10 castles in 7 days.
So after returning to Prague from a very very long 8 day trip with my program on our “spring break”, I feel like Prague is even more beautiful than before. Maybe because this is my new “home base” or maybe it’s because it really is the most beautiful city in Eastern Europe, but I really missed it. I didn’t realize how much until I left and came back.
Every day of the trip was packed with tours and sites and food and alcohol. It was exhausting. Even when we had free time it wasn’t spent sleeping in the hotels, it was spent seeing the sites of vienna, visiting the museums or walking around in the snow. The weather was awful pretty much the whole time except the one day we went into the Czech countryside to do a little hike and see some caves (Punkva Caves). They were awesome. It felt really nice to just be outside and be able to breath peaceful with the sun shining. I wore sunglasses for the first time since being here! Crazy.
So the places we went were as follows:
Trebic: A small town in southern Czech Republic. We saw a basilica, the Jewish quarter, and a synagogue.
Moravsky Krumlov: The home of Mucha’s Slavic Epic which is enormous and billiant (google it)
Brno: Museum of Roma Culture, tour of the city, went to a mexican dance club that night (pretty fun)
Kromeriz: The archbishop’s palace tour, stumbled on an easter fair market and ate a wonderful potato pancake and some candied street nuts..amazing. The smell is divine, really, that’s what heaven smells like.
Punkva Caves: caves. nature. wonderfulness. Castle Spilberk: An exhibit about functionalist architecture. The exhibit was kind of boring but an interesting concept and architectural movement.
Lednice and Valtice: Castles, minaret (a large tower built on the castle grounds by the royals just for fun), conservatory, gardens. It poured the entire day and we were outside pretty much the entire day. Tensions ran high.
Mikoluv: Wine tasting (fantastic old man who blew fire, everyone got very drunk that night, making the next day of tours just swell), tour of the town, the biggest wine barrel in Europe, another (get ready for this) castle, and Jewish quarter. This was by far the sleepiest town I’ve ever been to. The Irish pub closed at 1 on St. Patty’s day…
Devin: ANOTHER CASTLE! On the way to Bratislava we stopped and looked at this castle. I paid 10 crowns to pee (most expensive, usually its 3 or 4), but the castle was cool. Look for photos to come soon.
Bratislava: Tour of the city, ANOTHER CASTLE, lecture about Slovak economy (the educational part of the trip), a big church, and a big bridge.
Vienna: Tour with Wolfgang. We saw the most mozart look alikes in one square block, ate at some Vienna Coffee houses, had some sachel torte (famous dessert), and toured around in the sun, snow, rain, sleet, heat and cold. The weather was so unpredictable, one minute it was sunny and warm, the next snowing and freezing.
So that’s the short summary. I will try to post some photos but I didn’t have batteries in my camera for the first few towns. Also, on the way back to Prague, there was conveniently a 150 car pile up on the main high way so we had to take back roads through the Czech Republic to get pack to prague. Needless to say it took far to long to get home and I was getting antsy. We made it safe and sound and all is well. Since I’ve been back its been busy busy getting ready for the summer (jobs) and next year at school (class schedules, housing) as well as midterms this week in my classes here.
Next weekend Charlotte and I are off to Dublin and the next weekend I’m going to London to visit my friend Katie who is studying there because I got an awesome deal on a flight. Then traveling for the rest of my time here almost every weekend, then coming home. Time is flying.
Side note: Easter traditions here are weird. A boy buys something that resembles a pile of sticks tied together and decorated with ribbons and flowers. Then he goes around and whips (yes, whips) the girls he likes. In return the girls are supposed to give the boy eggs and/or pour water on them. I thought this was a joke, but its serious. People sell the “whips” on the streets and eggs in baskets. I hope that I don’t experience this tradition first hand…
