Czechoslovakia holiday photos September 1990

Czechoslovakia holiday photos September 1990. This is the worst holiday I have had in my whole life. There were several reasons for this. The holiday rep on the coach was on his last week before retiring and spent the whole holiday telling us what was wrong with Czechoslovakia so that we could tell the rest of the world (who would put it right). There was actually a lot wrong with Czechoslovakia and a lot wrong with the holiday too. In fact things were going wrong before the holiday when Chedok the Czechoslovakian travel agency lost my partners passport so that she was unable to travel. Those were the days when you had to get a visa to travel to Czechoslovakia. The coach was not so much a coach but more a bus. The hotels were bad and some were scary. Nothing works in Czechoslovakia including the hotel lifts, which is not fun if you are on the fifteenth floor of some decrepid tower block. The weather was bad...

To finish off a bad holiday we spent a rainy day in some dreary little town with nothing but a few small shops including one small hardware shop. Eager to spend the last of our money (you cant take it with you) people bought various bits of hardware. I bought a nice set of drills. One of the other guys bought a galvanised watering can for his mother. It was the sort of thing you couldn't get in the UK and it would make a nice present. On our way to the airport the holiday rep brought out a long list of things that you were not allowed to take out of the country, it basically contained every thing including drills and watering cans. So it was a matter of take the goods and see what happens. I stowed the drills well wrapped up in my suitcase. The guy with the watering can had more of a problem and tried hiding the watering can in his rucksack. He was pulled up at the customs, the watering can was discovered and he was taken away never to be seen again.

Anyway the photos don't show much of the bad so they are worth a look particularly if you went on the same holiday. This was the week Margaret Thatcher went to Czechoslovakia so there are a few photos of her too. I bet she didn't see some of the shit I saw.