So, Monday 2nd July I packed up my stuff and waved farewell to Prague. I found my train okay and managed to get into a carriage with someone who was no only going to the same hostel as me but had also just finished a degree at Nottingham Trent. Small world, huh? The Czech part of the trip went off without a hitch, but once we got over the border the Polish ticket conductor noticed that the ticket was for entirely the wrong day. And there was me singing the praises of helpful ticket office guy. Bah. Yep, ticket was issued for the wrong day, genius here hadn't checked her ticket properly, and the Czech ticket conductor had failed to notice. The Polish guy was really good about it though, and only charged me from the border to the next staion (where I had to change). He explained very carefully how I could get a cheap ticket from Katowice to Wroclaw by showing this ticket, so I'd be charged for the extra kilometres rather than for a whole new ticket. Polish train tickets issued on trains are basically little forms that the conductors fill in, and he even wrote a little explaintory note in Polish for the next ticket conductor to read.
So I changed at Katowice and when the guy came round I asked in my best Polish for a ticket to Wroclaw and showed him the note on the old ticket. What followed was possibly the most complex ticket-issuing I have ever seen in my life. It took the poor man nearly fifteen minutes and appeared to involve degree-level mathmatical calculations. I should've kept it to frame when I get home.
However, despite yet another train-related adventure, I got to Wroclaw okay and the hostel is brilliant. Really landed on my feet with this one. Incidently, if anyone fancies trying to pronouce 'Wroclaw', I'll give you a clue: it's nothing remotely like 'Wro-claw'.
