Prague – part three (Return Of The Stag Party)
Amazingly, I didn’t wake up with a hangover. In fact, I was fairly chipper and was down for brekkie (in the original bar) by not long after 9:00. The weather was already glorious – predictions were for a high of almost 30 degree, which it came close to hitting later on.
We decided to split into groups and go do our own thing, while searching for a bar to watch the FA Cup Final in later in the day. Whoever found the best was to get in touch with the others and arrange to meet there before kickoff. Sound.
Not long after we got into the main town, I spotted a bookshop. Being a sad fanboy, I wandered in and located (almost) the entire works of Douglas Adams. In Czech. And bought the lot. Annoyingly, the only book they didn’t have was Hitchhiker’s. Ah well.
Back into the scorching sun to catch up with… bugger. They’d gone. So there’s me wandering in Prague, unaccompanied, telephoneless and without a key to get back into the hotel room to fetch my mobile. Hmm.
Colin had mentioned heading to the castle at some point, though, so I bumbled off in that direction. Actually, truth be told, I bumbled off in a direction. All the signs were in Czech and I have no idea what their word for “castle” is.
On the way, I passed a major number of tourist traps, some lovely buildings (pics taken, of course) and many fit women (more pics taken – this time more subtley). Eventually, I reached the Charles Bridge which was heaving.
The bridge is maybe 12 feet wide and crosses the river that runs through Prague. I’m guessing it’s the oldest of the several bridges and it’s used by artists to trade their work. At ludicrous prices. You also get a fair few beggars on there who are literally huddled up in a foetal position, face down, with their hands held out for cash. Subtle.
Over the bridge, astounded by the tiny woman who was expecting money to be thrown at her for miming along to a tape playing opera, and into the real tourist area near the castle. This is when I discovered that the hill up to our hotel was only a warm-up. The one on this side of the river really knew how to be a hill. It had obviously been practising for many years because it was bloody good at it.
Pretty much breathless, I got to the top by the castle just as they did a changing of the guard (at least, I think that’s what it was). The place was swarming with tourists so I couldn’t really see anything. I headed down the opposite route, narrowly avoided being run over by a very expensive-looking Ferrari and bumped into Colin and co again. As I’d planned to do all along.
Unfortunately, this meant climbing the bloody hill all the way back up again. At the summit, we bumped into about half the other lads who’d come up the other side. A wander round the gardens, some more ogling of stupidly attractive women and we descended back to something nearer sea level for a bevvie.
As we sat drinking – and staring at women (there’s a theme here) – some workmen started repainting a zebra crossing nearby. As a result, we ended up drinking beer and inhaling what smelled like industrial-strength Tippex fumes for half an hour. Psychadelic, man.
Around now, the rest of the lads got in touch from a pub just on this side of the Charles Bridge. 50p/pint, air conditioned, big screen and not full to the rafters. Ideal.
It was a little early, so again we broke into groups and wandered a bit. I stuck with Dean and we had a bloody long plodge around in a circle, over one of the other bridges and back to the Charles. We spotted a fine weaponry shop (from which I was tempted to buy a throwing star and hide it in Colin’s carry-on luggage) and possibly the most stunning woman known to all creation.
Such as is common in the UK, though, this 4′-long skirt-wearing beauty was accompanied by a boyfriend who looked about as greasy and untrustworthy as a fox coated in lard. Not that I was even remotely jealous.
Dinner at Subway (same prices as back home, more or less) and on to watch ManUre getting beaten by Arsenal on penalties. Sweet.
There were some other random people in the bar. Two lads were yelling “Souness!” at me – they turned out to be Rangers supporters so were among a very small group to actually like the miserable bastard. Then two Blackburn supporters thanked me for taking him off them. Like I’d have picked him to replace Bobby. Yeesh.
On the way back, we popped into one of the bars we’d stopped off at the previous night – a sports bar. As it happened, two of our number were also in there and had been accosted by a drunk (English) guy who was trying to convince them to go to a sex club. He had brochures and everything. Handing it to me, he said something like “get a load of those – they’re lovely”.
True enough, the flyer had about 40 passport pictures of very attractive women on, all numbered like some kind of pervert’s Chinese menu. Without him looking, I pointed at one at random. “I *know* her!”
Without skipping a beat, he replied, “Yes, she’s been in Coronation Street.”
*cough*BOLLOCKS!*cough* I returned the leaflet and two of us departed, leaving the other pair to deal with the drunk loony.
Back to the hotel for a shower and change (well, shorts off and combats on. I wore my NUFC top all weekend), then back to the local to meet up with everyone else.
Continued tomorrow/after the weekend…
Oh ****. It’s that time again
I have been forewarned by a certain member of staff who sits opposite me. Every day for the next 11 weeks or so, she’s going to come in and talk about nothing apart from what time each of 13 people went for a ****.
Yes, folks. Big Brother starts again tonight. You, too, can stand round the water cooler and discuss how long you sat up late to watch some minger sleep in the vain hope one of her boobs appeared from under the cover, or how Stevie went to the toilet at 11:00 and how exciting it was. You sad *****.
I’m all for the company that’s offering £70,000 (last 2 paragraphs of that page) to someone who gets on and doesn’t say a word until they’re kicked out.
I think a better idea would be for Al Quaeda to smuggle someone onto the show and blow themselves up during day one. That, I would watch.
“Well, it looks like Abdullah’s going to give everyone a welcoming group hug. What the other contestants didn’t know is that Abdullah’s one luxury product was a vest lined with Semtex.”
*BOOM*
“I guess we’ll have a hard time picking a winner this series.”
so can you read czech then?? i love douglas adams, get the one about his travels looking for rare animal species, very funny but also educating. he has my sense of humour, i remember reading mostly harmless after doing my gcsc’s and thinking i was very unique at 15…
Nope. Can’t read Czech. Nor Greek and I have one of his books in that as well! LCTS was his best book by a mile – the fun bit is trying to find it. It’s either in “travel”, “sci-fi” or “natural science” depending on the bookshop. I’ve got it in UK hardback, paperback, US hardback and CD-ROM (US-only).
“Hrad” is Czech for “Castle”. But having climbed up the hill twice, I suspect you probably know that now.
I thought they’d spelled “hard” wrong and were talking about the ease (or lack of it) of getting *up* there.