From Praggage to Munchkin

Today saw us visit the Czech Republic capital town of Prague. I’d never been before so was really looking forward to this stop off. :-D

 

We freshened up and breakfasted at the services where we camped last night, getting central around 10am. Once downtown, we pulled up on the side of the road to figure out where exactly we were. A very friendly chap asked us if we needed help and told us we were blocking the entrance to his hotel. He offered to open up his car park for us, we gladly accepted, he gave us a map and directions on how to get into the centre and bid us a good day. We went in to use the loos before walking into town and were delighted to discover the utmost swankiness (mmmm – delicious-smelling bergamot hand lotion!).

We figured a hop-on-hop-off bus tour was the best way to see the key highlights of the town and found a City Tour podium pretty easily. We found our way to Bus Stop B, where the next bus was leaving at 11:30am but, when we got to the old square, we saw the traditional red hop-on-hop-off peeps, with red umbrellas and hop-on-hop-off branding. We got some tickets from one of the girls selling them and killed some time by having an early lunch in the square.

Tony's big toasty

 

Unfortunately, the big red open-topped vehicle was in for a service so, instead, they put on a substitute white minibus. It was small. It was not open-topped. And it had tinted windows. Now, I don’t know about you guys, but there are a few fundamentals when it comes to city sightseeing tours… I’ll forgive the colour of the vehicle, but the size of the van (meaning that a family of 3 had to put their pram on one of the chairs), and the lack of visibility outside of the vehicle owing to tinted windows/no open top were both suboptimal elements to this double decker open-topped sightseeing tour…!

We had to download an app to get the audio guide and the headphones they provided were no good for iPhones, which meant we all had our phones playing out loud in a small, enclosed space. All pretty less than ideal and using our phones meant that we couldn’t take any pics either. Overall, Shoddy McShodderson (and the Americans who had been waiting an hour before the bus came by to pick them up at Prague Castle was enough for us to not bother hopping off).

It was lovely to see what Prague has to offer: essentially incredibly ornate buildings everywhere you look, the famous Charles Bridge, the viewpoint at the top of the town that resembles the Eiffel Tower, Prague Castle, Mary’s Gardens and the astronomical clock.

 

Panoramic of the old town square

#artsy?

We decided to head back to the van and make our way to Munich. It took us about an hour to get out of Prague and so we raced daylight to make as much progress towards Munich as we could. We climbed up into the German forest, the smell of pine filling the van, and mounted the crest of the climb just as a beautiful amber sun set across layers and layers of mountains as far as the eye could see. The pink, red and blue hues stayed with us all the way until darkness fell, promising another fabulous day of weather for us tomorrow.

The autobahns are crazy - the cars go soooo fast (this is my first time in Germany so this is all novel to me!). Also, what a pleasure it is to have junction numbers on the map (we’re using an atlas to navigate ourselves).

We agreed to settle in a services for the night in the cosymobile but were forced to reconsider this a little when Smiley started playing up again. Tony unhooked the battery and hooked it back up again and it seemed to fix the problem, so we (royal we) will carry on doing that until it don’t work no more! 😉

Tomorrow’s plans: Munich, before pushing on down into Leichtenstein.

At this point in the trip, we’ve done 9 countries in 10 days, visited 3 Russian borders and have rescued 1 Ukrainian refugee. Not a bad week’s work! :-D