Twenty-nine years since we set off for the Czech Republic!

Time flies.

It's 29 years today that Audrey Amson (my partner at the time) and I set off for the Czech Republic, where I would teach in a grammar and secondary school for a year.

It was a Sunday. I had had the trailer hitch fitted a couple of weeks before and had only tested it with the Freewheel Shuttle connected a few times and not fully loaded! That was a mistake.

It was all packed during the week and finally on Saturday.  The first test ride with a few items loaded and it weaved all over the road behind me.

I had been told that the heavier stuff needed to be at the front towards the hitch and lighter stuff behind it.  

So it was re-packed. heavy stuff like text books packed in bags were laid across the nose, clothes and other stuff I would need (or not!) towards the rear. One test ride and it was as if it wasn't there....

I didn't take any photos before we set off. Back then the internet didn't exist and there were certainly no blogs or digital cameras....

The choice of taking the Kettle might not seem the cleverest but after being made redundant I had had to sell the Cavalcade and after a trip to Czech to look at the school in may the DR800SL followed. 

If I hadn't needed the money, I would have kept the Cavalcade and had the tow hitch fitted to it. It would have been far more luxurious to have travelled on it with its large luggage built-in and the trailer. Too late now for hindsight.

One stop in Belgium near Liege, and another in Rotenburg/Fulda where we stayed in the youth hostel that was actually over the fire station.  Only one photo survives!

Me, Kettle and Shuttle

We were taking the A4 route that took us towards Dresden and then down across country to Brno. One last stop on the Labe/Elbe at Bad Schandau in a hotel that Audrey had to pay for. I couldn't risk using a credit card as paying it off would have been difficult from 900 miles from home!

Once across the Czech border we were now outside the European Union and so passports were needed. It wasn't as bad as it had been crossing from Austria into Czech at Mikulov in 1986, where were interrogated for half an hour by the border officials.

Děčín seemed a bit seedy after even the cleanliness of former East Germany. Our route from here was Česká Lípa, Jičín, Hořice, Hradec Králové, Svitavy and then down into Brno and across to Zastávka u Brna

And to the house of Mr Petr Kroutil,  the head teacher at the school. They had allocated a flat for me nearby and it wasn't ready to move into for a week or so.  So they put us up in the "children's house". A kind of youth centre with rooms and beds.....

Gymnázium T.G.Masaryka, Zastávka u Brna

So the adventure was about to start.