achtung, baby

it's sunday morning and i've been in berlin since thursday evening.

i had a preconceived notion of what a hostel would be like and the one in prague fit it pretty much to a t. the one i'm at now does not - not at all. it's located in what would have been east berlin and not surprisingly this are is a hotbed of renovation and building. the acutal building that the hostel is in was a brewery at some point. the rooms have arched exposed brick ceilings that are 10' tall. it's only been here for a bit over a year so it's clean and not worn down. the picture is in the lobby. yes that is a bar you see. the yellow tables are set for the breakfast buffet - it's nicer than some i've seen in regular hotels. within the complex there is a beer garden. i love this concept of the beer garden - take an open, unused space put some tables, chairs and umbrellas out and deliver a trailer that opens up to reveal beer taps and coolers for bottled beer. this particular one also has a trailer that serves bratwurst. my first impression of the little complex is that if it were in baltimore it would be a struever brothers project (if they weren't broke).

due to some bad info in my guide book i missed going to terezin outside of prague so my first full day here i went about 20 miles north to the memorial at sachenhausen - a former concentration camp. i'll talk about it in person if you ask me but i don't really feel like writing about it here.

it seems the big difference between berlin from london and prague is that in the latter two there are sights all over where as they seem a bit more spread out. so day two meant a lot of walking for me. walking it was my choice - there are hop on/hop off tour busses but sort of like wandering around. once again i got to see something i didn't expect to see...i was at the brandenberg gate when about a dozen police vehicles pulled up followed by a group of a couple hundred protesters. they were protesting the g8 summit meeting in italy - it was a satallite protest for those budding anarchists who couldn't afford the 25 euro fare to italy to protest. the way i know this was because as i was taking pictures a guy comes up to me and - in german - asks that i stop taking pictures. i - in english - say i don't speak german and he then tells me in english and explains that the protesters don't like having there pictures taken because there are privacy issues and it can lead to the police harrasing them. i will not speak to the veracity of this statement but i will tell you what a moron i think this guy is. their group holds a protest at the brandenberg gate at 1pm on a saturday in july...there are a few thousand toursists there...tourist love taking pictures. not to mention there was press there and the ultimate...the cops have cameras! there were cops there with video cameras - at
least 2 that i saw. at the least sign of trouble (there was one little scuffle) they start filming. so einstein asks me to stop taking pictures. being polite i say yes and put my camera in my pocket but thinking this guy is trying to hold back the reine river with a broom i walk away and beging taking pictures again. if you notice on the left side of the photo is one of the cops with a video camera. and all the way on the right you can see the lens of someone from the press. anyway it was a fun hour and it was cooler than the armed forces day parade that i saw on tower bridge in london.

the rest of the day was spent wandering around and finding places to hide from the on again/off again rain storm. i can only imagine the miles i walked yesterday and that's on top of the 5 or so miles i ran in the morning so i think today is a veg day.

hope all is well in the states and good luck in the michael jackson memorial service ticket lottery!!!

happy trails,
dan

observations

warning...you are about to enter a stream of consciousness. there is no particular order or importance to any of the following comments and there will be little or no grammatical correctness or continuity.

prague is nice but i get the feeling that some areas have been cleaned up for the tourists

this doesn't mean that it's not a nice city. it's beautiful. the architecture is amazing and i very glad that it was on my itinerary.

things that strike me as different...not bad...just different:

there aren't many traffic lights but at intersection it's not the insanity that you would expect. if you step into the street generally cars stop and let you proceed. i assume this is a hold over from communism days when there were more pedestrians than cars. i don't know...but it seems to work.

there are mcdonalds everywhere. in fact i found out there ar 34 in prague.

it seems as if every other restaurant is a pizzeria. i had pizza the other day, not bad. i would have liked more cheese but the crust was thin and both chewy and crunchy.

not surprisingly old people don't speak as much english as young ones.

a lot of the older people look how i would expect them to...that is they look like old, communist blok photos that i have seen.

i like the randomness of the hostel. i just walked into my room at 3pm and two people were sound asleep. it's what international travel does to you but in a hostel you see it. in a hotel you don't.

at times i forget that i'm in a foreign country. i was walking down the street today and the couple behind me was talking in english (american english) and i was looking a store sign in english. i think that i don't like that.

as a rule the tourist sights and restaurants are easy to navigate without speaking the language. today i mailed some things home. this was not a non-czech speaking friendly event. thanks to the man who showed me which line to get to and the clerk who spoke NO english but was very nice and helpful...that is unless the package doesn't make it home in which case...what a bitch!

prague has the same street planner as london...or the other way around. either way neither has a straight street and it's really hard to figure out what street you are on. would it kill them to put up poles at the corners with the freakin' street names!

that's it for now.

happy trails,
dan

greetings, comrade

greetings from prague! lots to report, not just about prague but about my first few nights in a hostel. i was thinking that i might make my pictures available as i go but a few things have changed my mind about that not the least of which is the time involved with doing that. for now a few thrown in with the post and if i think that it's worthy i may post some mini-albums. so let's start with my departure from london. i actually booked my airfare from london to prague on easyjet months ago. europe is full of discount airlines that if you book months in advance you can fly almost anywhere in western europe for about $30. so i actually had my london to prague ticket well before my baltimore to london ticket. it's not just to brag how good of a bargain hunter i am but to explain that when booking that flight it seemed like a good idea to depart at 7am from london's stanstead airport. 7am on a sunday. luckily i had oliver and cathy to help me on the logistics or else i don't know what i would have done other than go to the airport late saturday night and sleep there. so here's how it went... wake up at 3:30 clean up a bit grab a snack and be outside by 4am for what is called a mini-cab. mini-cabs are basically a car service - you have to call to book them, you can't hail them on the street but they are considerably less expensive then the ubiquitous black cabs that london is famous for. for 6 pounds he drove me to a bus station (really just a stop) where a coach bus picked me up and drove me to stanstead - about an hour away - for 10 pounds. as a comparison when we called to see how much it would have been for the mini-cab to take me straight to the airport i was quoted 48 pounds (about $90). so i saved 32 pounds but lost about an hour of sleep. i should have guessed by the 3/4 full coach (mine was the 7th of 9 stops before the airport) that the airport was going to be busy. i couldn't believe how busy stanstead was at 5:15. it actually took me longer to get an egg & tomato sandwich than it did to go through check-in. stanstead is one of those airports with satellite terminals so i had to wait a while before heading to my terminal by subway. i searched a while and found a seat not to far from the orthodox jewish men wrapped in tfilin saying morning prayers amongst 500 or so observers right there in the middle of the main terminal. now it's not like i travel all the time but i have been in airports at 5am and i have NEVER seen so many people at one this early. the flight itself was fine, inflated my travelers pillow and would have slept the whole time had it not been for the guy who had the window seat who had to get up 3 times to go the bathroom...it was a 90 minute flight! three times! no mind you this is like southwest where you pick your own seat...you'd think that given that he'd have picked an ailse on! customs was a breeze. now was about to be the first part of an interesting trip from the airport to the hostel. i realized that i did not write down the address of the hostel and it was not accessible on my laptop without wi-fi (i'm not sure what i was thinking when i didn't prepare for this) i stopped at a tourist info booth for prague info and the lady working was very helpful not only with that stuff but with pointing me to the vodaphone store where there was free wi-fi. got my info and back to the ti booth where she gave me directions to the hostel. it involved a bus and 2 trams. i was tired and in a foreign country and don't speak the language...it wasn't going to go well. the bus went well but it was hard for it not to - it started right outside the terminal and ended where i needed to get off. i managed to find where the tram was stopping a local and pointing to the number and destination that was written on a piece of paper. i looked at the postings at the tram stop and thought that i knew what i was doing but apparently not...and went past my transfer point. i could go on for quite a while...sufice it to say that it took me close to 2 hours to do what should have taken 1 hour.

finally at the hostel! the building is probably very old but the hostel is fairly new and literally every piece of furniture is from ikea. i am in a room with 3 bunk beds - i have by choice a lower bunk. there are cabinets in the room that have been outfitted with a means to attach a lock for luggage. in the corner of my room is a sink. to get to my room you must pass through a room that has two single beds and a bunk bed and in that room is a small room with a shower and sink that i use. in the hallway is the full bath with a toilets, showers and sinks. all in all it's a very nice place. the people who work here are nice and helpful, roommates are nice and seem to change every day. there is a common room - where i am now - with wi-fi, computers for those without laptops, and a kitchenette. all this and it's about a ten minute walk from stare maestro - old town - which is sort of the center of tourist activity on this side of the river...and it's about $25/night.

so between the early start to the day and my wandering aimlessly for an extra hour to get here i decided to take it easy for the afternoon. i got settled in my room and took a big ol' nap. after waking i headed out for a get oriented walk and to get some groceries to cook dinner. it took some time and figuring to get the groceries but i managed. the pasta, feta cheese with olives, oil and seasoning, bottled water and beer was easy enough to figure but it took me about 5 minutes to figure out what kind of tomato sauce i was buying. all of what i listed cost about $8.50. the beer - 2 bottles - was gone that night but the pasta lasted 3 nights.

day one of touristing - prague castle

this is a complex of buildings that include st. vitus cathedral, the presidential palace, the royal palace and many others. i spent quite some time in the cathedral taking pictures of the chapels and their stained glass that surround the nave. i wisely invested in the audio guide or i would have been one confused jew in a cathedral! construction on the cathedral began in 1344. that's it for the history - you want more...google.

there are tour guides all over this place speaking in so many different languages...at one point i was walking along the golden lane which is the area that at one time housed the palace guards. i was standing close to one guide and over heard her mention that franz kafka lived in the blue house (after there were no more guards there). i moved through the group and down the road which put me closer to that house where another guide was talking - she also mentioned that kafka lived there but went farther to explain that he live in dozens of places around town...basically saying that it's not big deal it's not as if he spent his whole life there. that's the blue house on the left of this pic that is either a big deal or not...depending on the guide you get.

lots of cool things at this complex and i spent hours there wandering and marveling at the history and architecture.

the castle is - not surprisingly - situated on a hill. i chose to walk down back to town instead of ride the tram and am glad i did. it was a nice walk down a curving, cobbled street and while it was a bit touristy it offered some good photo ops. at the base of this hill is new town, i got some bread, cheese and grapes at a little store and despite a grumpy cashier had an enjoyable lunch a little grassy square near one end of charles bridge. charles bridge is important in prague history so to me it's sort of sad that it is literally non-stop merchants and buskers along the span. from there it was into the old-town square which is rich in visuals. the dominant one is the church of our lady before tyn to one side and the old town city hall on the other. the tower of city hall houses the astronomical clock. click here to see a video of it. look closely at the 2 windows above the top face where the 12 apostles appear. it's a little harder to see the figures next to the upper face are moving as well but it is subtle movement so i'm not sure how well you'll be able to see it. the lower face is a 365 day calendar/clock. the top one is time and astrological clock.

day two included more exploration of old-town and the jewish quarter. exploration of old-town for me included climbing two towers. interestingly both of them you climb 2 or 3 stories before they ask you for money - not much $4 or $5 - i guess they think that if they ask after you've climbed some of the steps then you're less likely to walk away with out paying. no matter both were more than worth the effort and money.

the jewish quarter was beautiful, interesting and solemn. one of the synagouges has the names of the jews from bohemia lost to the holocaust. like most historical sights photography is prohibited but it must have taken a long time and lots of patience to scribe all these names. amazingly it was done twice. originally in the mid-40's and then again after the fall of communism. it seems that at some point the antisemitism of communism led to the erasing of the names. i'm not sure that my words or photos that you will see can do the jewish cemetary justice. it is against jewish law to disturb the dead and the limited space allotted for the cemetary leads to a scene unlike any i have seen although tomorrow i am off to terezin the concentration camp about 30 miles from prague.





well i hate to end on such a heavy note but it's getting late and i'm tired.

happy trails,
dan

jack daniels and the queen

well, sorry it was so long before my first real post. i have a lot to say so hopefully i remember it all and hopefully it isn't too long.

quick details...

the flight was fine. got to dulles with plenty of time to spare, flew air canada through montreal to heathrow. i tried not to sleep too much on the plane as the sleep deprivation would aid me in acclimating to london time sooner. as luck would have it the middle seat on an airbus 330 isn't the best place to slumber.

so if you read the first post you know this is my first trip overseas and thus my first experience with going through customs. so after walking a half a mile from the plane to the customs hall i promptly took my place in line with 7,000 of my fellow travelers...at 7:30 am. what does it look like at 5pm??? it must be a mess. it took about an hour to get through and then on to the underground and finally made it to my friend oliver's home in west hamptead, london (northwest of the downtown area).

ok, so that wasn't so quick.

now on to some good stuff.

i didn't want to get sucked into the couch or bed so i pretty much just dropped off my things and headed out. after lunch in the neighborhood i hopped a tube out to wimbledon which at the time was on day 3 (i think). i didn't go in because the queue to go through was quite literally a half a mile long. still, one of those things that's just cool. i've been watching wimbledon for so many years and now when i watch and they show external shots of the all england lawn tennis club i will know that besides what they show there are things the tv cameras don't get...like this pic.

so i started day 2 out with a run. oliver had told me how to get to hampstead heath - a very nice park with lots of paved and unpaved trails. i managed to get there in about 10 minutes, run around for about 20, find my way back to where i started in the park and then proceeded to have my first encounter with the streets of london...that is to say i got lost. if you've never experienced london streets it makes getting around in washington dc a breeze, if that still doesn't do it for you do this - cook some spaghetti, take a good handful and throw it on the floor...there you have the map of london and to make it worse finding street names is tough. they don't have american style poles with signs on the corners the street names are on the buildings sometimes very hidden. luckily londoners are nice and they pointed me in the right direction and i had the $2 key chain compass i bought before the trip with me.

after getting home and cleaning up i headed off to be a tourist.

a stop in the tourist office at picadilly square and i was armed with a map and an idea of some things to see. other than a few hours of torrential rain on saturday night i had completely uncharacteristic london weather - sunny, low 70's a nice breeze and not humid - so it was a nice walk down to buckingham palace. as i was wondering around the front of the palace i notice a car pulling out of one of the gates i was near, it was a taxi and it was, as most taxis in london are painted with ads on the side. it struck me as funny the particular ads that were on the side...now we all know the brits can drink but the taxi painted with a jack daniels ad. some may say that whiskey is whiskey but something about the juxtaposition of the pomp and circumstance of the royal family an ad for the favorite drink of good ol' boys all over the south.

my friend oliver took the day off friday and after he took care of some things he met up with me and gave me a short walking tour of the indian district and then we headed off towards tower bridge. by some stoke of luck we happened upon an armed forces day parade - it's something akin to veterans day. we watched the short procession of current and former military and then toured the tower bridge. that's one of those things that can go either way...touristy and full of fluff or really cool and interesting. it was the later. skipping ahead a few hours oliver and i were walking along the thames and came across the most amazing busker who was doing this show with the glass balls - rolling them along his arms, manipulating them in his hands. i was so mezmerized that i didn't start video taping it until the last minute but it's still pretty cool. click here to see the video.

at one point oliver's wife cathy joined us but had to leave when she got a call from a friend who had locked himself out of his flat and need the keys she had. it's a long story but it didn't work out that easily and it ended up with cathy, oliver, myself, dave the key less friend, a co-worker of his, and mutual friend of cathy and oliver's all meeting for dinner and drinks at a pub. i mention it becuase it was a real united nations meeting. oliver is a german citizen who grew up in the us, cathy is canadian but left there as a teenager, the mutual friend is british but for the last few years has lived in dubai working for emirates airline, dave the key less one is british too and works for shell so has spent the last few years living in the netherlands and his co-worker who is american - texan no less - is back living in london after a few years in singapore. combine that with beer and wine and it made for some fun conversation. it was truly a unique moment that i'm sure i'll think back on a lot as it seemed like a scene from a movie.

this brings us to day 4 - my last real day in london as i would be leaving at 7am the next day. i spent hours in the tower of london which parts of have been there for 1000 years and it is where the crown jewels are kept. all of it from the historic to the jewels was fascinating. i don't have the time or the desire to give you a history lesson but if you google "tower of london" i'm sure you'll come up with some interesting reading.

for all of my pictures you can go here and browse them.

well it's been a long day and i need to get up and moving tomorrow if i'm going to see all of prague that i hope to. from what i saw just roaming around this evening for a bit i'm in for some great sightseeing!

happy trails,
dan

backround

a short while back while tending bar a seed was planted in my head about traveling the world...the seedling grew quickly into a full size idea and i decided that it was time to take advantage of the cheap airfare to europe and go wander around for awhile. while researching online i found a book titled Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel by Rolf Potts. it is an inspiring book and i fell for the idea of long-term travel hook line and sinker!

at this point my travel plans are still coalescing but will most likely involve stops in london, prague, germany, italy and france as well as some others. as of right now there are only a few things on the must do list. i'd really like to be in paris for the last day of the tour de france (july 26), i have some friends in rome and london that i'd like to see, i want to wander around the paris flea market (which is measured in hectacres...i don't know what a hectacre is but it sounds big), see where the allied troops landed on d-day and, as if that isn't sobering enough, visit a nazi concentration camp.

right now my plan is to leave on or about june 24 and return around july 29. besides staying in hostels and traveling by train overnight to save money i will be trying something call couchsurfing. what is couchsurfing you ask, couchsurfing is a worldwide network for making connections between travelers and the local communities they visit. that's how their website describes it...i explain it like this - imagine upon hearing that i am going to europe you tell me that you have a good friend who lives in germany you give me their contact info and tell me that i should look them up when i get there. now this person may only be willing to meet for coffee and offer up some advice of what to see or they may show me around their town or they may very well offer up an extra bed or couch for me to sleep on...that's what couchsurfing is only i don't need to know anyone who knows someone i just go online and look in a town or city that i am going to be in and look at the profiles of those couchsurfers in that town and if i see someone interesting i contact them throught the website and if they have the time and the inkling i would meet up with them. it's a bit unnerving at first but once you spend sometime on the web site it becomes intriging and a bit exciting and i'm looking forward to trying it out.

i decided to blog this trip (and future trips as i can make them) and hope to update it at least twice a week if not more. i will have my camera and laptop so if i'm not too tired or busy i will try to post more than that. i hope that it inspires you to take your own leap someday. i look forward to keeping you up to date on the trip and hope to have some comments to read on some of the longer train rides.

i'd love to hear from you if you think there is something you think i should see or do or have tips and suggestions. you can either post it here or if you have my email address send it to me there.

happy trails,
dang