At the agreed time, Monika, Tomáš, and I sat by the right leg of the Eiffel Tower, on the side facing downstream along the Seine, as arranged with Karel through our many letters.

We were sipping wine, and the passing tourists mostly ignored us. On the roundabout in front of the tower — the one with maybe five lanes — an old Škoda 105 stopped first, followed by a newer Škoda Favorit. Doors opened, and several people jumped out, including Hrdláč, a buddy who had brought us together, carrying a demijohn of homemade wine. They all ran toward us, leaving the cars abandoned on the busy roundabout, and we hugged cheerfully. Sixteen of my old and new friends were there along with me at that moment. Before long, we went to the nearest shop for more bottles and cardboard boxes of wine and spent the evening thoroughly drunk beneath the new Eiffel Tower.

Enthusiasm knew no bounds. It was the vibes after the Velvet Revolution — we were thrilled to travel freely and I was happy to see friends again after my two years in North America. The nineties were just beginning, a time when anything seemed possible. That night, we even climbed the tower as far as we could. Back then, it all felt achievable — unbelievable now.

In the morning, a gardener watering the grass woke us, and we set off to explore Paris: the Louvre, Pompidou Museum, Montmartre, and more. We spent three nights there.

Afterward, about half the group returned to Bohemia, while a few friends and I set off in the Škodas through southwestern Europe. Our first stop was Lourdes in southern France, as Váca — my college roommate from Plzeň University, living in East Berlin — wanted to visit the pilgrimage town.

Heading west toward Spain, starting with the Pyrenees, we ran into car troubles. The old Škoda 105 had worn-out tires. After a few hundred kilometers, wires showed through, so we stopped at a farm with a silage pit and a pile of old tires. We found two that fit and somehow mounted them. Fifty kilometers later, the same thing happened. The main issue was the car’s alignment.

Still, we managed. Along the way, we reached the Pyrenees and spent a night under the stars near a peak, gathering dried cow dung for a fire in the hot evening. As the saying goes… shit does burn!

We slept in various spots — once near a landfill, using old furniture and junk to create crazy photos. We visited Barcelona, Figueres for the Dalí Museum, and Madrid for the Prado Museum. The demijohn traveled with us, and at each stop, whoever had it would run to the other car to share a drink.

Naturally, there were incidents: a motorcyclist crashed into a car door while transferring the demijohn, and once, our car was broken into and belongings stolen. Still, the journey was fun. We reached southern Spain, Granada, and the mountains of the Sierra Nevada.

Eventually, we turned back, crossing Spain, the Pyrenees, France, Switzerland, Germany, and finally back to the Czechoslovak border. After two years in North America, as planned, I returned home, paying tribute to Jack Kerouac’s (who inspired me to that adventure by his novel On the Road) grave in Lowell, Massachusetts, and arriving in time for my father’s 50th birthday. The Iron Curtain had fallen, and a new chapter in Europe and my life was beginning.