back in a bag, I headed out toward the lobby to try to explain what had happened without incriminating myself. Thankfully on my way I came across the electrical box for our floor, found the circuit breaker for our room and reset it. The US powerboard is going back in the bag for the rest of the trip.

This morning we had another fantastic continental breakfast, and after discussing our rally car at length with the hotel owner, we started pounding the bitumen again. From Linz, we passed through Vienna for a late lunch, then into Slovakia through Bratislava and continuing through the night to Budapest in Hungary for dinner.

Budapest is an amazing city. As we parked the Micra, we noticed two young men paying undue attention to us and our car. We decided that it might be a good idea to stay close for the time being. Fortunately, directly across the road we found a bar/restaurant with a direct view of our car from the table. As we ate our traditional Hungarian soup with hot paprika, the two young men returned to scope out our car, but having noticed us noticing them, they seemed to decide to move on to an easier target.

Before continuing down toward Turkey, we decided to make a quick tour of some of the city's many attractions. After driving aimlessly for 10 or 15 minutes, we found a group of local teenagers who in flawless english directed us to the road up to the Citadella, overlooking the city.
The Citadella and the views of the city below are truely spectacular. It also seems to be the number one make-out spot for local teens. After an all too brief visit, we returned to the Micra for a couple of hours extra driving, but not far out of Budapest food-coma started to hit, and we set up camp in a field maybe 20m from the highway, to the sound of barking dogs and heavy freight trucks.

5 comments:

  1. Chaps - glad to see you appear to be alive. Message for intrepid explorer Krogdahl - Mission control has faith that all is well and you are well on your way to completing your mission, but "Mother" has grave concerns and wishes you to report in ASAP.

    That would be marvelous.

    Over and Out

    NK

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  2. Ditto from the other mother. Have left a couple of phone messages, but no response. No doubt an absense of coverage, but if you get this please respond. A few more photos on the blog would be nice too.

    Cheryl and Kate

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  3. Hello!

    Mother Hercus was also expressing concerns about survival of the team, this should reassure her.

    :)
    Caitlin
    PS. Guille and I had similar troubles in Argentina trying to purchase caffiene tablets. He had to stick with the less efficient method of actually drinking 10 cups of coffee each day.

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  4. Barely a few days into the trip, and already you face your first run-in with the law. Hope you found your iodine and your trip is not starting to resemble Oregon Trail. Post an update for us - we can scarcely extrapolate what continent you're on.

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  5. Pete - what's with the weird t-shirt pose?

    guys did you know you can send SMS updates to the mongol website? Most other teams seem to be doing that - and then youn see where you are on the map... just a thought :)

    keep up the good work

    N

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