The Gokwe Kid - Rogue Rhodie on a Roller: Part 16. I have seen the mist and not missed the scene.

Day 25. Thursday 21^st August (continued)

I parked up next to a couple of Czech registered cars and peeped through the windows thoroughly expecting some slaughtered, rotting corpses. Relieved, I climbed the steps to what looked like a rather smart veranda and inside was a cosy enough looking bar and a large dining area. Glancing around outside I noticed some wooden chalets but no tents or caravans and crucially – no one! No humans at all.

The only sounds were coming from the forest – the creaking of fir trees being bent by the wind, the howls of wolves, and as it was now 7.00 pm the screeches of witches, erm... I mean owls.

I shouted out the international greeting – “I want beer.”

From a nearby house, a pot bellied man popped out. Dressed in a T-shirt at least three sizes too small but not as small as the shiny nylon shorts that emphasised his reproductive tackle, he grunted and wandered over. Since he wasn't carrying a butcher's cleaver, I removed my hand from my last potential defence – the Swiss Army knife on my belt.

“Hi. Do you speak English or German.”

“A little English. No German.”

I was amazed he spoke at all or actually walked upright after what I had gone through to get here. I mean this place was beyond imagination. I reckon that if that twat Osama Bin Laden had hidden in here the Yanks would never had found him.

“I would like to camp please. Two nights. How much?”

He looked at me, looked at my roller, looked up at the sky (so did I, maybe he was expecting a drone strike).

“200 kroner” was the reply.

Not bad, that made it the cheapest place yet. Not only that, he wasn't interested in passports and such nonsense.

“Do you have food and could I have beer please and where do I put up my tent?”

“I cook food. One hour. Camp anywhere,” he replied as he poured me a beer for an amazing 35 kroner (about 75 pence.) Then he went off.

With darkness descending, I chose a spot near to some tables and chairs and not too far where he had pointed out a block of what was the showers and toilets. I managed to unload and make camp just as the last sunlight went. Unfortunately I became confused where you slide these strange fibreglass rods into the sleeves of the tent, got them the wrong way and as I tried to span and bend them into an arch – there was an almighty crack and one of the rods split. Oh shit! Boppering it up a bit (Rhodesian slang for a long term temporary entrepreneurial fix to a terminal problem of huge magnitude),and the tent could still work, but I knew its days were now limited to exactly three more nights.

Feeling cold, I took the day pack with all the high tec gear and went back to the dining/bar room.

Not having much confidence of any result, I was pleasantly surprised that whilst the phone struggled, the notebook had no problem locking onto to the free WiFi. It also had no problem of knowing it was obviously emitting from nearby as all forms of civilisation was bloody miles away.

There were a few more people around that I gathered were staff, but I was the only guest. Supping on another pint, I told everyone on TGK Facebook that I was still alive and kicking and was then presented with -

“Czech special. Cow meat and scrabbled potatoes with salad.”

It was nice enough but I was a bit miffed by the price – the same as camping for the two nights. (About sterling 7.50.) I concluded that the next day I would work out how to get out and find a supermarket and petrol station. What had supposed to have been 80 clicks had turned into 180!

Totally knackered, I didn't hang about after the grub and hit the sack just before 9.00pm.

Day 26. Friday 22^nd August

No cockerels awoke me. It was not necessary as the chattering of my own teeth had kept me awake most of the night and my pillow had a large collection of my fillings that had been dislodged scattered around it. It had been apparent within minutes of hitting the sack, that was about all I could do with it. Sue had looked sceptical when we were at Tescos in Prague with the size of the thing but I had assured her that it looked about the same as the one that had been stolen. I simply ignored the label which said 'Junior size, 70cms wide.' Stupid me hey. Still dressed with sweatshirt and Rhodie waistcoat, vest/west thing, I could hardly squeeze into the the camouflaged fart sack. Oh well, I must make a plan. Fancy getting this far and play a Captain Scott!

Poking my head out the tent door, which was soaking wet, the entire place was covered in mist or low clouds. I hadn't seen anything like this since Inyanga, Eastern Highlands of Rhodesia. Plus it was just as cold and wet. I needed a wazz badly and now I had another problem. I had placed a sign at the last petrol station. One sandal. It had been left behind whilst repacking after filling up. I wonder if, when the staff found it lying around, that they might have thought the messiah had been there for four litres of juice and a coffee.

Lighting up a smoke and with no sign of life, I had a wee-wee out of the tent in a left direction, with the wind – I am not fool enough to piss on my own doorstep. I was gagging for my fix of coffee. Getting the extremely proficient gas stove out of its case was very easy since most of it had been destroyed by bad man in Prague whilst ripping it off the pannier box. Opening the said box, I sighed. All that bouncing around in the forest had not only emptied most of the salt and pepper pots but in an a bit of temper, the lid bottle of the sugar bottle had come off and everything inside was covered in the damp sticky stuff. Still, there was enough left in and I also had some little tubs of evaporated milk, so in a jiffy, I was supping away whilst contemplating what happens next.

With the 'guti' being seriously dense, I had no idea if the day would turn out warm or rainy, in fact, vision was down to about 20 paces. With the only road outside the camp site it was logical that the river should be near down the steep, rocky and hole pitted drag. I wandered down as swirls of mist curled around me from the forest on both sides and after some 300 meters I came across an incredulous site. A bloke in full combat uniform, was slouching leisurely in a chair with a couple of fishing rods.

To the left of him was some old decrepit boats and to my astonishment, creeping, silently and eerily, small yachts appeared and seconds later disappeared. Wow! This was brilliant. Matey caught a fish, but judging by the the rather idle bending of his rod, it must be a tiddler. Much to my surprise it was about a pounder.

Whilst the catcher in the mist couldn't speak much (well, not my languages) he explained that it was a mollock, pollick, gollum, or whatever and being too small, he released it. That’s when I sussed out that whatever it was, it was no fighting fish. The stupid thing just laid there and needed a poke before it got its lazy ass in gear and wandered back into the murky deeps.

What also puzzled me (and you can see it from the last posting of the pictures from the bridge), was the immense amount of algae. This wasn't like the Spirogyra type known as 'slime' in Rhodie days (we actually used it as bait for tilapia, aka bream), but more like overcooked pea soup until there was no physical object, just coloured water. I suppose the nearest example is from Rhodie days when, if the chlorine was not administrated correctly, the pool turned green. On many occasions it meant emptying the pool and starting again, however, I couldn't see the Czechs blowing up the dam wall, flush the lot into the North Sea (the final destination of the river Vlatava), say sorry to the Germans and please don't invade us again, and knock up a new wall and throw in a few thousand tons of alginate. Sorry about all the dead fish. Its a hard knock life.

After what was really a magical moment, I wandered back to camp and with the mobile phone on, wandered around till the signal was strong enough to post the brilliant pictures onto Facebook. But – there was also an Email for me – from the Big Boss. Oh-oh. Back to reality with a bump. He wants to know when I am 'ready' to go back to work.

I had absolutely no desire to participate in that four letter word, and replied that if he would be so kind as to keep sending me money every month and put me on the books as a tax loss. I mean, the teeny bit I cost can easily be offset. I think he might have been a bit more than upset if I did send that, so I simply replied the 27^th.

The sun was now looking like the moon, but it was burning the mist off, and as the staff were now wandering around, I went back to the main building to charge my phone and notebook. I was asked if I would like some breakfast but decided against it in case I would have to take out a mortgage on my scooter.

With the skies looking great, I decided I would head back to Orlik and see if they had anything resembling a supermarket. Ahh – how was I to get there? I did try to ask the staff, but they seemed to be as confused as me as to where we actually were. Either that or there was a big problem in communication. Still, being the great detective from Africa, I didn't expect too much of a problem.

With some kind of road to follow, I kept the much enlightened machine delicately on the rutted path. After about four clicks I came across a cross junction. Perched on the one side of it was a small decrepit wooden hut. But there was actually a sign pointing to the way I had just come with the name of the camp site. As this sign could only be seen from the right fork, I opted to take that route.

Nine clicks later, I hit a tar road. Since there were no signs what so ever, I took note of a postbox, a shield for what could be taken as a warning of some kind and hazard a guess to turn left. Well, blow me down with a gay's hair dryer, within a couple of kilometres I am in one of those strange towns I wandered through at least twice. Four more clicks - I meet the main drag, left again, over the bridge and into Orlik village.

 

There is a Co-Op - Not quite British style, but I don't care and stock up on food and tins of juice, which was a bit cheaper than back at the camp site. There is a large detailed map in the 'Town Square' (hah hah), and I notice that there was supposed to be a petrol station less than a click further down the road. Hmm. I have no recollection of passing it. It was there, refuelled, and crossed the bridge again and thought I would take the road marked on the map that was in theory a direct route along the river to the camp site (that was not marked). No chance. Not only was there yet again another boom, but the council had stopped clever-clevers like me from scooting around them by piling loads of thorn bushes to head height. I wondered if I could drop the scooter, drag it under but thought perhaps, for once, this might be a very bad idea...

Returning back the way I came, back at the weird junction in the forest I pulled up. The sun was now sending out some warming rays, and I decided to have some fun. Firstly, I needed to crack a tinnie. I mean, what were the odds of the police turning up here? Secondly, I wanted a smoke and thirdly - concluded I couldn't do the first two tasks until I took my helmet off.

As I rummaged around in my day pack and the millions of pockets of my waistcoat, the junction came alive with weird people. One drove a tractor dragging logs. Four turned up on bicycles with a GPS machine that I gathered from the serious shouting at each other, was as lost as they were. (I laughed to split a gut.) They wandered off and then came a group of early twenties with baskets crammed with all sorts of mushrooms and from the opposite direction a young bird jogging.

Once I was alone again, I set up the tools of my trade – doing bullshit...

After a great giggle of stupidity, I returned to the tent, unloaded my beer and grub into a fridge in the main building for the use of people like me, loaded up a plastic chair onto the back of the roller (no picture, dumb ass I am), and with a bottle of rum Sue gave me and a cola, I drove down to the same spot on the river.

 

What a transformation. The army bloke had been replaced by a family of five, also fishing, the mist was gone and the river/dam was spread out before me. Very nice indeed and I chilled in the sunlight, occasionally disturbed by the excited shouts as yet another lazy, scaly gollum thing was dragged out the green depths and popped into a net to await its fate as sleeping fish and chips.

With my mind now ready to write, I said goodbye to the family that had observed me in some form of horror, and went back. I then asked the pretty blonde babe if by any chance they had a blanket spare as I had no desire that they should be forced to find their way to the nearest morgue in the morning with my frozen body. The round trip would cost a pretty fortune – plus all the paper work. Especially since the body they would deposit has no identification what so ever.

I was duly delivered a freshly washed cover and duck feather duvet. All at no cost. Now well sorted, I wandered into the main building, ordered a pint and on the veranda started to write. At 6.00 pm feeling a tad hungry, I went back to the tent and prepared my evening meal, which I haven’t a clue what it was!

Just as I started skoffing, with a very loud explosion of noise – thousands of overweight women arrived on bicycles, all wearing identical T-shirts with some motive explaining they were slappers...

(To be continued.)