Czech Republic - Prague / Bruno / Ceske Budejovice / Cesky Krumlov

Prague

"Oh Prague is LOVELY" - is pretty much the first thing anyone says when I say I'm going to Prague. I get it! You've all been there! Well now I have too ... and it's LOVELY!

(So lovely)

So I was malingering around Eastern Germany for a while waiting for this couch surfer to host me until he cancelled due to being sick. This meant I could head to Prague earlier and just find a hostel instead. I was perusing hostelworld and saw a hostel that had a 94% rating, was 12euro a night and included breakfast. I thought "hot damn! great deal!" booked it and organised a carpool for the very next day.

The car poolers were great! Two Germans that were just spending a nice weekend in Prague. I ended up bumping into them while walking around the city actually. If they weren't a couple on a romantic holiday I totally would have insisted we all grab a drink together. Shame. I got dropped off in the city and made my way to the hostel (after helping a lady who was literally trying to carry a punching bag). In Germany I had a German SIM card so I had ALL the internet! In The Czech Republic however I didn't have shit! It was hard to go back to scrounging for wifi, looking for the closest fast food chain to get internet from, choosing cafes based on the wifi signal etc. Ordinarily it wouldn't be a problem and I would just go offline for a while but because I'm doing couchsurfing and carpooling blah blah blah I needed to respond to people quite quickly. Anyway. The hostel was not that close to the city but it was on the underground system so it was ok.

(It's sort of like my Nanna's place)

I'm not quite sure why the hostel got such a high rating. It was essentially a house. An unclean house that had furniture everywhere. You know those houses where people have just accumulated crap? So there's framed pictures of knitted horses on walls and bizarre lamps that you can see aren't connected to a power source. However, I did have my own room and, as mentioned, it was cheap as balls.

Prague, the old part, is very pretty. I won't lie. However it is also a MEGA tourist trap. It's essentially boxed in by a river so it feels like the tourists are literally being herded together to spend money. I spent a day or two walking around. There was a guided walking tour but the man was waaaaaay too enthusiastic so I bailed after about 10 minutes. He connected his phone to a speaker worn around his waist and would strum notes on a guitar app? I didn't want to see what else he had in store. All the major sites are quite easy to find anyway - what was harder was finding somewhere that felt authentic.

(The sunshine belies the dark clouds)

So on my second last day I went to go meet Hugo. He lives on the other side of the river boxing everyone in and we spent some time at a beer garden that over looked the city. It was beautiful! We had some dinner and then he invited me to go to a batchelor party. I'll give you some context on this - it deserves it - Hugo used to work with a guy, this guy was getting married but until this point hadn't bothered to organise a batchelor party, until his wife-to-be called his WORK COLLEAGUE to organise a batchelor party and invite some people. Unfortunately the work colleague didn't really know who to invite or what to do so everyone just ended up going to a bar. I was lucky that people were friendly and could speak English but we just had a few shots of peppermint schnapps for some reason and left again. Weird.

On the last day I checked out the cool national gallery (surprisingly not filled with boring crap - there was some actually substantially interesting stuff) walked to the castle and back through town. I had been doing so much walking that I just wanted to chill out so I spent some time at the 'hostel' or in cafes. I organised to catch a bus to Brno - The Czech Republic's second biggest city. These buses have TVs in their seats, free wifi, a powerpoint and free hot beverages. I watched Gravity.

(The 'small' hall)

(Isn't this guy a babe? Frantisek Kupka - a well renowned Czech artist)

Brno

I had arranged to stay with Peter who is Slovakian (Slovak?) but lives in the Czech Republic. Apparently the languages are similar enough that he just speaks Slovakian (Slovak?) at work and people respond in Czech. I stayed two nights and while Peter worked I would explore the city. Because there aren't nearly the number of tourists as Prague (plus there's a lot more space) the town just has a really laid back atmosphere. There's a cathedral and a castle etc. but it was interesting just walking around the city.

Peter wanted to show me some of his favourite places so we had ribs at a great Czech restaurant, and went to some cool bars. We eventually met his friend and went to a bar that is down a dark alleyway and mostly hidden from sight. If I wasn't drinking a beer there - I'd probably be raped there. Towards the south west there's an area of buildings that were created by people a while ago out of whatever they could find. A kind of shanty town. It's up on a hill and it's a bit exhausting to walk there but eventually you get to this bar and it was awesome! We walked across the city to this electroswing party that was happening inside an old castle. There were just a lot of cool things happening, you know?

(Peter in front of a big wall. I should be a photographer you guys. So art. Much wall,)

It was also here that I noticed the bright colours that Czech buildings come in. Buildings that are lime green and yellow, blocks of flats in rainbow colours, the brighter the better really! This vain attempt to paint over communism is really quite charming! I think it portrays a certain sense of determined social progression. Those Czechs are working hard!

(I believe in you!)

Brno is also the home of GREGOR MENDEL! This was a complete surprise to me and was only discovered while idly flicking through a guidebook and finding a page labelled 'local celebrities'. Gregor Mendel is one of the fathers of genetics - my major at university. Truth be told he was father of the kind of genetics that I find a bit boring (Charles Darwin is the father of the science I prefer). I actually found it really engaging though to walk around the abbey where he planted his peas and developed his theory of trait inheritance. The museum was pretty dull - they really could have spiced it up a little maybe with some eye colour stuff or interesting anomalies blah blah. However it was pretty much to-the-point ... for better or worse.

(Gregor Gregor Mendel Mendel)

Ceske Budejovice

Working my way across the various cities I arrive at Ceske Budejovice - as irritating to say as it is to type I assure you. CB has nothing really noteworth other than the fact that Budweiser is originally from here. Not being an avid Bud drinker this doesn't really flash on my awesome-radar but it does mean everytime I meet a Bud-swilling 'Merican I can give my two cents. Look forward to that world.

However I do like that the city is virtually tourist free and I suppose it was more of a chance to take part in regular Czech life. I was staying with Jakub and his mother through couch surfing (in an olive green and pink block of apartments) and can I say what lovely people they are! They both showed me around the town - such as it is - and were very hospitable the whole time. During my stay there was a jazz festival that Jakub helped to organise so we went to that at various times across the two days I stayed. The final night had some flamenco music! Everyone loves flamenco.

Jakub and his mother are both vegetarian and it was a joy to finally get some VITAMINS into my system. It was nice actually - being in a city where there wasn't much to do because it meant I didn't have to do much! I've been spending a lot of time trying to organise my next few steps as I'm so shit at it! As I'm trying not to spend money I'm forced to do things cheaply but it just takes so much more work.

(Taken from the tower. It's tall but it's not, like, TALL tall)

Cesky Krumlov

Jakub's mother and her friend were going to see an art exhibition in this beautiful small town on the same day that I wanted to travel there so a quick 20 minutes later and we were strolling into Cesky Krumlov. It's a lovely small town hidden among cliffs and rivers. There's a castle, live bears (LIVE BEARS) and a sea of old pretty houses. There are also a fuck tonne of tourists and the opportunity to go paddling in the river. I did not participate in the latter due to the former but around lunchtime I sat by the river in a quiet out-of-the-way place and watched them go by slowly.

(Artist's sentiment noted. No need to point out. Posted on purpose.)

It's a peaceful town and it was nice to just walk around. It reminded me a lot of a videogame town actually - pipe music playing, nooks and crannies to explore, quite small but there was still lots to do. At one stage I was sitting in the main square and an old man called Jan sat next to me and almost delved into his life story. I say 'almost' as he was essentially explaining what happened in the two world wars and I don't really need an old man to explain it to me while I'm sitting in the sunshine so instead we just had a small chat about the usual things "Australia? That's a long way away! Are you here on a Eurotrip? Oh you're in London. That's closer. What do you teach? I never liked science in school but these days I find it very interesting".

(Kris)

(This is where I chilled out with one of those cinnamon log things)

I strolled around for a few hours and eventually I made my way to the bus stop. My plan was to go straight from Cesky Krumlov to Munich however due to the whole COMMUNISM thing the east-west transport links are a bit grim. Instead I decided to head up to Prague for one night then head to Munich. It was gay pride in Prague over the week I was away but on the final night (the night I was there) they had a cool outdoor party by the river so I hung out with my friend Hugo and his friends - I had a really nice time!

So I'm off to Munich for a few days now and that will round off My Germany trip and handball me into France!