After a couple of days in Vienna I met up with Amber, a friend from university, and we headed up by train to Mikulov, a medium-sized town just across the Czech border. We picked up touring bikes, shoved a few clothes into small panniers and cycled out to explore Moravia.
I knew very little about southern Czech before I arrived and was pleasantly surprised to discover that near the Austrian border the terrain is relatively flat and dotted with wineries. After sampling the local wine at a few different "Weinkellers" I learned to stay well clear of Czech red wine. However their ice-wine and several of the white table wines I tasted were fantastic, particularly sweeter grape varieties like Muškát Moravský.
Our completely unplanned journey took us west along well sign-posted forest trails and minor roads eventually arriving at "Vranov nad Dyni," a local tourist hot-spot on the banks of the Dyje river and overlooked by a spectacular palace. We found a pension with a great view, run by a friendly old couple who spoke absolutely no English and used sign language to negotiate a room. Random adventures are always the best!
As we headed north, the vineyards gave way to fields of wheat, maize and sunflowers and the terrain became rolling hills that were fun to roll down but hell to pedal up. It was about this point that I discovered Amber had actually been awarded an Oxford Blue for cycling so I didn't feel quite so bad as she disappeared off into the distance every time we climbed a hill. She would inevitably loop back a few minutes later to find me "taking photos" at a particularly steep section.
Most days we would head out in the late morning and ride for a couple of hours before stopping for a lunch of bread, cheese, pickles and Vegemite. After lunch we'd ride for another 3 or 4 hours, stopping to admire the alarming green architecture and to scrump raspberries, cherries and apples from the front yards of unsuspecting locals.
Although your average Czechoslovakian isn't exactly friendly, we were warmly received at an Irish pub and shared a table at a Moravian restaurant with a local wine-maker. He told us the history of the region, invited us to an underground rock party, offered to drive us back to Vienna and then talked me into ordering a local specialty that was delicious despite containing more garlic than I would normally eat in a year.
Although they occasionally dabble in wine, the Czech Republic is most famous for inventing lager style beer and I tried a lot of Pilsners before settling on Pilsner Urquell - the original and still the best. Czech's pole position in the beer drinking stakes is aided by their ordering system. At any local bar you only have to order one beer and as soon as you finish it, they'll automatically bring you another. I was quite drunk before I realized that you actually have to go up to the bar and pay in order to get them to stop.
In the end we covered a little under 400km in six days of riding, hit a top speed of 65.4 km/h and with Amber's expert organization and navigation, I hardly even had to look at a map!
