Relief in Karlovy Vary

Freshly arrived in Karlovy Vary, I found a phone, gave Lucie a call, and waited for her to pick me up. Meanwhile tourists strolled by, casting odd looks my way.


Lucie's family, plus Viktoria and Sergio, enjoying a BBQ my first night with them.

Matthew and I. You can see that paddlers look the same the world over.

Me passing Sergio his brand new paddle in the canoeing shop, with Lucie looking on.

One of the mineral hot springs in Karlovy Vary that people drink for its curative properties.

Ah, the fabled city of Karlovy Vary. Fabled in my own mind, at least. When I first found out that this was a spa town, I thought: that should be a welcome treat after weeks of paddling. And as the trip itself progressed, KV attained the status of a magical turning point, a place that, if I could only reach, this trip would finally cease purely being a difficult yet worthy existential challenge, and actually start being enjoyable too. After all, if I could only make it there, i would at last have some company - and help paddling - from my old friend Viktoria and her Guatamalan boyfriend Sergio, a very welcoming couchsurfer to stay with, spas to soak my weary muscles in, and would be through the worst part of the uphill battle that was the Ohre river.

But it wasn't easy to get there. If I had not had such a tantilizing goal, I'm not sure I would have had the willpower to make it.

From Kadan I had optimistically hoped I could make KV in 2 days, through bypassing the worst of the rapids by simply wheeling my canoe along paths and roadways for 30km. But it turned out that the paths often led up into the high hills on either side of the river, and the only thing worse than paddling up this river was trying to push Sarka laden with gear up hills. So for the majority of the trek I was trapped on the river - the relentless flow of which reduced my progress to about 1km/hr and my arms to aching mush.

Much of the time I wouldn't even be paddling - just poling my way up through the gravelly shallows at the river's edge, where the relentless current slackened somewhat - or simply walking through the water, towing the canoe behind me on a line. J-stroking was a forgotten luxury; it was too ineffecient and I had to do power stroke on either side constantly.

The low point came on the 2cd day, when I felt nausiated from intestinal problems that have been building for some time, and the conditions meant I had only made 3km by lunchtime. I found that maintaining my mental stamina - the will to carry on - was even harder than maintaining my physical stamina. After running aground on my 200th rock of the day, I'd sometimes just sit there for a few minutes, while I tried to muster the willpower to carry on. My morale had also bottomed out. To make matters worse, I was facing a headwind for much of the time. I tried to vent my emotions by hurling expletives at the wind, the water, the rocks; the only element not set against me was fire, for the sun at least was not too hot. If anyone heard me pass, they'd probably think I had Turette's, Certainly they must have questioned my sanity to be heading upriver.

Later in the afternoon, by which time I'd only managed to fight my way 7km upriver, and was just hoping I could do 10 by the end of the day, I thought it might take me 4 days to reach KV. Fortunately, at that point I finally found a road that stuck pretty close to the river and didn't go up any big hills, and gratefully wheeled Sarka onto it. I stuck to it for the remainder of the day, and by sunset had made 16km total, enough to put me through the worst of the rapids and within striking distance of the city of redemption, KV. For the first time, I stayed in a real campground. I had no appetite for food, but did go to the restaurant and downed 3 shots of jagermeiter while flipping through a motorcycle magazine featuring lots of shots of scantily clad women draped over Harleys, and felt much better for it. As I progressed up the river, I noticed more and more German, and this campground restaurant seemed to be run by Germans. There was a big wedding or something happening in the other room, full of cigarette smoke, and buffets, and Abba music, the walls adorned with antlers and deer heads, and a constant parade of huge plates of food being carried 4 at a time by the servers into the diningroom.

I only had to paddle 8 hours the next day to make it the final 16km to KV - a relatively speedy pace. It was a Saturday and the weather was perfect, so I passed a near constant stream of Czechs canoeing the Czech way - downriver of course, with beer and dogs and babies in their laps, funny mexican sombreros on their heads, strumming guitars, and always in big laughing groups. I think I shouted "Ahoy!" to nearly all of them, if they didn't shout it first. Then it was usually followed by laughter, crazy looks, and comments that I couldn't understand but could certainly guess as to their content. When I was on the Sazava and the Vlatava, no one really batted an eye that i was travelling solo, or in a wierd looking canoe, or wheeling it through towns. But paddling up the Ohre certainly unleashed a flood of comment. I don't think anyone had seen that before, and I could tell they all thought I was nuts. One guy who spoke English said, "Are you going all the way to Karlovy Vary?" This when I was maybe 7km from there. "Yeah," I said, "all the way there..."

When I got to KV I wheeled my canoe into the city centre, found a phone booth, and called my couchsurfing host, Lucie. Soon her and her boyfriend appeared with a car with a roofrack, to sweep me and Sarka away to suburban, middle-class comfort. I had been feeling like I stood out in my river wear: short shorts and T-shirt, messy hair, scruffy face, eating dried fruit from crumpled plastic bags. But then Lucie and Matthew looked exactly the same (minus the scruffy face on Lucie, of course). They were paddlers too, which is partly why Lucie was excited to host such a crazy person.

It was all I had dreamed about and more. I am Lucie's first couchsurfing guest, and she has spared no effort to make me (and Viktoria and Sergio) feel at home. We have displaced her brother to another part of the house, while we occupied his spacious bedroom. We have been provided with soft beds and softer duvets, BBQs, homecooking, laundry, internet, tours of the downtown, beers with friends of theirs, showers, baths, late night walks through the forest...the list goes on and on. Her and her parents' hospitality knows no bounds. She and her boyfriend, Matthew, are both paddlers themselves, and are very athletic and are studying recreation at university. I have finally met a group (her and her friends) of Czechs who don't smoke. Though beer drinking is still a popular activity, of course.

Moreover, Lucie and Matthew have been fun and interesting people to spend time with. Lucie has just graduated, and before heading off to graduate studies in Prague in the fall, she's about to embark on a summer of working abroad. She's still not sure where: Ireland or Norway maybe. It makes me envious that Europeans can so easily take off to a completely different culture to work and live. She says she can book her air ticket the day before she leaves, no problem. She actually learned English while living in Denmark, and then later in the USA. In many smaller countries, such as Denmark, Holland, or Norway, nearly everyone speaks English well, because their own populations are so small, to only know their own language would be very limiting. And English, of course, is the international language. Not so yet in the Czech Republic - as I discovered - but it is moving in that direction with the youth.

Yesterday I had my long awaited visit to one of KV's spas. I asked Lucie's mom which one was the best, and she told me where to go. KV is a sedate town full of older people and staid tourists - most of the youth don't stay here - and the spas are these grand places charging high prices. But Lucie's mom told me where the locals go. Around behind one of the grand spas, white columns rising magestically in front, you go, to what is almost a back alley. And there you find an indescript doorway. You pay about $10, and that buys you 2 hours in the spa. It was basically just a regular public swimming pool, but with a side room with a wet and dry sauna, cold bath, and relaxation room. There was also a whirlpool - tepid but surprisingly relaxing to lie back and let the frothing bubbles levatate you. But i spent most of my time sweating in the saunas, jumping into the cold bath, and almost falling asleep in the relaxation room. There was actually a sign on the doorways to the saunas saying "no bathing suits" so i had to comply. I also followed the lead of the other sauna-goers by rubbing my skin until all the dead skin and other accumulated crap rolled up into what looked like eraser crumbs and was washed away in the next cold bath. Afterwards I felt so relaxed and happy wandering around the downtown with Viktoria and Sergio, eating pizza and ice cream and drinking beer - not a care in the world - it was the polar opposite of how I had felt just a couple of days earlier.

The plan now is to leave tomorrow morning to continue up the Ohre toward the German border. This plan might be sabotaged by the delay in the delivery of my GPS unit, which Andrew has Fedexed from Canada, and was supposed to be here already. But apparently it is being held up in Prague, reason unknown. In any case, we have to leave Lucie's tomorrow, as she is going to Plzen for her graduation ceremony. So we'd have to find a hotel or campground if we had to wait longer for the GPS.

Viktoria and Sergio may not be with me for too long. I am asking for three weeks - that would get me through the hardest part of the trip left - but Viktoria is under pressure from a friend in Switzerland to come there. The reason that Sergio was able to afford his flight here is that a rich Canadian is in love with a friend of Viktoria's who used to live in Guatamala and is now living in Switzerland, and gave Sergio a bunch of money so that he and Viktoria could go keep her company there. They have also brough a bunch of Guatamalan crafts with them, which they are trying to sell on the streets along the way. This is of course illegal without a permit, and invariably a cop comes by after an hour or so and threatens to fine them. But before he comes, they always manage to sell some stuff. Yet this is all stuff that must be carried on portages.

Moreover, I'm not sure they feel up to the work involved in a canoe trip. Sergio believes that it's bad for you to work your muscles hard enough that they're sore. But i bought him a paddle today, and I'm hoping they'll get into the trip and enjoy it. I don't want them to do it unless they enjoy it.

Even if I am left alone again, it might not be so bad in Germany, as I hear that most Germans speak at least some English.

I've updated the map, so if you haven't seen it recently, have a look (link is in the "Map" post below)

against the flow

View from my hotel in Louny.

The river ahead; from Kadan into the hills of western Bohemia...

Things got a little tight on my portage through Kadan.

The massive dam spillway I had to get around and over to get to the lake.

Parked my canoe for a bite to eat.

Too tired to smile for the camera.

The embankment from hell.

Ah yes, the serene beauty of a canoe cutting gracefully through the water...

Not too much to report on this leg of the journey, except my own thoughts, which is about all i have left to me now.

Four days of hard slogging from Louny have brought me to Kadan. I came down with a little flu bug (i bet i picked it up from a 2-litre plastic bottle filled with draft beer i shared with a couple of boys at a portage), which knocked me out for my day off in Louny (i'm sure this is no coincidence - illness with me will usually wait until i have a moment to spare for it), then sapped my energy for the next two days of journeying. Together with the rainy, cool weather, this was the low point of the trip so far. But then my strength returned and i actually started to enjoy the struggle against the current. there's something satisfying about going where - or in a direction - you're not supposed to. And my body is starting to feel like it might be shifting into a higher gear, getting accustomed to this new physical regime i'm putting it through. I don't wake up in pain anymore.

I had what was probably my most physically challenging day yet yesterday. It began with the usual upriver paddle, for 4km. Then I dragged Sarka and everything else up a steep concrete embankment (see photo), then up a rocky path, then along a level bit for about 4km, then up and over a high man-made embankment holding back a lake. Then I paddled across said lake, for about 10km (this was the easy part of the day). Then had lunch. Then paddled for another 7km upriver, through a new kind of rapids: these ones had less water in them, but were full of bigger rocks, so even though i could paddle into the current, i'd invariably get caught up on rocks.

Then I came upon a stretch of four dams in about as many kilometres, and was happy to find a trail along the side of the river that took me past them all - almost. After walking my canoe through Kadan (and stopping for the best spaghetti carbonera of my life at a riverside restaurant), i had to paddle across the river to find the portage for the last dam. I set up my tent in the last of the light.

Now I'm enjoying a day off in Kadan. I had another plate of spaghetti carbonera for lunch.

Having said all this, what I've been thinking about lately is, well, the same thing I've been thinking about for years, which could be summed up as the 'excitement of discomfort versus the bordom of comfort'. And again, the book I've been reading, "Haunted", by Fight Club author Chuck Palahniuk, sheds much light on this subject. It's about a group of people who go on a writers retreat but get locked there, and then they all go about trying to make the experience as agonizing as possible for themselves so that, when they are rescued, they'll have a great story to tell and will be famous, loved, rich, etc. It's basically what I'm doing to myself with this trip. I know that the more misadventures i have (enter Vikki?), the better story I'll have in the end. Palahniuk takes the idea further, basically saying that humans in general love pain, suffering, drama, stuff to happen, and they love flaunting their suffering for others to see. he (or a character in the book) makes the analogy that the earth is like a big rock polisher, and we're the rocks, banging together for years and years until all our hard edges are worn off, and we're smooth, refined. He implies that then, when we've reached this stage of enlightenment, we can finally just sit back and enjoy life. He says this takes many lifetimes to accomplish.

I'd say that humans, as a group, are not headed for any spiritual enlightenment. But individually, for one human lifetime, his metaphor does makes sense to me. as we get older, we do, hopefully, get our hard edges worn down by the drama in our lives. And maybe after enough of this suffering, we're wise enough to find all the enjoyment we need looking at a flock of birds, or whatever turns your fancy, and no longer need to seek out difficulty.

But until then, I know that I still need at least the occasional injection of struggle and strife that a trip like this provides for myself. And i know that it will help me be a much happier person when i return to my real life.

From Prague to Louny-Town

I've seen a few of these historic water level markers. This one dates back to the 1700's. The highest one, so high you can't quite see it because it's shaded by the roof, is from the great flood of 2002 on the Vlatava.

A motorcycle convention that I raided (successfully) in search of drinking water.

Through the locks.

The Charles Bridge: about 700 years old and the most famous tourist attraction in Prague.

Me portaging through Prague.

I have to laugh when i remember Pavel saying to me that he couldn't guarantee that my new canoe wouldn't get a few scratches in shipping. I assured him that the Sarka is guaranteed to get a lot more beat up than the courier could possibly manage, as this photo attests to.

My 5km portage through the countryside.

A field of poppies.

The cursed Cepel, at one of its wider spots.

Portaging through Roudnice.

You don't have adventure, it has you. This was my realization this week as I paddled from Prague, down the Vlatava and the Labe, then up the Ohre to Louny.

The Vlatava and Labe are big rivers with motor boats and cruise ships from Germany and huge barges piled high with commodities and pushed along by tugs. Long stretches of flat water, broken up by a few dams. About the most exciting thing to happen to me on these waters was going through a couple of locks. The first time, the lockmaster descended from his tower when he saw me paddle into the vast lock, meant for cargo ships, and said one word: "Little."

Then he said, "No problem" and told me to hold onto the ladder.

And it was no problem, and saved me a portage - made extra nice by the fact that i had foolishly early inadvertedly let all the air out of one of my little canoe wheelies. It was a perfect example of what i was talking about earlier: trying to make things perfect and in the process wrecking what was working pretty good. My tires were a little on the soft side. But i thought, "wouldn't this be even easier if they were nice and firm?" And then i started fiddling with the presta valves, just to see how they worked, because i'm not familiar with presta valves. and before i knew it, there was a hiss of air escaping, and i had a flat tire.

no worries, i thought: i'll just find a cyclist with a little air pump and pump it back up. there were lots of cyclists riding on trails along the river.

i found one quickly enough, but just as quickly found that my wheels were too small to fit one of those little compact bike pump in between the spokes.

it took a couple of days, but i eventually found a resourceful moped mechanic who solved the problem by attaching a small length of plastic tubing to the end of his air gun, and with me holding it tight over my wheel's value, got them nicely inflated. I like people like this, 'get 'er done' people, who don't give up on something just because they don't have the right tools.

I found this guy in Roudnice, which is where my adventure began. I had been paddling for a couple of days down these big waterways, covering lots of kilometres (48 one day!) but getting increasingly bored. then i noticed this little river than ran from the other side of Roudnice into the Ohre. I had been planning to follow the Labe in a big loop to the north then back down again to pick up the Ohre, but this little shortcut would knock 20km off my paddling - 10 of them upriver. All i had to do was portage about 2km through Roudnice. and now that i had my wheelies back, that shouldn't be a problem.

The first bit was hard slogging - pushing my canoe with all my gear inside it up a long, steep hill. but once i reached the top of that, it was a long, slow decent to the little river, called the Cepel. Pushing the canoe along was as easy as pushing a bike.

I was surprised by how few looks or comments i got from passersby; there is a certain Czech stoacism, it seems, that keeps people from too much demonstration. but there was one little toddler on his trike who couldn't stop staring. he was like a deer caught in headlights as i came down the sidewalk towards him, he deaf to his mother's calls to follow her.

When i first got to the Cepel, i was amazed by how big it was. But then that turned out to be just a little man-made reserviour, letting out a trickle into the Cepel below it. The Cepel must have earned its name in higher water times, because when i went through it it barely qualified as a ditch. when i went through a village it smelled more like a sewer.

One thing i am laerning on this trip is how slowly most things happen. Gestation, growing up, red tape, and paddling are but a few examples of things that happen very slowly. i've had to learn to be more patient. the Cepel was a prime test of my new patience. For five hours i pushed and dragged my way down the 7km of the Cepel. it was alternatively deep enough to float without too much bottom scraping, but so narrow as to be totally overgrown with grass and nettles on either side, just barely a canoe's width, or it was wide enough to avoid the overgrowth, but not to float very far before i had to get out and push again. every time i got back into the canoe, i'd track more brackish water into the boat, until my gear was swimming in it. i soon developed a kind of gondoleer style of standing up (which got my head above the weeds) and polling myself along with my paddle (which allowed me to push with greater force).

I ran into a few people along the way, and this time they were amazed to see someone crazy enough to be canoeing down this trickle. on a couple of occassions kids in riverside homemade forts followed me for awhile down the stream. i had a close call as i passed a farmer couple. i was just waving to the wife, when i heard a loud thump in the back of the canoe, and turned to find a baseball sized rock there. the husband had been digging his garden, throwing stones he dug up into the stream, and nearly got me with one by accident. He should have looked for passing canoeists first, obviously.

by the end i felt half-crazed to get out of there, with my sweaty, dirty, nettle-stung skin itching and my muscles weary. but i didn't want to stop - i just wanted out of there. when i finally made it i pulled over at the first adequate campsite i could find and had a swim, then took the next morning to let all my stuff dry out.

all told, i don't think i got there any faster then if i'd gone the long, easy way, but an adventure was had. or had me. and now, no matter how bad things get, i can always say, "At least I'm not on the Cepel," and feel a little better about my predicament.

After that i spent 3 days fighting my way up the Ohre. It isn't easy, in stretches, but at least I'm making headway. progressing 20km is a good day. I've come to love the little dams now, because every time i portage up over one, i'm sure to find at least a few kilometres of slack current. then, as i get closer to the next dam, the current tends to pick up more and more.

i reached one point where paddling into the current was just getting stupid. i was expending all this energy, and just inching my way forward. so i had a look at my map and noticed a "bike path" i could take to a point further up the river, avoiding a big loop in the river. it was between about 10km of paddling upstream, and 5km of portaging with my wheelies, to get to the same point. the choice was easy. i wheeled my canoe down a quiet country road (the "bike path"), through three villages, and back to the Ohre. This was one shortcut well worth it. I have a feeling that, from Kadan to Karlovy Vary, where the river looks like it's half rapids, I'll be using this technique a lot. Hell, i might even walk the whole way.

After three days I reached my planned rest stop, Louny - right on schedule, too. Amazing, when that happens. I locked my canoe to a tree by the river, in what looked like an unused and hidden bit of bush, and found a hotel in town to rest for a couple of nights. I figure that since i'm not spending anything on camping along the way (in fact, i spent ridiculously little money on this leg of the journey, because there were no restaurants geared towards canoeists and easily accessible from the river. i went 5 days without a beer - which must be a new record for the Czech Republic), i can afford to splurge on a hotel occasionally. and even that doesn't cost much: about $37/night. It's an modest place, but it feels like the Hilton to me. The first thing i did was take a long, hot shower until i was practically drooling with pleasure. A couple of beers, a couple of big meals, and some English Aljazeera on the satilite TV, and it was off to bed for me.

Predictably, I had the worst sleep in ages, because i'm so unused to sleeping in a bed. I should just spread my thermarest out on the floor, and i'd probably sleep better.

Good news from Vikki: her and her boyfriend Sergio are flying into Prague on the 15th, and then coming to find me. Human contact! Conversation! Help paddling! Yes!

Getting my feet wet

The Sazava proved to be the perfect little warm-up for what is to follow on this trip. Water levels were low, which made for a relaxed paddle, though Sarka's a few milimetres thinner in several places now. Often I'd only have a paddle blade's depth to push myself along in. the water was murky and smelled vaguely of rotten fish, but that didn't stop me from swimming in it several times a day when it was hot.

My bedtime's about 9pm. And I try to get up at dawn - 5am - to hit the water early and avoid the wind and heat. though sometimes i am delayed in the morning because i have to spend upwards of an hour picking dozens of slugs off my tent and canoe, then go back and pick off the ones that oozed up again while you were deslugging the other item. i need some unpaid interns to take care of this kind of shit.

I crossed about 40 little dams - most with water flowing over them in varying amounts, and most down a gradual incline (a few were true waterfalls of a metre or two), so if there was enough water flowing over (a rarity), you could paddle right over. This was hazardous, though, as I learned the hard way. There's a moment when your bow is in the flat water below the dam, while your stern is still sticking halfway up the watery ramp, and those are the only two points in contact with anything. So natually the canoe tips violently to one side or the other. It's not quite enough to capsize the boat, but it was enough to throw me out of it once. It was just into a couple of feet of water, though, and I went wading after my canoe. Luckily there was no one around to see this happen (often there's someone swimming or fishing at the dams).

Another way to cross the dams is through these concrete chutes that they all have. I'm not sure if they're constructed for canoeists to go down, or fish to go up (i saw both using them), but if they're for canoeists, they're designed for higher water than I had. I saw some youth groups run a few of them, but their boats are basically open kayaks, and made of some virtually indestructable plastic, and could handle the sharp drop down into the shoot. If i had tried these, it probably would have ended in catastrophy. I did do one successfully actually, but it had no sharp drop at the beginning and had plenty of water flowing through it.

The only other way around the dams was to, of course, portage. This I only had to do a handful of times, because the dam was a waterfall and i couldn't just pull my canoe over it.

Although i often cursed these dams that would come up every few kilometres, they provided a little spice in what otherwise would have been a whole lot of unbroken paddling.

On my last day i got a taste of what the river might have been like before all the dams; after i crossed the last dam the river took off through about 10km of what felt like an endless series of little Class I rapids. They posed no danger; the challenge was to avoid the submerged rocks and save Sarka's hull for future battles. I got pretty pleased with myself at my improving ability to pick out the suspicious looking waves indicating a rock from all the innocent standing waves, and my developing backwards draw which saved my ship from many a looming rock. Though after so long of staring intently at the roiling waters, i felt like my eyes were beginning to play tricks on me. And during the few interludes when I wasn't being propelled relentlessly forward by the current, it felt strange to actually have to paddle. it was good fun - my best day yet.

The day was helped along considerably when, feeling hungry and fatigued from the day (i eventually paddled 45kms that day - by far my longest) i came across in the late afternoon a little riverside bar and had a refreshing beer and ubiqutous klobasa (sausage with mustard and rye bread). It fortified me for the rest of my journey.

There are many little bars, restaurants, and camps along the river, but unfortunately I was a little before the main holiday season, and most of them were closed. When they were open, however, it felt quite civilized to pull over in your canoe for a cold beer. I ended up camping anywhere - in a park, by the riverside, in a closed campground - and never had any problems. i asked permission when possible, but sometimes a thunder storm would be chasing me, beginning to spit rain, and i'd have to pull over and hastily make camp in the first available bit of real estate i could find.

While there were a few stretches with no development along them, most of the river had either towns or cottages along it. And there were fishermen hiding in the bullrushes everywhere, nearly always wearing camo, and always smoking a cigarette (everyone smokes here - and everywhere). They usually pretended i didn't exist, and i tried to do the same - after all, this was probably the first bit of solitude they'd had i ages. The kids i passes would always shout out "Ahoy!" and I'd answer back. One house even had "Ahoj!" painted on its side.

So I nearly always had people around me - many of them extremely tanned older men in speedoes and with huge, distended bellies (half a lifetime of beer with every meal will do that), wandering around their cottage yard, cutting the grass, etc. They looked quite comfortable and contented. But despite being constantly surrounded, hardly anyone spoke English, and my Czech consists of about ten words (please, thank you, beer, water, toilet, and few kinds of food). I'm reduced to one word sentences and lots of pantomime. So it was an isolating experience. I haven't had so much time with my own thoughts for quite awhile. I eventually started to feel a little unhinged, in fact, and could be found singing or babbling to myself - occasionally getting caught out by a well-hidden fisherman.

I almost didn't bring my MP3 player, but am i ever glad i did! The first time i listed to it - laying in the grass after a beer at a YMCA camp - i nearly wept with happiness. i don't know if it was merely that i hadn't heard any good music in 2 weeks, or that it appeased my homesickness to hear this familiar music, but since then Sufjan Stevens, Hawksley Workman, David Gaudet, Gogol Bordello, Lila Downs, Danny Michel, Beirut, Spike Jones and even Tenacious D have been my best friends on this trip.

I've also had a lot more time to read than I anticipated. I quickly finished the two books i brought from home that were supposed to last the whole trip, but found some more in Prague. I particularly enjoyed Louis de Bernier's "A Partisan's Daughter". His books - especially his later ones - are so simple and truthful, perfectly capturing the human tragicomedy we're all players in. This book in particular deals with the tension between excitement and security, idealism and acceptance, and i find these themes very apt for my present circumstances. I am realizing why I'm on this trip: to learn that adventure is not all it's cracked up to be, and to accept modest happiness. I had a good, modestly happy life in wakefield. But i got bored with that so i took this trip. I wanted great excitement, great love, a great, big, wonderful life. But i don't think anyone ever gets to live like that. you can't be human and not be dragged down by something or other. the best you can hope for is a modest, nice sort of happiness, on the whole more good days than bad, and if you find yourself living such a life, well then by god don't throw it away in the hopes of finding something better! you should count yourself lucky if you get to live this much happiness. to ask for more is to comit the ancient mistake of hubris - perhaps the fundamental human flaw. And i think this trip has taught me that - in fact, it already had begun teaching me it before i even left, as i started to already miss what i knew i must soon leave.

so, ok, lesson learned - can i come home now? part of me would like to return now, a wiser man, but i've spent too long thinking about and preparing for this trip to stop now, before it's barely begun. and besides, i got all of you to try to entertain. this is the first time that i've done something with the aim of writing about my personal experiences. in a way i'm trying to turn my life for the next couple of months into a interesting work of art. so far i don't feel like i've succeeded in making it very interesting. but my friend vikki tells me that her and her nicaraguan boyfriend will soon be joining me (too bad i had to take out that third seat!), which, knowing Vikki, will undoubtedly spice things up considerably. I'll try to keep it on the comic side, rather than the tragic.

I'm back in Prague now, taking a day off and stocking up on supplies. We've outfitted the Sarka with 8 barrels of pork, 200 gallons of water, 4 bags of gunpowder, two tortoises (to be later eaten), and 50 gallons of rum (the crew will have to be rationed to a cup a day). Our next safe port is in Karlovy Vary, a two week sail away. It is a spa town; i think I'll need it by then.

To get there I'll have to paddle UP the Ohre river - in total 240km to get to the German border. I think I'll be okay for the first third, but after that it heads up into the hills, and there's whitewater. i checked a website that tells you information about all the rivers in the Czech Republic, and it said that the average speed of the current was 5-7km/h. my top speed paddling solo is probably about 5km/h.

I am so fucked.

If i get stuck the back-up plan is to find some source of transportation for the Sarka, to get it up to a point in the river where i can handle the current. It's either that or wait for reinforcements to arrive. With three paddlers, we should be able to paddle right up the rapids!

I love my canoe wheels! at first i would take all my gear out and awkwardly lift the canoe and try to set it down on top of the wheels, and the supports would never be facing up. anyone watching this exercise would quickly jump to my aid. but now i've worked out a system that is so easy it should be illegal. i don't even have to take my gear out. i just put the wheels on the ground, supports facing up (i figured out that they will stay like that if you're careful) and wheels stopped from rolling with a paddle on the ground. then i lift one end of the canoe out of the water, leaving the other floating, and simply place the middle of the canoe on the wheels. strap it on with a couple of bungees, wheel it across, and repeat process in reverse on the other side. absurdly easy! i haven't even used my hard won yoke once yet - and if i never do i won't be sorry!

i've heard cuckoos for the first time - they sound just like the clocks. i get the feeling they're commenting on me.

Sazava photos

Angry papa swan; not a pretty sight. He chased me for a good long while for getting too close to his chicks.

Where it all began.
How old is this gum?

The gear doubles as balast when I have no bow paddler.

Welcome to my kitchen - first night out.

You see these sorts of signs all along the river.

One of about 40 dams (wiers?) we had to cross.

A pretty town; I slept it its park.

I saw a few of these giant snails. And many, many slugs.

The slavs do like to drink.

Signs advertising a riverside bar - hard to miss when they're right in the rapids. I stopped here for a much needed beer and sausage.

My first real dam, on the Vlatava. But nothing my trusty wheels can't handle.