My Vacation in Czech Republic

Written by Rolf

This travel-story was written in dutch originally, but I decided that, if I was to put it on the Internet, I should translate it into english, so it might be 'useful' to more people. I own an el cheapo shitty dutch-to-english dictionary and my english is not fluent, so I apologize for wrongly translated expressions.

Friday

Instead of the originally planned 7 o'clock, we (me and an ex-girlfriend) left, after some painters coincidentally painted a small window and I had bought some food supplies, at 10 o'clock with a fresh Cincquecento, completely stuffed with luggage including a healthily filled backseat.

The trip went according to plan and the feared slopes of the Deutsche Autobahn from Kassel to Kircheim weren't that bad after all. We discovered that if we started to ascend at a speed of 170 km/h, we were going at least 80 when we were on top. However, this required some manouvering through the rest of the traffic.

On the way we stopped several times of course and got out of the car for the necessary consumptions, pee breaks and driver changes.

In former eastern Germany we found a cozy pension in Winterstein. The pension itself did not have a restaurant, apart from a breakfast room of 2 by 2 meters, but the hostess pointed us to another Gasthaus nearby where we could eat good and cheap. After dinner we walked for a few miles and watched Domino D-day live on RTL television.

Saturday

We got up early and after breakfast we got back into the car. In Hohnstein we decided not to enter the local castle since it wasn't early in the day anymore and we really didn't want to pay to see its inside. A little further we got out of the car to climb an exact 519 steps straight up through fierce rock formations, alongside the road. As it turned out, when we finally were at the top, there appeared to be a village and no trace at all indicated that we had climbed to such a height. A bit of a disappointment, as we had hoped for a spectacular view. That's what kept us going after all. During the same way back, we stopped for a short romantic break at 219 steps from the top.

In Dresden we dined at the MacDonalds and, after the both of us ATMed some money, went for a little stroll through the mall and de Toys-R-Us. At the end of the afternoon we desperately had to look for a place to spend the night, but everything - and we tried at least 8 hotels and pensions - seemed to be fully booked.

We decided to drive on to the Czech Republic, which we entered at Hrensko. The atmosphere was rather depressing. Immediately after the frontier, the roadside was filled with primitive exchange offices and stalls with booze, cigarettes, clothing and lots of gnomes (the garden ornament kind). Oddly enough, these stalls were run by oriental people, a race we never saw again in the rest of the country.

Just outside Decin we found our place to stay in Hotel Palme. It was rather expensive as we learned in the following weeks, 50 DM per person per night. Although the wedding which took place there (gorgeous bride by the way) was quite loud, it did not bother us much. We were kind of surprised that at one point the band started playing "Another Brick In The Wall". With this and other popular tunes we enjoyed ourselves and each other the entire night (the music had stopped around midnight), playing Rummikub and teaching my ex the card game Klaverjas.

Sunday

After breakfast we drove toward Hrensko again, where we walked for many a kilometer (at least 16). In search of Europe's largest natural sandstone bridge, the Pravclicka Brana, we accidentally walked the wrong way - on to the market (the previously mentoined stalls). Fortunately we discovered within an hour that we'd better go the other way and another 20 minutes later we thought it would be sensible to lock the car, bring some films and change into our walking shoes.

We continued our trip through the Edmundsklamm, a walk alongside the Kaminice river. Halfway we could not walk on and had to board a boat, filled with tourists, which took us further up the river where it was wider and calmer. While waiting for that boat, my ex got stung by a needlessly aggressive wasp, but that did not kill the fun, although since that day we were both scared of czech wasps. And that sucked because they were quite massively present in the North Bohemes. During our impressive boatride through the ('Silent') Klamm - the Kaminice surrounded by high rock formations - we collected enough energy for the rest of our walk.

We climbed upwards to the village of Mezna, down again to cross the road to Hrensko, up again on our quest to the Brana. This was a constant climb of 2 kilometers, to an altitude of 500 meters. Very tiring, but worth it. Almost at the top, we had a royal view of the sandstone bridge, but for an even better view we had to go another maybe 50 steps. Because it was getting late and we had to pay for those extra meters, we decided to tumble back down with a Calippo in our hand, fleeing for the wasps.

Back home in Hotel Palme we had dinner. The hotel was managed by a friendly German guy (imagine that) and the food was excellent. Especially for us he prepared two large Spezi's (my ex was familiar with this tradional German beverage - half Fanta, half Coke (the kind with bubbles)) and for me a extra strong (garlic) but very good tomato salad. While we were eating, the manager virtually told us the story of his life and how he ended up in Decin. At least my ex enjoyed listening to him.

Monday

Driving through the rain we were looking for the "natural organ" (the musical kind), a rock formation of vertical shiftings, but didn't find it. The problem with this and other sights is that hardly ever the sight is indicated by signs and therefor you miss it. The picture in the travel guide looked nice.

Because of the weather we appropriately stopped at a cemetary to enjoy a little lunch (crackers with Russian salad). Driving on to Grabstejn, we got lost and decided not to stop in Liberec. We then entered Poland via Harrachov to Sklarska Poreba where my ex remembered a pension from her childhood. Arriving at the pension, the ages turned out to have fcuked up her memories, because Pension Lena was little more than a handful of second-hand furniture from the sixties in a small room. But hey, we had a roof above our head and our own bathroom.

Tuesday

Although time had obviously blurred her memory, she did happen to know some other sights worth seeing. So we walked to the Wodospad Kamienczyka, a 27 meter high waterfall. After having paid a few local coins, we could wear a helmet and descend to the bottom of the waterfall. Normally there would be a man with a StBernard dog, whom you had to pay (the man, not the dog) to photograph the dog (which was the only way to get a shot of the waterfall) but fortunately, that greedy bastard had the day off.

After having consumed an awfully tasting hotdog we continued our way into the national park. This path led to the top of the Szrenicka, a 1362 meter high bump in the Krkonosze. During our climb I captured this dramatic view.

Considering my ex's blister and my muscle ache we decided to return the way back down using the chair-lift. As this cable hovered several meters above the trees it was an unpleasantly chilling experience.

At night we had dinner at Pizzeria Tivoli, a place where they knew how to make a pizza. The young native couple which we had seen earlier on the mountain, also happened to dine at Tivoli's. Apart from occasionally staring at us like we were eating their pizza they didn't show any sign of recognition.

Wednesday

After a brief meditation we decided we should wear shorts today. Dressed that way we departed on foot towards Sklarska Poreba's other waterfall, the Wodospad Sklarski (hmm, could 'Wodospad' mean waterfall?). Since we had to pay again and we already had seen a waterfall, we went the other way and started a walk that would turn out to be a six-and-a-half hour walk through hills, valleys, woods and heaths, visiting several viewpoints. The few czechs we ran into naturally ignored us and imperturbably continued their own quest.

Again at night we dined at Pizzeria Tivoli because of their brilliant calzone.

Thursday

After breakfast we departed toward the Czech Republic again, which was after all where we would spend our vacation. Undoubtedly we had good reasons to drive around Karpacz for a while but anyway, we entered the Czech Republic again, resisted the temptation to buy garden ornaments for a special price, via Trutnov to Adrsbach, because there would be something cool to see. We drove through the agriculturally flat land when we noticed a huge parking lot filled with several herds of tourists. This had to be it. And indeed, behind all the germans we suddenly saw enormously tall sandstone pillars rise out of the woods.

"Let's leave the car for a while," said the ex, and we walked to the counter. Not surprised anymore having to pay to walk around outside, we followed the tour that was laid out throughout this gigantic rock garden. The tourist mass were nowhere to be found anymore, so we happily walked along in silence through, under and between the randomly placed rocks. After a climb of about 40 meters up a small metal staircase we arrived at a small lake (that's right, a lake at 40 meter above ground level) on which we enjoyed a little boat trip. The captain of the boat dutifully played the practical jokes we already knew since our trip down the Kaminice river, but hey, it was his job so we acted surprised and humoured. We continued our walk along an 'advanced' route which was not suitable for old-aged and folks with crippled limbs, but the royal views of the rock park made the climb and my heart failures more than worth.

The energetic type of people that we are, we casually also followed the new blue route and that made it 17:00. "Let's leave the car for a while", yeah right. Passionately searching for a place to spend the night we tried to figure out the signs along the road. I guess the hotels in this region didn't really expect guests and why would they, hiding their billboards behind bushes and shit.

Early in the evening I thought to spot a sign 'unterkunft' and we took a sharp curve to the right, up a user-unfriendly path with a slope of at least 25 percent and holes in which you could lose at least 4 of your hub caps. So this path turned out to be someone's yard. Luckily he was friendly enough to point us to the hotel on the other side of the road...

The hotel, Zamek Skaly, an old castle named Bischofstein, reluctantly welcomed us as their only guests. They obviously did not expect any guests this time in the season (it was september) as the heating was turned off already and the lights as well. But hey, we had a roof above our head and it was not too far down the dark cold gothic hall to the public bathroom (fortunately we had not seen The Sixth Sense yet then), so we decided not to mind the belching waiter in shorts and adidas jacket, because the food was good, although the 'ding' we heard from the kitchen just before dinner might not necessarily have been the doorbell.

Friday

Luckily we had paid in advance so the next day we quietly rallied away, far from hotel Bischofstein. In the rain we stopped in Broumov, where the supposedly oldest wooden church would be. Searching for this church, we saw among other things, an ATM machine with curtains and spotted dutch people at 100 meters: they were filming a square, like they were expecting it to move (take a goddamn picture, move along and stop embarrassing us). And to make ourselves feel entirely at home, we had a cappuccino in hotel Winterswijk.

A helpful agent of the local Tourist Information Bureau succesfully tried to bore us with his annual vacations and explained the way to the oldest church.

The church seemed old indeed.

We continued our quest to our next goal, the Adelaarsgebergte (that's dutch, but not really relevant anyway), got a little lost thanks to the flawlessly indicated dead ends, saw some deer which a sign had warned us for and ended up in Ricky. The hotel we found, hotel Konsel, appeared on the outside as being the expensive kind. The clerk answered my question if they could spare us a room, by throwing me the keys. The room was big and tidy, the bathroom big and clean and it was only 30DM per person including breakfast. But hey, we had a roof above our head.

We had an extensive and extremely tasty dinner (coke, onion soup, steak, salad, fries, sorbet) for 15DM per person.

Saturday

Although it wasn't that warm and the weather even threatened to rain, we did go for a walk, which would last for about 10 kilometers. During the first half of the trip, it looked like we were in Drenthe, apart from the steeper slopes and the incidental fox which thought it necessary to cross our path. Having reached the top ('top' is a big word for a 50 meter climb) it got colder and wetter to the point where my ex even tightened her cap, resembling Kenny, and rags of clouds blew over the path. The landscape spontaneously adjusted itself to match the weather and half-decayed bunkers regularly loomed up. I started out a bit sick, but by now I was entirely in my element, whilst my ex was feeling a bit less pleased and would rather be watching Cartoon Network.

Back at the hotel a shitload of guests had arrived for the usual saturday night wedding. That night they played the czech version of "Tulpen uit Amsterdam" for the married couple. Since this party took place at about the whole lower floor, we called for roomservice at our room.

Sunday

The next morning we had to pay the hotel bill but since neither of us had that many cash left, we defied the rain, looking for an ATM that could recognize our foreign bank cards. And we found one in Hradec Kralove, a town at a distance of 80 kilometers from Ricky. We also tested the cappuccino over there, which also was prepared differently than all the other cappuccino, ate at the Mac and pinned some cash at a large bank, where they, if we were to believe the sticker, did not tolerate firearms.

Monday

Then came the time we had to leave the hotel and they (accidentally?) tried to make us pay for an extra dinner, but because we are wonders at math, we didn't buy it, so to speak. They apologized, we payed and drove to Hradec Kralove, again, the town which we were familiar with by now. Via there we went further to Jicin, into Cesky Raj ('Bohemian Paradise').

At Prachov we parked the car, played with a little red cat puppy, raged at a begging white fluffy dog and chased wasps. The weather had cleared by now so we it was time to take a walk. Prachovske Skaly was kind of similar to Adrsbach but slightly different so we had the appropriate amount of fun.

It was getting late, so we had to look again for a place to stay. We found one after a lot of driving around nearby Turnov. Hotel Lazne Sedmihorky required 'kurtax', because the hotel was in a 'spa' area. At breakfast I would be introduced to another characteristic of this kind of hotel.

Tuesday

On time for breakfast, I thought, it was around 9 o'clock, but all hotelguests seemed to be up and running already. When we walked into the dining hall toward the only table that hadn't been turned into a lunch table yet, we were stared down on by an arrogant waitress.

At a short distance from the hotel was another pretty piece of nature, Hruba Skala, again a collection of stones, just scattered around a bit differently this time. After one and a half kilometer we arrived at a castle, where there was a bus from Paulusma. The shouting tourists were on a lookout for Geert and following Kees or something and we decided to switch to english.

After another 3 kilometers we arrived in Valdstejn, where we visited an exposition of breathtaking nature photography. Originally we entered the building to look at some old church, but that did not impress us. And why would it, it was just another church. There are enough of them already and if a church is indeed the house of god, how many does he need people to build for him? Wasn't the dude supposedly omnipotent and omnipresent?

In the afternoon we drove past Hrad Trosky (='Castle Rubbish') to Turnov to do some grocery shopping. The castle (two ruins on hilltops) wasn't free to enter of course so we drove on, also since we had left our cameras at the hotel. Why should one pay to see a building that's ruined? They were obviously not planning to rebuild it.

Wednesday

After breakfast, we planned to test the pooltable, but when the coin, recommended by the clerk, did not give us the balls we needed, we addressed the man. He answered with "Speak with Herr Ober Kolonel". My ex, caught offguard by this nazistic answer, replied "Wie seht er aus?". The man, undoubtedly a german war criminal, continued joking: "Gross und stark". With that, he totally ruined my mood for the rest of the morning and when we checked out, I viciously threw our key at Mein Kampf's co-author, hoping he would respond to my aggressive gesture. He didn't.

Since we did not get the required permit to drive on the czechian highways, we had to enter Prague through a detour. Via Trosky, Sobotka (where the local graveyard was rather disappointing), Mlada Boleslav, past the Melnik vineyards, Veltrusy and Kladno, where it was time for the Mac.

My ex casually hit a pheasant (I think; it went rather quickly under the car) and after going the wrong way thrice (a rarely ever used word for 'three times') we suddenly were on the 6, the right way into Prague. VrijUit's directions to the pension sucked (or we must be overestimating our talent to read a road map) but we arrived at Pension Filip quite smoothly. Because of the heat, it was well over 30 degrees centigrade (are there also 'kilogrades'?), we immediately jumped into the shower.

We had a great dinner at a restaurant, which was slightly more expensive than we were used to, but still much cheaper than we expected, in Mala Strana, at the west side of the Moldau.

On the way back, through criminally dark alleys, it was still bloody warm.

Thursday

We thought we would 'do' Prague in a day. Of course Prague is huge (for european standards), but we think we saw the most important tourist attractions.

The weather bothered us a bit at 30 degrees but we were walking nonetheless. Via the stadium behind the pension to Hradcany, the Loretta church to the Sternberg palace. We entered the Praguan (?) castle through the Matthias gate with its keepers, through a small hallway to the Saint Vitus cathedral, a rather satanically looking big church, where the sun was shining through the colored windows. The sign "photographs forbidden" could clearly be seen at the flashing of many a camera. Out the cathedral again through the Golden Street and via the Stairway of the Kings down, toward city center.

In Josefov we wanted to visit the old Jewish cemetary, but had to pay 17 guilders per person. I estimate that at least 1000 tourists a day visit the cemetary, total entry fee of at least 10000 dollars, maybe a two- or even threefold. I'm planning on opening a cemetary myself, as you can understand. So we walked. In another street we caught a glance of the cemetary. As the story goes, Jews were not allowed to bury their dead outside this graveyard, so the ground was constantly raised to be able to store the newer bodies. Because of these numerous raisings, we saw, above the little shops, the chaotic scattering of the crooked tombstones.

After having consumed a piece of pizza we accidentally entered another church, Saint Nicholaschurch, or Staromestke Namesti. This particular one was so abominably ugly, that we hurried outside, along the Jan Hus monument, surrounded by tourist youth, Tyn church, town hall with astronomic clock, via alleys to the Tesco (like the dutch Bijenkorf), Laterna Magika (national theatre) of course crossed the Karlov Most, Karls bridge, where we exchanged experiences with a nice dutch couple.

Ate at the Mac and through the park climbed up the Petrin hill back to our pension.

Friday

In gloomy weather we left Prague to castle Karlstejn, which we did not enter, despite the fact that it was cosily full of cans of tourists. We drove through Karlovy Vary to Jachymov, near the german border. Here we found a restaurant/pension with pig and fox skins and deer's antlers on the walls. We ate, mainly drank and spent the night here.

Saturday

As we were near the german border we both had the strong feeling our vacation was at its end and we longed to get home, and besides, it was raining like hell (although stories indicate that rain would evaporate down there). On the way home, we lunched at the Mac in Erfurt. After that we drove with an average speed of 160 km/h (in a Cinquecento) and we were home at 20:00.