PRATTS IN PRAGUE
Sunday 7th March, and great excitement around the locality as the unofficial Skipton branch of CAMRA prepare for departure by exclusive taxi (Alan’s poxy blue Peugeot) for a short trip to Leeds/Bradford airport (Yeadon airport to those of us who really know). So there we was, 5 of us crammed into this crappy blue velocipede driven by Alan himself who kept us entertained along the route by weaving in and out of oncoming traffic. Seems he’d spent so much time towing aircraft down runways that he forgot which side of the road he should really be on. However, all things considered, we arrived at the airport relatively unscathed to meet up with the rest of the crew where we did all the usual touristy stuff like checking in and getting drunk. Well not quite drunk ‘cos Guinness was £2.80 a pint and, finally, the moment of excitement, it was time to board our flight. Now, this wos the very first time ever for me, Fred & Jenny to leave the ground so we boarded Jet2’s luxury silver tin budgie wondering wot the hell we were doing and how something that looks like a tube train wiv wings could get off the ground. Well, it did and, as we reached take off speed, I realised it wos exactly like an Arriva trains class 142 unit until I looked round and found every one smirking at me. Ah, it wos only my seat that wos rattling, helped along by one of them Lancastrians, Steve I think it wos, who wos sat behind me doing something wiv the seat that only shepherds do wiv sheep!
During our flight it came as no surprise that a microscopic tin of beer should cost us an arm and a leg. But there wos an even greater surprise in store, no one had told me we were part of the K&C Morris dancing team heading for a convention in Prague. Morris dancing? I ask yers. Okay I did have my jingly tankard but do we look like Morris dancers? (don’t you dare answer that). Anyway, after spending 2 hours flying over lots of fluffy white things, we finally arrived at our destination, Prague, my first impression of which wos Bradford wiv attitude. So, after collecting our gear and milling around aimlessly for several minutes, we finally boarded a minibus wiv trailer for an exhilarating journey through Prague ghettos to our hotel about 2 miles away where, after not bothering to attempt to overcome the language barrier, we got sorted and made for the bar next door where our tour leader ‘Brown Owl’ Andy ‘Grabba Granny’ Grant picked up some strange Slovakian granny, which, the more beer we drank the more amusing it became, and Tony got told off by a Czech barmaid for closing the door, which was even more amusing ‘cos, even though we couldn’t understand a word of it, it wos obvious he wos in trouble! Czech beer is of course cheap and strong so ewe can well imagine wot some of us were like after several litres of Staropramen’s finest chilled lager!
Monday
morning came wiv a bang and, after being disturbed from my slumbers by
Brown Owl (this guy really has no respect for the dead), informing me I
had seconds to get breakfast before departure to some god forsaken
outpost in the Czech Republic, we all set off on this incredible tour.
Now at this point my recollection of events and indeed my notes become
somewhat disorientated so I make no apologies for lack of chronological
literacy, besides Alan (the quiet ones are always the worst) forced me
to stay in the bar ‘til 3am, well, it’s rude to
refuse hospitality ain’t it?
The following day, or was it the day before or the day after, I’m not sure if I can remember, anyway it was after Alan had forced me into another ‘til 4am sesh in the bar where we met the Devil and his name was Slivovich, home made stuff at that, we travelled on a train to a place called kut nay whores (Kutna Hora). It wos a shame to leave the train actually ‘cos we’d just got comfortable and spent an hour trying to sleep off the rockband playing in the head. Anyhow we got there and much to everyone’s surprise the Brown Owl scored again in the form of an elderly girly guide who directed us up lots of steep hills to viewpoints and such like which no one really cared about, least of all me or Alan, who had developed a serious hangover. But wos that the end of our torment? No! Wos it hell! The idiot then dragged us all the way up to a cathedral that wos shut! Not only that, the bar wos shut for re-furb as well. Still, relief wos not too far away and we finally made it to a pub where, interestingly enough, the locals moved so that we could all share a table. If this had been Keighley they would have beaten the living daylights out of us! Cathy wouldn’t talk to me or Alan most of the day. It seems that the previous evening somebody had been phoning them up on the internal hotel phone in the early hours of the morning. However we wos still in the bar until 4am talking to some neo-nazi who showed us nice piccies of his family dressed in SS uniforms and stuff, so this time we had a genuine alibi.
Kutna Hora? Nice place, something to do wiv silver and mountains, should have guessed really wiv all them hills.
Oh yeah, almost forgot some girlie about 10 years old threw a snowball at me under the direction of her granny or some moron. Obviously that’s the only sport they have in this place, snowball a tourist and win a coronary!
One of our expeditions took us on a disused railway line in cattle trucks to some obscure, long forgotten village where we found a rather nice little drinking den and where, once again, the locals moved to let us all sit together. We obviously looked extremely desperate for each others’ company and this was perhaps the first time we’d experienced true Czech hospitality, where the proprietor couldn’t do enough to help us even though no one could understand wot he was on about. Between us we managed to misunderstand each other in Czech, German & English but it got us much needed food and ale so it will surprise all those xenophobes out there that we really do have a lot in common. After this little reprieve from hiking all over the place we decided to try out the other establishment near the railway but it was a typical Keighley type taproom with Keighley type locals to match so we didn’t stay very long and some of us had to dodge the level crossing barriers or even walk along the tracks to make it back to the station on time!
Of
course at
some
point in the trip we had to have a wander around Prague, which would
have been okay if we’d stayed on the trams but oh no, such
luxury wasn’t to be our lot, and the mother of misfortune
found us wandering wearily across the King Charles bridge after
spending an interesting time in a pub wiv no light. Obviously
they’d forgotten to pay the electric bill or were getting
their supply from network rail, still they got some candles for us,
mind ewe I nearly didn’t have to suffer this ordeal as I
narrowly missed becoming a victim of the serial tram driver, moving
just in time to see the whites of eyes and the disappointment that he
couldn’t paint another drunken English tourist on the side of
his technologically defunct vehicle. Still I’ve bored
everyone already wiv that tale now so we’ll move on shall we?
By this time we’d managed to lose the Italians who were
following Brown Owl around on some misguided impression that he was
showing them round this delightful city. Lucky for them that he
wasn’t. Not so lucky for us though as we ploughed on up yet
more hills to reach the funicular railway which took us up eventually
to a most pleasing of places, St Norbert’s priory, where they
had their own brew pub. A place most of us could have stayed for the
rest of the week. Still, all good things come to an end and we finished
up walking back down lots of steps and things to find a couple of nice
brew pubs after watching our tour guide put his jacket on the wrong way
round and step in some dog poo. The fun part wos watching him dance in
a puddle to try to clean it off. Even the locals enjoyed that one! One
pub we went in forced us to drink something similar to nitromors.
However, generally the beer wos okay but far more expensive than wot we
had become accustomed to. Brown Owl, of course, took lots of photos.
Amazing how many ewe can fit on a non-existent film in your camera
isn’t it? Perhaps he ought to invest in a digital one? Ah,
maybe not. He would have to fork out for some batteries - that would
never do! At some point in the tour it was decided that we should sack
our tour guide and give the job to Fred ‘Bald
Eagle’ Baker who freely admitted that he needed upgrading, a
fact which many of us did not fail to agree with.
Now Prague, it seems, has a similar problem to Dublin, in that large groups of English folk are not really welcome in some establishments. So our beloved Brown Owl wandered off down this decrepit dingy alley way to ascertain if it wos okay for us to go into the pub. The result only he could have managed with his elegant charm and wit. He said there wos only room for us in the function room but that it would cost us £100 each to get in ‘cos there was a turn on, not only that we would have to leave our jackets in the cloak room for a mere £5 per head, which we all rather stupidly readily agreed to. So there we were, all sat round this table in the middle of a function room, drinking beer, munching and listening to a Czech strangled cat wailing their happiest versions of folks songs to us, most of which probably translated something along the lines of “My mother died of frostbite in the kitchen, ho, ho, ho, ho, my father was murdered by my communist sister, ha, ha, ha, ha, my brother was in the SS, heh, heh, heh, heh but I love my goat, whaa, whaa, whaa, whaa” I had to admit that I was so impressed I bought one of the CDs so I could play it to the Brown Owl’s answer phone.
After that, well it was back to base camp to prepare for an early departure the following day back to the airport where we tried to appear solemn and understanding as we bumped into Graham & Trish just arriving for the second tour. We’d only just got out of range when we could conceal our laughter no more. Finally we had escaped the clutches of the Brown Owl, who was now going to give the new intake a gruelling tour with questions afterwards (Oh, I forgot to hand in my homework. I’ll have to do a second term now).
Dave and Steve disappeared somewhere during one of the tours and I understand that they had a Brazilian rump or something or other, but I’ve no idea what that might have been. I mean I don’t get much chance to visit students quarters these days so perhaps someone could enlighten me?
Well, we arrived back in England after 4 days of beer, snow and beer only to be plagued with a flat tyre on Alan’s car on the way home. It wos fun standing there watching him struggle changing it at the side of a busy road, but more fun when he handed profound Brian a wrench. He’d no idea wot to do wiv it, though it did seem to swing close to Alan’s head at one point.
Prague? Yes, well worth a visit, lots of interesting brew pubs, folks seem friendly enough and ya can ride around on trams 24 hours a day on a 7 day ticket for just £5!
