Prague – My even older Holiday Weblog

The Final Road Home – Bohemia #8

Day 7

After breakfast on Sunday, we were on our way.

Stephen and I had to fight over who would drive first but I pulled rank and said it was my car, so he could get lost. I hadn’t driven in Berlin yet and wanted to do so. The weather was still fine and the drive out was ok. We only had one hold-up, but saw a second incident.

It wasn’t clear what the original incident had been but one silly old duffer had run his car into something in front of us (we think that it was the central reservation, as no other car had stopped). Well, he just got out of his car and walked away (in search of a telephone I expect) and left the car there, in the fast lane – with his wife still sitting in it! Silly old sod. A little later on we saw a rescue helicopter in a field with all the services around it. Something must have happened earlier and was in the process of clearing up as we saw them lifting a stretcher into the chopper.

The first sign we saw that there had once been a split in the country was when we passed an old customs post which had once blocked the autobahn. I’m surprised that they hadn’t demolished it.

I had phoned France before we left the hotel in Berlin and had booked a room in the same Formula 1 we had stayed in on our first night. At least I think I had. The lady on the phone spoke no English and my French is poor to say the least. However, we struggled through. I wasn’t sure whether I had agreed to pay by Visa, if we didn’t turn up on time (which was the idea) or whether she just held the room until 19:00pm, which was company policy. However, when we got there after 20:00pm, we had a room and she had me on her list. We could have been there earlier, but for the French.

We had filled up in Germany, when we had only 1 – 2 gallons left. We could possibly have made the next petrol station but it wasn’t worth the risk. I estimated that we might JUST have enough to get us to the Shuttle (and therefore fill up in England, where petrol is cheaper). However, we were about 10 miles short of the hotel and maybe 30 miles short of the tunnel when I thought that perhaps we had only 1 – 2 gallons left in the tank again. We had done around 400 miles by this time too, so we thought it best that we fill up. We were a shade inside Boring Belgium and we had no cash, so I had to use my Visa and would therefore need to put at least half a tank in, to make it worthwhile. But that in itself wasn’t a problem. The problem was that we had to come off the motorway and drive into the nearest town. The French were just leaving this town in their millions, having just spent Sunday on the beach, in the hot sun. It took us almost two hours to get to the hotel, just ten miles away. Mind, that also include half an hour trying to find the hotel again. When we did find it, we realised that it was next to a massive hypermarket, something we had missed when we visited last week.

We ate that night in the barbecue place next door. A basic choice of food, all chargrilled, with chips and salad – the usual French fayre. It wasn’t too bad but we were spanked again for price. I actually complained in French again, that the bill included too many beers and the waiter understood, agreed and altered the bill. I’m getting good.

Day 8

In the morning, we took a look around the Carrefour Hypermarket and stocked up on beer and wine. I couldn’t find my favourite coffee, so had to do without. We then called at the Cité de Europe, the new Meadowhall type of place by the side of the Shuttle terminal. Here we found a small looking, but in fact quite large Tesco dedicated to beers, wines and spirits, nothing else. The prices were good too. It’s the only place in France that offers a full range of New World wines. We were able to buy Nottage Hill and Rosemount Aussie wines at about 25% less than at home in the UK. Lovely.

We then set off up the road toward England. We arrived at the Shuttle terminal and were told that the next train was boarding “now” and that we could get on it if we wished. We asked what time the next one would be and were told “half an hour” – so we selected that one as it gave us just enough time to go around the duty-free shop. So, we did this, then drove to the loading area. We were now told that there would be a delay of 20 minutes and that they would in fact begin loading at 13:30pm.

This was actually even better. It was almost 13:00 and we now had time to eat our lunch, purchased in the hypermarket, in the sunshine. So we set out the car’s picnic rug, disembowelled the car of all food (in bags, and cool boxes), knives and forks, cruet and drinks. We were sat there having a merry old time. The Spanish women sat on the bench next to us fair laughed when I went back for the second loaf of now droopy, baguette. The Germans behind us watched disdainfully, but we were ‘alright Jack’, the sun was out, the food was nice and we were going nowhere for half an hour. We then heard the announcement to say that boarding would commence immediately and knowing better (it was only 13:15pm), we carried on eating. Then the traffic began to move.

Well, you’ve never seen a car re-packed so quickly!

Up came the rug, with all its contents, to be dumped unceremoniously in the boot and everything else dumped in the back seat with Ben. I was still trying to finish my coke and get into the car as we drove off. I heard something drop even then, but couldn’t see what it was. As we drove towards the ramps, I noticed that the eye-piece for the video camera was missing and now knew exactly what had dropped under the car. I had Stephen reverse the car up the ramps and back the way we had come – to where we had stopped for lunch. A bit of arm waving, pointing and all known languages persuaded the troops to let me back into the waiting area where I found, the now much run-over, eye-piece. It cost me £25 to replace.

We had a little snackette on the only piece of grass available at Watford Gap service station and managed to arrive back in Mirfield about 18:00pm. Ben and I washed the car on our way back to Linthwaite and that was that.

Our adventure was over. Thank you for staying with us.

Prague Day 2 – Bohemia #5

Day 4

Following a late breakfast, we set off back into Prague, again by tram. This time, we weren’t going to knacker ourselves up walking all day. We went for a drink in the same bar where we were mugged yesterday – just to show them that we had learned from yesterday’s spanking, yet found that the beers had gone up to 50 Zlotaks. That still compared favourably to what we would pay at home and anyway, it was pleasant sat by the river, watching the boats go by.

We then went and booked a ‘City Tour’ by bus. This took us to some of the places we had trudged around yesterday, but this time we had a running commentary this time and enjoyed our two hours very much. It was certainly the first time I had ever paid to follow a man with a yellow umbrella, especially as the sun was bursting with heat. To ease Ben’s hunger, we had a late-afternoon Bratwurst, a hot-dog sort of thing, which was disgusting. We then went to look around one of the larger supermarkets in Prague. Not air-conditioned, but cool, compared with outside. We found a deli-bar in the lower level, where beer was 12½ Zlotaks per 500ml glass – bonus! We settled in here for quite a while, watching the customers come and go and the intriguing antics of the serving lady. [See comment on yesterdays post]. We christened her Ludmilla. She was a large lady with a penchant, at quieter times, for sneaking pieces of meat out of the salads and into her tummy! As time went by, we saw each meaty salad become more and more meat-free.

Given one more drink, we may well have stayed here to eat (it wouldn’t have cost more than a fiver to feed all three of us) but Ben didn’t fancy anything they had (he likes meat), so we decided to go back to the hotel for food.

This was a mistake. The food was still buffet service, like breakfast and had probably been there about three hours when we got to it. The soup was pretty fair. If a little greasy, but the main course was a choice between pot-roast pork and lumpy meat in gravy with something else I cannot remember, but with sauerkraut and lots of boiled potatoes.

We got up early and set off for Berlin. Breakfasted and washed, we were off by 09:00am and called at a small supermarket to buy food and drink for the day. We saw people queuing to get in, but there were no queues in the shop – which was weird. So, Stephen and I went in anyway and picked up the food and drink we wanted. A small comedy occurred when we tried to buy 6 slices of a nice lean meat they had on display. No one spoke English, French or German (and of course we had no Czech), but we managed and even got laughs from all around. We then queued up to pay.

It was now that we saw what the problem was. The Czechs no longer needed to queue for bread, or for meat as these items are freely available – they queue instead for SHOPPING BASKETS! As one was discarded, it was taken up by someone else wanting to do their shopping. So, please remember, back in 1995, there was a shopping basket shortage in Prague. Perhaps if, instead of making gnomes for German men to take home after visiting the ‘Sexy Girl Fun Palace‘, they could have made shopping baskets?

We also had a ‘Czechout Girl’ teasing us (we think), she was so happy.

Prague, Day 1 – Bohemia #4

Day 3

… We missed the first day’s breakfast but the next two day’s fayre was interesting …

(This post is just one day)

Each morning we were offered two types of bread; long thin slices of white along with large slices of brown (but a particularly Czech type of brown bread). To go with these, we could have as much sliced meat as we liked (as long as we didn’t mind all the fat or its appearance), cheese and overcooked (nearly knackered) eggs – but of course we were used to knackered eggs already. The jams were interesting too, one I tried seemed to be rhubarb and apple with a hint of chilli. Very small cereal bowls were provided for the two cereals available. Coffee was left in a flask on your table at 07:00am when they opened the breakfast and bugger you if you wanted any more.

It sounds appalling when I read this back, but it really wasn’t all that bad¹. The hotel was ideally placed close to the number 9 or number 4 tram line into the city and for 15p. (return, we were told) we were easily transported into the city in about 20 minutes. The trams were quite fast when they wanted to be, but only had single seats up each side as this allowed more people to get on with their bikes (and no doubt, cows, sheep and furniture when moving house) or to stand. There weren’t quite as many bikes here in Czech as we saw later in the week, and that is probably because Prague is set in a deep valley through which the river Vlatava runs, a tributary of the Elbe.

We went down into Prague (or Prag as it says on the map we have, or Praha as seen on most city advertisements) that first afternoon and looked around. There were lots and lots of tourists, many more than we had anticipated, almost all of whom were (as Stephen liked to say) “bloody loud mouthed, noisy Americans”! He would say it louder if they didn’t hear him the first time. (lol).

The weather had warmed up by now and we were quite hot. Stephen carried the rucksack around today. This contained all of our raincoats, as it had rained so much the day before. Ben carried the video camera and I had my heavy Zenith² with me, so by the end of the day we were knackered. We decided to stay in town and look around until we fancied our evening meal. It didn’t seem worth going back up to the hotel and then back down again to eat. So, we stopped now and again for a beer. Stories had it at the time that a pint of Czech beer can be had for around 15p. Right in the centre of Prague. But, we didn’t find that. At one place, by the river we did find beer at 15 zlotaks³ for a 500ml glass (approx. 37.5p). We were happy enough with this but when we came to pay we found that the packet of pistachio nuts we had eaten, cost just over £4.00. After being mugged in this way, we were much more careful whenever we stopped for a drink.

The city centre is beautiful, with lots of old and ancient buildings. The Charles Bridge (closed to traffic now) heaves with tourists and craftsmen and women. Everyone is there to view the 30 statues that line the bridge. Some are brass and some are stone⁴ and stand there on the bridge rampart for all to see. They are a little blackened with age and in need of a good clean up, but are worth seeing anyway. Over and then up from one end of the bridge are the parliament buildings, via what seemed like thousands of steps. We climbed these and had a good look around the cathedral at the top. The bright and colourful windows were magnificent. These windows were brighter and more colourful than Notre Dame’s rose window which we saw in February⁵. We eventually walked back down and off the other side of the bridge looking for the famous Wenceslas Square, but to no avail. We did find it later in our visit – it should really be called Wenceslas Rectangle as it is just one long and wide street bang in the middle of the business district.

We did find the Old City Square, on one corner of which, is the famous astronomical clock and a massive statue to something or other on the opposite corner. This old square was surrounded by buildings with Dutch Gables, in the very eastern European style. The square also hid another church which we christened ‘golden balls’ because of the unusual decoration around its towers. We spent some time in this square, with a beer and just watching the world (and people) go by. Much to Ben’s frustration I think. He may well have been better taking his young self, off on his own at this stage but he stayed with us.

Before crossing the bridge towards Old City Square, we had decided to take a boat ride up the river. I cannot remember how many Zlotaks that cost but it was reasonable and included a coffee and a piece of cake. This was probably a local speciality, in the style of a Swiss roll and may well have been called a Czech roll. The sun was gorgeous and we were able to see lots of the famous buildings up and down the river.

As we walked wearily back from the Wenceslas Rectangle and across the now thinning throng of tourists, we started to look for something to eat. Ben had been doing this for an awful lot longer I think. Everywhere was getting full and we eventually managed to get seats at a table just vacated by an English couple who worked in Prague. The restaurant was slightly up river from the main tourist haunts and situated on a large boat on the river itself. Our table was on the top deck and we had beautiful views of the floodlit buildings on the opposite bank. The food was fair to middling and relatively inexpensive, certainly cheaper than those meals we would buy later in the trip, in Berlin.

We returned to the hotel by racing tram, had a nightcap and went to bed. Sleep came easily enough after last night but it was disturbed by the heat and general mugginess of the weather. Hot and humid.

1 – I probably typed this up originally, on arriving back home in England. I will have kept daily notes in a notebook. I’ve been back to Prague several times since this first visit and the catering has improved 20-fold.

2 – Neither video, nor photos seem to have survived into the 21st century.

3 – The Czech currency is Czech Krown (CK). We were so tired and confused this first day that none of us could come up with the same name twice. We referred to it as Zlotys, Kopeks, Marks, Croats, Kronas and eventually settled on Zlotacks as the more amusing and definitive name for a currency needing charisma. (Remember, this is all pre-€)

4 – These are gradually being replaced, to preserve the originals. http://praguemonitor.com/2016/11/14/prague-bridges-vulnerable-statues-replaced-copies

5 -I guess that this was when Stephen, Bev and I drove to Paris, to pick Emma up from her French work placement. She’d been working in a hotel in Besançon and had caught the train from there to be picked up in Paris.

Also worth a read: https://redqueenmusings.wordpress.com/2018/03/15/a-short-break-in-prague/ (thank you)