PRAGUE - FIRST LOOK

Prague, Wednesday January 5, 2011

A fairly long day today, but not as long as we collectively feared.

After a last breakfast we clambered aboard our coaches at 08h30 for what we were told would be a nine hour journey to Prague, with an eta of 17h30. There was only room for our knapsacks (Hugh says they are most inappropriate for a grown man, who should never carry more than a briefcase) so we had to sit with our coats on our laps as we always found it too hot to sit in our coats. This made for a very crowded seat and I had half a cheek in the aisle - most uncomfortable. We stopped for a fifteen minute pee-break after about 90 minutes and since I had no local currency and didn't want any, I declined to pay the requisite fee and used the public ones. I was glad I didn't have to sit on the icy steel throne! We re-arranged the coats, but it didn't make much difference and I was resigned to a very uncomfortable few hours ahead. It was only after our lunch break that Hugh suggested that I ask the courier/guide if I could sit in the spare seat in the front row. I did and luxuriated all the way in to Prague.

The lunch stop was at a McDonald's. Milan the guide had warned us at the start that this would be the case as he said they were the only reliable food stops on the motorways. We were off the bus and in only just behind Hugh - no doubt we old travellers know the tricks of the trade. Hugh was paying with a credit card which delayed the works somewhat but once the staff had got that worked out, they battled manfully (or womanfully to be more accurate) to deal with the sudden rush of 66 foreigners, most of whom hadn't eaten in a Macs anyhow and didn't understand the rules! Milan told us there was only one woman in the kitchen and the cashier was on the job for first time that day. (We thought the cashier was bemused by the credit card because she only saw them rarely, but were way off the mark. We only learned later that countries like the Czech Republic jumped a couple of stages of technology. The problem with the cashier was that she had never handled a credit card that required a signature instead of a PIN. It was we Australians who had old technology, not the Czechs!)

Milan played the movie Amadeus on the coach DVD - which we didn't enjoy at all. We didn't have a very good view, but from what we could see it was not our scene. Maybe you had to know more about Mozart than we do.  As I say, I was quite comfortable in the end as we drove through the lovely snowy countryside, but the travels we have had on coaches have reinforced my long held view that I would not choose that method of travel. The seats are simply not designed for my size person. Incidentally the road surface in Czech are appalling for long stretches. They are concrete slab highways and as ever, they created a very bumpy ride.

We got in at about 16h00, considerably earlier than expected. Milan said this was due to the opening of a new bypass  which had taken all the heavy trucks off the road we were on and clear up a long standing problem that had created hour long backups. He seems an excellent guide - just what girl in Paris was not. He explained what we had in store, how he had arranged for our check in at the hotel so there was a minimum of fuss, what we were going to do.

As he had said, we were into the hotel and in our room within minutes of arrival. It is a very nice Art Nouveau building (THE style in Prague!) and decorated accordingly. We are on the eighth and top floor in a kind of attic Rome with sloping windows. It is very large and very comfortable and a HUGE improvement on the Paris room.

 

We went for a freezing orientation walk at 18h00 last evening and then left Milan and the group to do a bit of exploring on our own. Unfortunately we me up with Marj and Chris (I think they are a couple but Rab won't accept that). I say unfortunate because Marj is very bossy and thrustful (so to speak) and so although they were good company sitting on the boat, they are less so for a wander through town window shopping and looking for a Czech eatery. I missed a number of photo opportunities as we marched at speed from place to place and in the end, since we couldn't agree where to eat, they went their way and we went ours, ending up in a nice cellar restaurant where we had some good food and a couple of large beers. Just what we wanted. Rab had roast pork and sauerkraut and I had a grilled schweinhaxe which, while not up to the standard of the one in Koln, was nevertheless just what I wanted.

And so to bed.