Europe 2006 | George Filev

George's trip so far.

04 Jul 2006 02:27 Filed in: Europe 2006
If you ever wondered what it would be like to be part of a touring theatre company, hopefully, this will give you an idea.

We begin the 48 hour journey to get to the other side of the world which will encompass flying, train travel, taxis and on route by foot. All check in at Tullamarine airport heading for the final destination of Poznan in Poland.

Malaysian airlines and first stop Kuala Lumpur on a pleasant flight and the stewards handed us 2 bottles of wine as we left. Think we were the B.O.B's (Best On Board) of the flight. That is the first 8hrs &10min done . Got on the next flight heading Kuala Lumpur to Amsterdam with KLM travel time 12hrs & 25mins... boy was that fun with no personal TV screen or leg room to speak of. Then Amsterdam to Berlin which should have been 1hr & 20min but the plane was cancelled due to staffing issues so we had to stay at the airport for 8 hrs so that we could get on the next flight to Berlin.

Ok we finally get to Berlin and then have to catch Taxis to a train station that is 40 mins away from the airport so that we can catch the train to Poznan, Poland. Well we get to the train station and the train will arrive in 5hrs time so we wait till it gets there and board the train to Poland, a 4 hour journey.

We arrive at Poznan station and are greeted by our representative with a van who drives us the 1.5hours to our hotel. We find out that we are actually performing at Zakrezewo Castle and not in Poznan itself. All in all with transfers we have been travelling non stop for 48hours sleeping and eating when we can. You still think this is glamorous now??

At least when we finally arrived we got to a hotel with the venue for the performance next door and for a few days we would not have to go anywhere.

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This is the beautiful castle that we performed in front of in Poland.

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Smiley, smiley now that we are here and after a good nights sleep. A bank owns the castle and they hold functions, like this private party, for their best clients.

The gig went well, even though one of our performers was too ill to perform, and the client was very happy.

Next job was for Sally and I to drive the truck and the trailer from Poland to London in the UK. The first day we drove 950km in 16hours to a little town called Venlo in Holland. Enough time to sleep and breakfast before heading off the next day for a 650km drive and boat ride across the channel to London in the UK. We have crossed 6 different countries in 2 days and travelled over 1500km through some beautiful and diverse landscapes to get to our destination only stopping to eat and sleep when we needed it.

We are in London!!

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Weather is hot everywhere we go.

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Spent a rest day visiting the Tate Modern Museum. Some weird stuff in there. The next day we performed in Greenwich at the Docklands and it is a huge appreciative audience that go wild after the show. Met up with some friends Michael and Matt who live in London, had some dinner at an Indian restaurant and hear that Australia beat Croatia in the Soccer. Guess where we are heading next...Croatia!

Next morning get taxis to Luton Airport and catch WIZZAIR flight FL W6802 to Zagreb. We get to Zagreb and Hire a van and drive to Rijeka in Croatia for a relaxing couple of days at a sea side hotel. Here is the view from my bedroom window.

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That's right, the ocean was lapping at the back porch and the water was very nice. Great hotel 4****STAR with amazing food so did a lot of relaxing and finally caught breath.

Rijeka is a great town with a beautiful central mall area where we performed for the opening of the Sumer Nights Festival.

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It is a port town with many cargo ships docking there and one of the captains of an Egyptian vessel had to close the hatches after our show because fireworks were being used and he had highly flammable cargo which could have made a spectacular show, an unforgettable event. We met him for drinks after and he was happy that his crew got to watch the show and the organisers were very happy.

Now the company is off to Bar Le Duc in France for the Renaissance Festival. I drive the van to Zagreb Airport and we fly to Paris. We then get on a bus, then catch a train to Gare Du Nord, walk to Gare Du Est and catch a regional train to Bar Le Duc on a 3hour journey. We get to the station to be met by our volunteer, Sarah, who takes us to the hotel. Bar Le Duc is a very romantic town steeped in Renaissance history.

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This is the square and the church we performed in front of. Everyone in the town dresses up in medieval dress and demonstrated old crafts and sold things in the market.

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The French have some funny road signs...

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Many street performers from all over the world are hired to entertain the crowds that come to take part in the festivities.

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Next morning we needed to get up early to make our way to Spain. We had to get the bus, and then train back to Paris and taxis to stay in a bug infested hotel near the airport. Following morning up early to catch the Aerlineas Argentinas flight to Madrid.

This particular flight had issues the week prior to us catching it. The flight time was changed from 6:30pm to 11:35am on the same day. Our plans had to be changed to fit this in. We then get to the airport and no one knows what is happening with this flight. We are told to wait till more information is given. We are then taken to check in and all the computers are down and there are people running around all over the place. We finally check in after a long time and things seem to be ok. We get to the gate and the screen says that the plane leaves at 1:40pm instead of the 11:45am on our boarding passes. The airport staff assures us it is a computer malfunction and we are leaving at the 11:45am scheduled time. We don’t bord the plane till 12:30pm and then sit in the plane on the tarmac for a further 2 hours as apparently the pilot has not been given a flight plan for take off. We finally start moving. The hosties seem to forget to give the safety instructions before take off and we are off for a bumpy ride to Madrid.

The flight time is 1.5 hours. The actual travel time with the waiting on tarmac was 5hours. To top it all off three of us who checked in luggage, myself included, had our bags lost in transit.

As it stands we still don’t have our bags so you may be seeing me in the same clothes for a long time because no one knows where our bags are. If that is not enough, they put our lost baggage claims in under the same name so we are only entitled to 100 euros compensation in stead of 100 euros each to buy some clothes to tie us over till they find our bags and get them back to us. We are looking into sorting this out by doing a lot of yelling but as we are moving around so much, we may be without a change of clothes for some time as our bags follow us around the globe.

So what to do in situations like this?? Go shopping!! Bought some new underwear and a shirt today and headed off to the Prado Museum to look at some of Goyas works. It was wonderful and great to take the mind of the fact that I am in the same clothes for three days.

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Madrid is so beautiful!!

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Well hopefully I will have some more clothes next time you hear from me. As you can see it is not all plain sailing being an international performer. More of a farce really, but I am having fun when I can and enjoying the company of the people on tour.

Till the next instalment, Adios, Au Revoir, Auf wiedersehen, cheerio, adieu, bye-bye for now and all the best.

Much love,

George

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