Cesky Krumlov on a sunny day

Our beautiful home for the next 5 weeks.

Hello, readers!

First some good news - we are very happy to report that the van works! Not only  that, but it is big, roomy, safe, easy to drive and generally awesome. Sarah has done well to get her head round the automatic transmission, and now swears that she will only ever drive an automatic in the future. I've been navigating and  I think I've done OK so far, keeping Sarah away from that middle white line and getting her to use only her right foot with the driving.


We took a roundabout route down to Cesky Krumlov, due to Sarah being scared of motorways - and after an hour of country bumpkinism we decided that seeing as Czech motorways generally have 1 lane, we might as well find one and get on it. So from then on the journey went smoothly and we arrived in CK around 6.30pm. We camped by the riverside with about a million canoeists, got our first celebratory beer of the trip and then decided to wander off to get provisions.

Or so we thought. At that time, the storm hit and the deluge prevented us from doing our plan, coupled with the fact that I FORGOT MY WATERPROOF COAT! Doh. Might have to start a second blog about the things I've forgotten. Anyway, we spied a fellow Wicked van and the two kind Kiwis inside - Sam and Jamie - welcomed us over, gave us dinner and protected us from the rain. A great start to the trip and a great experience of hopefully many more new friendships to come.

Sam and Jamie's Wicked  van.

The evening progressed into a few beers in the campsite pub (a barn) and several discussions ensued around such light-weight topics as the comparative farming methods in Britain and NZ, the lack of individual responsibility in society, and why we continually seemed to knock our beers over despite not actually being drunk. A good evening was had by all and suddenly it was 1am, so time to build our bed and tuck in for our first night's van sleep.

Cosy!

Hope you are all doing well out there in the real world, we are slightly tired but so far very happy. Ready for AUSTRIA this evening!

S & A