Easter Holiday Travels Part 1

Hiya!

Sorry it’s taken me so long to update. The past month or so has been pretty crazy! After four weeks of traveling, it’s exam time. It’s been really difficult getting back into study mode these past couple weeks, but I’m trying. Anyways, I know no one wants to hear about my studying habits, so let me fill you in on all of my travels. In four weeks, I managed to visit 7 countries and though there were some frustrating parts of the trip, for the most part it all worked out really successfully.

Note: To make the process of writing and reading this a little easier, I’m going to talk about my trip in a series of posts. This post will include our Eastern European tour of Prague, Krakow, and Budapest.

Prague : March 28-31

My sister Claire came over to travel with me for the first half of my trip. I had to be out of the dorms in Edinburgh on March 28 and with Claire’s work schedule, we decided it would be best to meet in Prague. I got there Saturday night and Claire came in on Sunday morning. I was nervous that something might get messed up with our flights and we would miss meeting, but it worked out really well. Our hostel was just off the main square which proved to be a really great location. We were within walking distance of most of the big tourist attractions so it was nice not to have to worry about figuring out public transportation. Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t that great most of the time we were there.

Some highlights of places we went/ things we saw:
Frank Gehry’s Dancing House, the Alphonse Mucha Museum, the Charles Bridge, the ossuary in Kutna Hora, Prague Castle, the Infant Jesus of Prague, the John Lennon Wall, the astronomical clock

Best Part: My guidebook had a little snippet about an ossuary in a village called Kutna Hora, about an hour outside of Prague by train. The book described it as ‘a chapel filled with artistic and religious creations made entirely from parts of human skeletons.’ Claire and I both thought this sounded interesting so we decided to check it out. Though the trains proved to be a bit difficult, it was well worth the trip. We walked in and were both pretty amazed by what we saw. It was like we just stepped in a scene from ‘Indiana Jones’ or ‘Pirates of the Caribbean.’ It was strange and scary, but so unique and beautiful at the same time. We both spent a ton of time taking picture after picture, but I’m not sure if any of them actually do it justice.

Worst Part: The worst part of Prague was the weather. It ended up being cold and rainy most of the time we were there which needless to say, made things less pleasant. We even had to go shopping for Claire to buy a hat and pair of gloves! Since it was earlier in the season and still cold, nothing was really in bloom so we couldn’t see any of the gardens mentioned in our books.

Overall, Prague was nice. We ate some pretty good food, and had some good beer, which is supposed to be some of Europe’s finest. The city was very pretty, with a lot of really nice architecture. It was really touristy, which was fine except for the hordes of obnoxious high school groups. After hearing about it so much from other people, I’m really glad I got to see it, but I think it was probably my least favorite city we went to. That may be due to the fact that the weather was bad and it was our first destination so we were still figuring out a lot of things.

We took an overnight train from Prague to Krakow which ended up being a disaster. We got the 24 hour clock mixed up and realized the train we were trying to catch at 11:30 pm actually left at 9:30 pm. We had gotten to the station early and had missed it by less than half an hour. We had to wait for the midnight train. We accidentally sat in first class and got yelled at in Czech and once we moved, got no sleep in between listening to the other guy in our car argue in Czech with the conductor about his ticket and worrying about missing our two transfers. It was not a pleasant experience, but we did make it to Krakow, on schedule.

Krakow: April 1-3

After a horrible night on the train, we headed straight for the hostel. Again, we were in a good location right off the main square and within close walking distance of the train. The weather was really nice which was a welcome change! The sun was out the whole time we were there which made it warmer and more pleasant to walk around. Again, the city was really walkable so we didn’t have to worry about transportation. One perk in Krakow was our new friend Tom. Tom is the nephew of a woman that works with my dad at home. They made arrangements for us to meet up. He took us out for dinner our first night there and took us out to Wieliczka to see the salt mine as well as showing us around Kazimierz, the old Jewish quarter on our last day. He ended up being a nice guy and showed us a good time!

Some highlights of places we went/what we saw:
Wawel Castle, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Bunker Art Gallery, St. Mary’s Church, Wieliczka Salt Mines, Schindler’s Factory, Kazmierez

Best Part: On our second day in Krakow, we bought tickets through our hostel to go on a day trip out to Auschwitz-Birkenau. I guess it’s kind of weird to say that one of your favorite parts about visiting a city was going to a concentration camp, but it was. It was really interesting to see it in person after learning about it for so many years in school. A guide took us on a two hour tour around the main camp, Auschwitz, and then we were bused over to Birkenau to look around for half an hour. Our guide was really good, and the whole experience just was very thought provoking.

Worst Part: Though our hostel was nice, and very conveniently located only about a block off the main square, it proved to be kind of a rough stay. We stayed in an eight person co-ed room. When we first got there, there were four Irish guys in the room. They didn’t seem to be too happy that we were coming in and taking up their space. After the first night, they left and were replaced by five Spanish guys that had to be no older than 18. After coming back from clubbing in the wee hours of the morning, they proceeded to talk, not whisper, but talk. As if that wasn’t enough, one of them had another girl with him who was staying in a different room in the hostel. The guys kept talking and the girl’s friend kept coming in telling the girl they had to leave to catch their train. The girl finally left, and we asked the guys to stop talking, and they did, but only for about 5 minutes. At that point we decided to make it an early morning and just get up. We were not looking forward to the next hostel.

Overall, I really loved Krakow. I think it was my favorite city we saw during the trip. It was such a beautiful city, with a lot of really interesting things to see. Again, we ate really well. The sun made it a lot warmer. Also, we were there before tourist season so we didn’t really have to deal with large crowds anywhere. We walked through parts of Wawel Castle, basically by ourselves.

To get to Budapest, we took another overnight train. The tickets ended up being more expensive than we had planned. Then when we got up to the platform, we were told we would have to transfer unless we rode in a sleeper car which was more expensive. We decided to pay extra to not have to deal with the transfers again but we couldn’t figure out how much we’d have to pay because the conductor of the sleeper cars didn’t speak English. After some help from some fellow passengers who spoke French and some English, we were able to get it figured out. Luckily, we were able to get some sleep which made for a more pleasant first day in Budapest.

Budapest: April 4-8

When we got to Budapest, we were surprised to find that it was not only sunny and nice, but it was hot! If I had brought shorts, I definitely would have worn them! Our hostel ended up being kind of a far hike from the train station, especially since we started walking in the wrong direction initially. Our hostel ended up being pretty nice. Since the city was a lot bigger than the previous two places we went, the location was not as central as our other hostels had been. We were staying in a 10 person coed room which we were both nervous about after our last hostel experience. We got there, and it was small, but nice, and it turned out we only had to share the room with one other girl while we were there. She was in town for a conference so was not around too much. We basically got our own room without having to pay for it which was really nice! The staff was also very nice and we didn’t really have to worry about waiting to use the bathrooms, the computer, or the kitchen. It was a great relief after our last place! Since the city was a lot bigger, things were a lot more spread out. We still walked most places but we also ended up taking the metro a few times. It was pretty easy to figure out though.

Some highlights of places we went/ things we saw:
St. Stephen’s Basilica, Heroes’ Square, Museum of Fine Arts, the Chain Bridge, Matthias Church, Fisherman’s Bastion, Hungarian Parliament, the Great Synagogue, swam in a Hungarian Bath, the Applied Arts Museum, the Liberation Monument

Best Part: Besides our hostel, I thought Fisherman’s Bastion on Castle Hill was really cool. It basically looked like a big sandcastle made of stone which in itself is pretty cool. But also, we were able to get really great views of the city including the Danube River and Hungarian Parliament.

I also thought St. Stephen’s Basilica was pretty cool. It was very beautiful both on the outside and inside. We went up to the top of the dome and were able to get some more great views of the city.

Worst Part: One thing that was really difficult to get used to was the currency. Hungary has one of those weird conversion rates where $1 is equal to 223 Hungarian Forints. It was really hard to keep track of how much we were really spending. Our first night there, we decided to eat at a restaurant mentioned in both of our guidebooks and even favorited in one. The food ended up being bad and the service was even worse. We didn’t realize until after we had left, but we ended up leaving the waiter a $10 tip.

Overall Budapest was really interesting. It had its ups and downs. Like mentioned before, the currency was really horrible to try and figure out. Also, we didn’t get very good food while we were there until the last night. The middle two nights, we were so tired from all of our walking we just made pasta in the kitchen at our hostel. And we did a lot of walking which wasn’t terrible, but mixed with the heat, it made for some pretty long walks. It had its positives too though. The city itself was very beautiful. It reminded me a lot of Paris, with the wide tree lined streets. And I thought we saw and did some pretty cool things. I’m sure not many people can say they’ve swam in a Hungarian Bath or backpacked in Budapest at all for that matter.

I’m going to end this post here. Here is a link to all of my pictures from the whole trip including Paris, Belgium, and Amsterdam (that post coming soon). I think you can get a pretty good idea of everything we saw and did. Enjoy!

http://picasaweb.google.com/NedPix/EasterHoliday?authkey=Gv1sRgCPHjr8W-oZrx-AE#