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Day 9 – Clifden & Ballaghduff

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I’ve had a nice few days of peace and quiet here at Clifden without driving, shopping or anything else. The site here is superb and I’ve made full use of their private beach.
Today started off sunny but extremely breezy. I used the opportunity to get some clothes washed and set up an impromptu washing line along the fencing.

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The remainder of the day was spent back on the beach enjoying the views of Omey Island and the Atlantic ocean. I even fell asleep on the rocks, don’t know how long for, but luckily I woke up just as the tide was coming in round my feet!

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During the late afternoon I had a “visitor”, don’t know her name but she was panting and it wasn’t that hot so I assumed she was thirsty and gave her a bowl of water. The campsite owners had gone out for the afternoon and I was the only humanoid around so she decided to adopt me for a few hours.

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For the evening session, I decided to walk the 4 mile round trip to Sweeny’s Bar, allegedly the hub of all the local communities. Just as I finished the 40 minute outbound journey and walked into the pub car park, it started to rain, throwing up a beautiful rainbow. What great timing – it must be Guinness o’clock 🙂

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Day 9: Vienna

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Can’t believe I’m on day 9 already, it’s going very quickly. Today was spent parked up at Vienna, my stop between Auschwitz and Plitvice Lakes National Park in Croatia. I took a trip up to the town which is on the other side of the Danube, a pass is available to trains trams and buses (24 hr) for 6.70 Euros.

The town is very much like Prague – a curious mixture of old and new that all seems to work together, the centre of the small old town features the Imperial Palace. It’s Sunday here and all shops are closed. There are a few McD’s open, Burger King and the odd Turkish or Chinese restaurant for those who need a bite to eat.

The McDonalds I went in had a different breakfast menu to the UK ones, maybe 30-40% of the items in common, some were tuned more to the local Austrian palate.

Like Prague it seems to feature a few homeless people in the most touristy bits. I guess they survive on handouts from the passers by.

Some wandered the streets, some were asleep on benches, and some were sleeping on the grassy areas.

Another similarity with Prague was the multitude of horse drawn carriages ready to give you a tour round the city centre.

I took the U2 line into the centre, this loops round the North, West and South of the City.  Making my start at the South, I walked to the East and then from there back in to the centre where I found the lovely Imperial Palace.

This has the name of Franz Josef I engraved in a stone over the archway, some building work is going on, but that doesn’t detract from the lovely view.

The front of the palace features a walkway that takes you into the Palace Gardens. These are home to some very large bronze statues and nice grassy areas to park yourself on.

Going all the way through the Palace Gardens takes you to the West side of the old City and the Museum Quarter. I had a look and a museum ticket was 25 Euro, I fancied a look in but didn’t want to see things that badly so I headed back to the South and then back to the campsite.

The metro train back over the Danube took about 10 or 15 minutes, did a pile of washing and drying as I was near a water tap 🙂

Tomorrow is Croatia and the picturesque Plitvice Lakes National Park. I get a nice deal from Three which gives me unlimited internet on my phone in the EU for £5 a day. However, Croatia is not in the EU so I won’t be doing any data roaming. That means the SootyTrak® system will be off as it depends on the mobile phone GPS and internet to work. Should be back on Wednesday when I head back into Slovenia and onward to Venice.

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Day 4: Nuremberg to Prague

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I woke up nice and early this morning left the Nuremberg site just after 8:00. Not long after I was out on the Autobahn system again and looking for a filling station. Unfortunately, this took a bit longer than planned and the fuel gauge got down to empty and then even lower still.

The picture was taken when I had about 5 miles left to the services. To say I was worried was an understatement.

Once the panic was over and I got some fuel in, the rest of the journey was uneventful. There are some disused border controls with the motorway just going straight through them. 4 days, 4 countries and nobody has asked to see my passport yet – a waste of £74?

The Czech motorways are not much different to the German ones. You have to buy a vignette (13 Euros for 10 days) which is the toll fee for using the motorways. I now have 5 tax discs of various sorts in the window! If it gets any worse I will have to peer out of the window through a small area “tank commander to base…”

My ETA was around 12:00 according to the LBGPS (Lying B—— Global Positioning System), and that’s too early to turn up at the site. I decided to kill some time by pointing the Sooty van at the outskirts of Pilsen to find a supermarket. Quite close to the motorway was the Kaufland which is a bit like Netto or Lidl. A catchy jingle comes up on the loudspeaker every couple of minutes, but it gets on your nerves fairly quickly.

My command of the Czech language is non-existent so I was shooting in the dark with some of the shopping. Bavorska Klobasa it said on the pack of four super sized sausages, but what were they? They looked good, and as it turned out, tasted very good too.

A pack of four 330ml bottles of Budvar for Kc 43.40, just worked it out that’s £1.40 and a bit of a bargain. I have some in the fridge as I type this but suspect they won’t be in there for very long.

The sliced bread felt like very heavy dough, which didn’t appeal to me – I grabbed a couple of French sticks instead. Some other items graced the trolley like Fazole s Parky (Beans and Sausage) and I left.

The outskirts of Prague were very busy on the traffic front with a lot of traffic lights to punctuate the journey. I got to the campsite about 1:30PM, the man told me the office was shut until 2PM and to just grab any space I wanted, have a shower etc. and just make myself feel at home.

I had a good gab to a Dutch couple next to me, as with almost all other Dutch people they are very friendly and well travelled even giving me some useful advice. “Uhhh, no, Dunkirk is not in France, it’s in Belgium”. OK, now I know why I got E in my O level geography!

As my final task of the day, I fired up the little Maplin washing machine. It did a fine job of washing some towels and clothes, these are now hanging out to dry.

Now to check out what to visit tomorrow – there is no shortage of attractions in Prague so I may solicit the views of my friendly neighbours on what to see 🙂