Words by Dec Maher
We entered the cab, lit a cigarette and made small talk with the classic Messi vs Ronaldo debate. Africa by Toto was bellowing out of the speaker as we circled the block for what felt like an hour, waiting for this taxi driver to make the drop.
It was our second night in Sofia and I certainly hadn’t foreseen spending it chasing a £20 bag of weed.
Interrailing around Europe was one of those things me and three college friends had been thinking of doing for ages. No more would we waste our precious youth doing nothing all summer, this year was going to be different – and it certainly was.
Despite having a year to plan this once in a lifetime adventure, planning the route we wanted to take was ultimately decided less than a month before it was time to fly out. Meaning we were cutting it fine with the Interrail passes (€208) as to whether we’d actually get them in time. The cities we chose to visit were: Sofia, Belgrade, Budapest, Bratislava and Prague. Whilst Budapest and Prague are quite common tourist destinations, the others are not, so we thought we’d try some weird places.
Slumming it in murky hostels seemed part and parcel of the whole experience but being the middle-class scumbags we are, we thought we’d dip our toes in to being real adventurers by booking three hostels and two AirBNB’s for the five cities we were visiting. The prices weren’t actually that different, but you do get what you pay for.
Having touched down in Sofia with two mates, (one was joining later), a rucksack full of t-shirts, shorts and sun cream, we realised that whilst the cities sounded nice on paper because they were a bit “out there” and different, there was actually very little do in Bulgaria’s capital city apart from getting pissed. Which we did most of the time.
After catching a cab with an elderly driver who didn’t speak a word of the Queen’s (can’t blame him), we were dumped in the centre of Sofia and made to find out hostel using Google Maps.
Thank god data roaming charges have been abolished, or we’d have been fucked.
One of my friends, a huge stoner, made it his holiday mission to prove how easy it was to pick up a 20 bag in any country, regardless of language barrier. The first attempt to do so started when we were having some breakfast at a café in the middle of Sofia. A
bedraggled 50 something Welsh bloke called Owain Hughes comes over, tells us some bullshit life story about how he rents out land to Gottwood Festival and had his Moto GP engineering designs nicked by Honda, and says he’s here for a long weekend on his own to shag prostitutes. The only bit of information that we actually needed, was the number Owain had been given by a taxi driver who’d offered him weed.
So, my friend gave this guy a call, who said he’d sort us out when he got off shift. He arrived at our hostel about two hours after he said he’d be there, blaring music at an ear-piercing volume. Through terribly broken English he told us to get in his taxi as if it was a normal fare.
It was far from a normal fare.
The price quoted was the equivalent of £25, assuming we’d be paying a premium for being foreign. After circling the block for what was actually 20 minutes, it came to light that this guy did not have the contraband, but was waiting for another guy to drop it off to him.
Eventually, he abruptly pulls to the side of a main road, and the most stereotypical looking Bulgarian meathead pokes his shaven scalp through the window, asking for twice the price.
Naturally, we shit ourselves and ended up paying whatever the nutter wanted.
Thankfully we never saw the taxi driver or his accomplice ever again, which was probably in the best interests of both parties.
So my first rule of interrailing is not to try and pick up in Bulgaria. As much as you’d like a smoke, it isn’t worth the hassle.
The next day we were out having a meal in the main square, when out of nowhere someone comes marching down the street hysterically, waving around a pretty substantial knife.
He flipped a table at the restaurant across from us and continued down the road, screaming in his native tongue. A few minutes later, a military vehicle rolled down the strip. Hardly anyone batted an eyelid, so I suppose that’s Sofia for you.
Apart from that, it was nice, so don’t let me put you off.
Pint prices: Sofia: £1.50, Belgrade: £1, Budapest: £1.10, Bratislava: £1.10, Prague: £1.60
After exhausting all that Sofia had to offer, the next leg of the trip saw us head to the capital of Serbia: Belgrade.
Having arrived at the station early, packed with snacks and supplies to fuel the 8-hour journey, we expected a nice train, leather seats and at the very least air conditioning, considering the searing Serbian summer heat.
What greeted us was two carriages that could easily be confused with the one used on the last train home from Preston. A rattler to say the least.
The 8 hours on this train felt like a lifetime.
Whilst the scenic views of the countryside towns of the Serbian wilderness were nice to look at, they got a bit boring after the third hour, and there’s only so much iPad Monopoly you can play before you go crazy. The only other option was to sleep.
In hindsight, we’d have probably found somewhere to go in between the two places rather than making such a long journey. Something to think about, if you’re planning your own trip.
Once we arrived in Belgrade, we were shocked by how beautiful the city was. The skyline was filled with high rise buildings, the people were very friendly (most spoke good English), and everything was really cheap (£1 a pint!). One of the few let downs was that Serbia isn’t in the EU, so data charges applied. We got around it by buying a pay-as-you-go sim for a few days.
The first thing we planned to do in Belgrade was to attend a football match, that of the famous Partizan Belgrade, who had a friendly fixture scheduled against Grasshoppers Zurich.
Having trekked across the city, our first mistake was going to the wrong stadium. Accidentally rocking up at fierce rivals’ Red Star’s stadium. Luckily there was nobody there.
Not to bother, we made the short journey to the actual stadium, but this time there was nobody there either.
Turns out, the match was in fucking Slovakia. Straight to the bar.
A day later, we thought it would be wise to go and get our seat reservations for the train to Budapest. For this, we needed our interrail passes and our passports.
But I didn’t have either.
I’d left them on the train that got us here. I’d committed the single biggest mistake any holidaymaker could make. I’d lost my passport.
After turning the apartment upside down and pleading with the train station staff to have another search of lost property, the reality of my error set in. I made my way to the British Embassy, who told me I needed to file a police report.
So, I spent one of my three days in the police station getting a police report, and another sat waiting in the embassy whilst a man named Obrad tried to sort out my life.
The new passport cost me just short of £150, plus I’d have to pay for every train I was about to get, as I’d lost my rail pass too. Through frantically ringing parents home, and Serbia not being in the EU, I’d also racked up an extra £60 on my phone bill. A very expensive error.
It turned out that the interrail pass was a bit of a ripoff, as you can book single fare international tickets at most train stations for a fraction of the price. For the four train journeys I bought after losing the £200 pass, I spent approximately £120, which would have been a good deal had I not lost the pass initially.
The most annoying thing about losing my passport though was the time wasted that I could have spent in Belgrade. The castle, which looked out over the city provided splendid views, but having spent the majority of time talking to state officials during the day, there was a sense of missing out on some of the other things Belgrade had to offer.
So, there’s another thing to do whilst Interrailing. Don’t lose your passport.
The replacement passport I was given looked nothing like a normal one and looked like it could be the worst fake anyone had ever seen. Cream coloured and flimsy, it read “emergency” on the front and wouldn’t have looked out of place in a children’s play set.
There was no surprise that when the border police came to inspect passports mine was given special attention, halting the train for a good 45 minutes. This happened for every single journey.
Top Tips:
Don’t trust street dealers – it’s not worth the hassle.
Don’t book long trains – especially during the hottest part of the day. Look for overnight ones or stop somewhere a long the way
Look after your passport – it isn’t worth the time or money replacing it
Research your destinations – make sure there’s something worth going for
The journey to Budapest was much better than that to Belgrade, and the end destination was equally as beautiful. Probably the best city we visited on the trip. Budapest had the tourist destinations during the days and the places to go for nightlife that made it the perfect place for a city break.
Once again my friend got scammed for weed. This time giving a bloke £20 outside the train station, only for him to walk off and get on a train. Like I said, it’s not worth the hassle.
We met up with our fourth friend and found our hostel, a classic room with two bunk beds, in a house littered with Americans that had far too much enthusiasm.
If you’re planning to go to Budapest, I’d recommend it. The Jewish quarter is much like
Manchester’s Northern Quarter, full of artsy bars and street food, and the natural baths allow somewhere to cool down during the heat. The cathedral is an architectural masterpiece, and the river Danube which separates Buda and Pest is pleasant to walk or pedalo down.
Having experienced the highs of Budapest, we were less optimistic about the next city on our list: Bratislava. The only reason the capital of Slovenia had been put on the trip was as a mid-point between Budapest and Prague, but we thought “fuck it, nobody ever says they’ve been to Bratislava”, and went.
Our scepticism wasn’t misplaced.
Bratislava was largely barren, with a pretty standard European style city centre. One
cool thing was the UFO Tower – quite literally a building in the shape of a UFO shooting down a tractor beam. There wasn’t really much to do in Bratislava, so we made a day trip to Vienna.
I wouldn’t want to pass judgement on a city based on a few hours in the city centre, but the two huge museums were very impressive. The city was, however, rather expensive, so we soon got back to Bratislava and from there headed to Prague.
Prague was full of tourists, and another beautiful city much like Budapest. It was cheap, full of awesome architecture, and even had an Andy Warhol museum as well as another impressive castle and grounds.
All things considered, interrailing is definitely an experience worth trying. Despite personal acts of idiocy, travelling around Europe with your best buds is everything it’s cracked up to be. An experience I’ll never forget.
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