041 - sat 10 jun - cesky krumlov

today's adventure was rafting down the aforementioned river that runs through cesky krumlov. our group was split into two rafts. before we had even left town, the other group had managed to snag their raft on some wire and were lucky to shuffle it up on to the bank before total deflation. total deflation is, incidentally, my favourite steven seagal movie.

so we floated down the river for a couple of hours. there was conversation. there was also a small bottle of rum. it was a lovely thing to do in the morning, drink rum and row down the river. before we reached our designated pickup point, there was, of course, a pub on the side of the river. essentially a collection of plastic tables and chairs and a few portable rooms, it was a wonderful thing. everyone treated themselves to grog, which in the czech republic turns out to be hot rum and water. mixed in with some sugar its like having a warm sugary alcoholic tea. we debated the ancestry of the term grog before heading off.

back in town we headed up into the castle for a tour of its insides. hooked on to the back of a group of perhaps a hundred, it was a pretty impersonal experience compared to our excellent private guide of the town the night before. and our tour guide seemed like she should have been working the beaches at byron bay and not guiding us through some historically significant castle and its many hangings and chairs and paintings and whatever. but hey she said things and we listened. learning occured.

we couldn't resist returning to our vegetarian hangout for lunch. we all ordered things that we'd seen each other eat the day before. and at the end of our meal, our cute sheepish waiter brought us a free dessert to thank us for our intense patronage. what a guy. what a restaurant. be there.

i headed for the internet cafe while suz wandered the shops of cesky krumlov for a couple of hours. she bumped into last night's tour guide whose day job is working in the town's coolest bookstore, which seemed to make a lot of sense. then we headed back up into the castle and found tucked away at the back some really pretty gardens. and a really weird revolving ampitheatre. kind of like when you see john farnham, and the stage revolves, except you sit on the stage, and you spin in a circle while john farnham runs around the edges. but not just john farnham, imagine also olivia newton-john. and anthony warlow! someone get me gudinski, i have a great idea! we'll call it 'the man vent!' they must wear clown suits. and i will have a jet pack.

we couldn't get enough of this castle. when we'd had enough of the castle, we wandered down and had coffee by the river, this time not at the vegetarian place. we didn't want that guy to put out some kind of restraining order on us. but it didn't pay to branch out because we ended up at a place where the coffee tasted like pancakes. coffee in other countries is very confusing.

our tour leader had organised a special treat for dinner tonight, at an underground restaurant in a converted medieval cellar. the taller members of our group had to crouch to get through the little halls of the place, but with the candles and the wood benches and the authentic history of the place, it was really great. and then the food was awesome. a couple of the guys got giant hunks of pork that seemed like something out of polanski's macbeth.

then we headed to the cocktail bar. since we'd gotten to the czech republic, the word absinthe had been bandied about like, a lot, like something that gets bandied about a lot. like, a bandy. its not hard to find a bar that sells absinthe in the czech republic, or anywhere in europe really, so we made our order. i didn't mind it although it was pretty foul. green absinthe made me think of sambuca. maybe that helped me get it down. then there were absinthe cocktails. we danced with a man named martine. suz requested britney spears' "toxic" on my behalf, and then the dance floor was alight with tim. tim, and the famed stripey-shirt man, who was a very large, you might say rotund, czech man who had a low centre of gravity and an impeccable sense of rhythm. he wobbled with sex appeal, like i've never seen before. and he knew every single song. suz was lucky enough to get a dance with him at once point. i was jealous. i wanted to dance with stripey-shirt man. lets be honest - i wanted to BE stripey-shirt man. i will get there. pass the pork knuckle.

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