Riding the rails with the Goths, Visigoths and other marauding hordes from the north.

Our train out of Prague was very young. I don't mean the train itself; it had all the earmarks of a Soviet era classic. No, I'm in reference to the passengers. For all intents and purposes, we rode the rails with a trainful of drunken Czech frat boys. It was great fun. Richard and I blended right in.

From Prague to Ceske Budejovice, we were on a quasi-express train, stopping at only the largest of burghs. Tabor was particularly popular with our travel mates. They all chanted "Tabor, Tabor, Tabor" at full volume the entire time we were stopped. When the train pulled out of the station, they discontinued the chant, much to Richard and my (and the entire town of Tabor's) delight.

At Ceske, we all popped off the sorta-express and transfered to a local. We stopped at more flipping villages than you can shake a stick at. I don't mean to disparage the quaint settlements such as Vyhen, Kaplice or Umlenice (Czech town names look very differnt with their accents and squigglies), but at each stop the fratboy frenzy grew sharper. As we pulled into Rybnik, I was nearing desperation, searching my pack for something that could end my pain and suffering.

Then a miracle happened: two carloads of hyperactive young men disembarked. The rest of the train ride to Salzburg was wonderfully uneventful. One might even say eerily quiet.

But if you hear of a quaint village in  Southern Bohemia that was devestated by a plague of inebriated youth, you now know more of the story.