The Road to Zrenjanin - Part 2

Previously on Krk's self indulgent ramblings...

"I'm not crossing the Croatian border again! I'll fucking shoot someone if we do! Hungary is in the EU and Schengen now and they have new highways. I say we cross into Serbia on the Hungarian side. It'll just cost us an hour or two. Well worth not crossing the fucking Croatian border again."

We say goodbye to the trailer, or the "backline" as the industry folks say.

The plan is to drive to the closest crossing point into Hungary and skip crossing into Croatia again. The show in Zrenjanin is luckily tomorrow and not today, so we have a little leeway in taking a slightly longer route.

The drive is fairly uneventful through Slovenia. It's a gorgeous country. Small. We cross into Hungary and the fun begins.

These freeways don't exist! So we end up taking rural highways through the Pannonan lowlands of Hungary. I joke about the potholes and I think four people turn to me and inform me that this is nothing compared to driving in Romania... which is a stone's throw away at this point.

Saso is driving far faster than these roads were designed for. I'd become accustomed to his aggressive style of driving over the last three weeks, so it's no longer jarring my nerves. It's become increasingly apparent that this slightly longer detour is going to take a lot longer than we'd first thought.

As the sun is setting, suddenly the van starts lurching left and right every so often.

"What the fuck is going on?!" someone in the back yells. Chris is sitting shotgun and replies, "Saso is dodging owls."

So this is how the drive is going to go. I don't know who it was, but someone put on some Kansas. "Carry on Wayward Son" comes on and Paris starts singing along. She's younger than anyone in the band by a fair measure and everyone is a little shocked that she knows the song well enough to really belt it out. And if you've heard Paris sing, you know there's some power in those pipes!

Curious, someone asks why Paris would know a Kansas song so well. "My dad listened to them a lot." Makes perfect sense. The question seemed so silly after such a pat response!

We all join in and someone starts passing the bottle of medica around... that's honey brandy.

So THIS is how the drive is going to go! We're making the best of what is a less than optimal situation. Dodging owls, drinking media and singing along to Kansas.

The singing dies down. The road is bumpy as fuck and we're all bored. Paris starts holding a note as we bump along. The bouncing of the vehicle modulates the tone of her voice. Amy joins in. Gino joins in. There's laughter all around.

A thought occurs to me. We're in Hungary. Not one of the countries I told my bank I'd be visiting. I'm hoping we have enough snacks and sparkling water to carry me over to Serbia where the bank is expecting me to spend money.

We make a rest stop at a run down gas station. The smokers chain smoke. Everyone hits the head. We're not terribly far from Serbia, so I no longer worry about needing to spend money in Hungary and then deal with the inevitable fraud protection call I'd have to make when we get to Zrenjanin.

Basically everyone in this van is an animal lover and what do we see... a feral dog with her litter of SEVERAL WEEK OLD PUPPIES! She seems tame, but everyone is a little cautious around her because she has small puppies.

I turn into a five year old around dogs, especially puppies. It takes the utmost restraint for me to not lay on the ground and let the puppies run all over me and give the momma dog copious amounts of affection.

MUST.. GET...BACK... IN... VAN! The temptation. It is too great!

The rest of the drive is fairly uneventful. Most of us are a little drunk from the medica. Everyone is getting tired. People nap.

Finally! The Serbian border! The border crossing is super easy and fast. The Serbian crossings always were. It's still about 2 hours to Zrenjanin and what should have been an 8 hour drive is turning into 13.

We roll into Zrenjanin. Amy and Gino decide to stay at the apartment complex of the promoter while the rest of us stay at the super nice Hotel Vojvodina in the center of town. We drop off Amy and Gino and head to the hotel. I'm rooming with Val tonight. We get to our room and one of us decided to take a shower only to learn that our drains were clogged and overflowing. We have to get a new room.

We switch rooms. It's like 1am at this point. After this super long, highly inconvenient day, Val and I sprawl out on our respective beds. He turns to me and says, Let's raid this motherfucking mini-bar! I need a drink! Do you want the whiskey or the Pelinkovec?"

"Pelinkovec please."

We begin tearing into our drinks. Val calls Lana. It's still early afternoon in Seattle. I can't remember the details, but I believe this was around the time Lana was considering adopting several of their current dogs or if they had already adopted the dogs and there was some medical situation with one of them that needed attending to. Pretty mundane stuff really, but after a 13 hour drive, dodging owls and having to switch rooms, it was pressing pretty hard on Val's nerves.

We down our drinks and hit the hay. Tomorrow is a show day! And this was a show with someone in attendance that I knew for once, so I was really excited to see Matt.

All I can say is that once the show ended... the shit really hit the fan!

To be continued...