The final instalment of the Iron Route Journey. East, West, Good, Bad, Win, Lose, Draw.

Another look at 1989.

Sometimes things go wrong in life. The printer at the car hire company breaks, the sat nav doesn’t work, the journey is longer than you’ve been told and you turn up very late.

Sometimes other things go wrong

It was the second time I’d stood on the banks of the Vltava River in Prague, watching the Charles Bridge stretch lanterns across the water towards the castle. The stone figures melted in and out of existence through the mist like ghosts and I paused to realise just how far I’d come.

Not just the thousand miles from Istanbul…

“Are you ready?” asks Christopher, a guide from the nearby village of Wieliczka. He’s cloaked in a long charcoal jacket and blowing on his hands to keep warm. For a giant-sized man, he uses a soft voice. “Because once we start, I will not be able to talk to you. And you will not be able to turn back.”

I stand in the queue, a man turns me back.

I stand in another queue. Alone, in silence. Paperwork in one hand, a heap of clothing in the other, limp yet heavy like the body of a sleeping child. It’s cold outside.

I wait.

I queue.

I hand over my camera…

Cold War. Iron Curtain.

Four words, two phrases, several meanings.

When I went to school, a third of the world lived under “communist” rule. Travel was restricted…

Italian food. There was a time when I couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about, but I can barely remember that now. The moment my train slowed to a stop in Trieste (and, if I’m honest, quite a while before that) my daydreams wandered…

Trieste, Italy Behind me, I know that sapphire lights stud their way across the stone. Right now, though, I’m watching darkness. Behind me, flames from an occasional car streak across the empty velvet sky, backlit by the brilliance of a long forgotten empire. Ahead I see nothing. Black, dark, empty, silent. Just the sound of [...]

A man casts a glance over his shoulder before arching back and casting his line into the water. The street chatter and rush hour traffic drown out the subtle splash but from the look on his face, you’d think he stood alone in the countryside, miles from anyone, miles from anywhere.

In 1989 the Berlin Wall fell. I was at school at the time and I wasn’t entirely sure what all the fuss was about. Fast forward through the years and despite – or perhaps because of – having studied it briefly, watched the odd Bond film and read plenty of spy thrillers (both fact and fiction,) I’m still not all that sure.
Then There’s Ljubljana…