Trans-Homeland Express

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"But there is no connection to London. Don't go to Nuremberg", said the clueless old woman at the české dráhy helpdesk in hlavní nádrazí as I asked what would happen if I missed my prescribed connections onwards to Frankfurt, Brussels and London if the 10 minute delay on the 5:10 international rychlík to Nuremberg increased significantly. It was a still, mild morning and despite my one hour of sleep, I had been free of worries enough to be thinking aloud about declension of pronouns during my lone walk to the station, until I had been greeted by the rather unnerving departure board.

But this time it all worked out okay. We set off 15 minutes late, and had gained ten of those by that point where the frozen streams and snow coloured forest we were cantering past suddenly turned German. The earlybird students who had joined me before Plzeň had inspired me to get my macbook out and get the beats rolling, and as we were joined by hordes of Bavarian pensioners from Cham, Schwandorf and Amberg, I was EQing the same bass riff for what seemed like forever, before realising we were finally approaching something which actually looked like it had a higher population of humans than pheasants. Nuremberg.

A quick change and a croissant later, I was basically struggling to stay awake on my first ever ICE train journey. Perhaps it was my tiredness that made me despairingly annoyed with the short piece I had composed on the international rychlík, such that I abandoned it for the time being and started something heavier. But then my tiredness got the better of me and I fell asleep during the last, extremely slow and boring section of the second leg of the journey.

The sight which awoke me was quite extraordinary. For someone who has for the past year and a half restricted their view of what constitutes a clump of tall buildings to Jizní Město, arriving to a scene like Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof was like time-travel into the future (or indeed, the present). What's more, I had an hour and a quarter to kill here, so cue me going for a walk into the depths of the spectacular skyline, checking out (but choosing not to try) the food on the street market which led to it from the station, stopping for an extremely re-grounding dose of fast food from a hot dog chain, and sitting on a bench outside a rather intimidating statue of the Euro symbol, which to me just said, "welcome to Western Europe - we are rich - you probably aren't."

This wouldn't be the first time I'd crossed this entire country but only stopped to see a very snapshot of it including some fast food. Perhaps next time I do this, I'll make a stop in Frankfurt or Cologne and get to see some of the country properly at last. It's not like I have anything against it - it's just that everything that's actually interested me has always been closer to it (from England) or in the other direction (from Czech Republic). This of course does not take into account the inexcusable fact that I haven't been raving in Berlin yet, but in good time…

By the time we boarded the next ICE train, I was feeling far more awake, and after a brief stop at Frankfurt Airport, we finally did what I had been waiting for us to do all the way here from Nuremberg, and simply shot off into a blur the unknown. This was high speed travel like I'd never known it before, and I was high speed producing screech wobble like I'd never known myself before. We made two short stops and suddenly we were in Cologne, then Aachen, then Liege, and then I was suddenly very, very tired.

I had another hour to kill at Brussels Midi before my suggested 30 minute advance check-in time for the Eurostar. I left the station and found a bar with free wifi to check up on my cyber life, and used my last euros on a heavenly glass of kriek. The idea that I had been travelling for 12 hours was lost on me. It really didn't feel it at all. Even the train from Prague, which had been a sloth compared to the other two, had seemed to complete its 5 hour journey relatively quickly.

So then off I went, feeling rather merry but more tired after the kriek, ready to walk onto the Eurostar and sleep. How stupid of me. Of course, we were reentering the UK now, and despite being a part of the European Union, one does not simply walk into Mordor! One has to go through a stressful process of airport style security and passport control simply to get on an international train to Mordor via France, which I probably would have cynically enjoyed by imagining the trouble this would cause if such restrictions were in place at Praha hlavní for all international departures, except that I really was very tired, and being welcomed back to my beloved homeland after travelling for so long by the one thing I abhor most about it really didn't put me in the mood for such mind wanderings.

I probably slept out of Belgium. I was hoping not to see any of France and just sleep it all off, but this was not possible - we stopped at both Lille and Calais. One thing is for sure - this has been the longest single rail journey I've ever done in my life. And at the end of it, I'm even ignoring the fact that I'm going to be walking about 10 miles tomorrow as I go for my annual pilgrimage for Kathau Day. Even the fact that I need to go two trains further to Crystal Palace to sleep is evading me. I need to go to my favourite bar in Kings Cross to use their internet and send an email to my boss which I forgot about yesterday. Oh, and I need a shot of something. Anything. I really don't care.

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Photos

ICE Train
Slightly contrast to the photo I have before this which shows two Hurvinky at Domazlice

Comments

[JonathanCampion]

Really good blog, as always. Your writing always reflects the pace and comfort of the trip, and is always entertaining. Are you going back the same way? Not heading further east any time soon?

[pilnikjezerobota]

re:
Thanks Jon - nope I'm playing a show in Wigan then flying back from Manchester next Sunday. No plans to go further east except a show in Bratislava later on this month.. I don't think I'll be returning to Bulgaria or Romania any time soon so I guess it's Poland and Ukraine next!