Wednesday, July 13, 2011

European Chronicles June 28, 2011

            Well, folks, I’m not even sure where to begin. Today was jam-packed! We only really had one full day in Prague, so we basically tried to do it all. We began the morning with a tour that our hotel lady recommended. They picked us up—yeah!—and drove us (a bit frightening here) to a place somewhere on the other side of the river to meet up with the rest of the folks. We had a bit of time to kill so we walked around some. Guess what store we found? H&M! They are EVERYWHERE here! I won’t complain.

            We boarded the tour bus along with our other tourees and we were the only Americans. It’s quite fascinating to me that English is the common language among everyone over here. If they look at you and know you’re not from their country, they will speak English to you—and it’s not just to us. English was being spoken to Asians, Indians, Middle Easterners, other Europeans, you name it. I’m quite grateful for this. Anyway, our tour group had quite the diversity—Indians, people from Brussles, a couple from Lebanon, some from Spain—and others that I didn’t catch. We trusted in our umbrella holding tour guide (who I named umbrella boy) to teach us lots and lots…

            But, perhaps we shouldn’t have held him in quite such high regard—the dude was SO hard to understand! Sam and I caught more in the Spanish segments than we did in the English. His singsongy voice matched with NO facial expression just killed me. :The tooooour willll taaaaaaake an hooooour. Really? I got tired just listening to a sentence. That being said, we saw some INCREDIBLE things—unfortunately, I’m not completely sure what they all were, but they were awesome looking and old. I’m a big fan of old things—we don’t have “old” things in the States. When I post pictures (check FB), you can google these cool places. Or perhaps some history buff can help me label my pictures like the awesome guy on Nicole’s blog. Oh! The tour also had a boat portion. It was pretty neat, but it was HOT up there!


            The tour ended in old town square (shortly after the Brussels lady yelled at the tour guide for not letting her stop and go where she wanted), and we were hungry. We happened upon a Hard Rock Café and decided it sounded delicious. Guess what? It was! I had about the best burger I’ve ever had there AND we got free refills!! Yahtzee!!

            After lunch we wandered and wandered some more and wandered some more (not totally sure where we were going, but everything was amazing to look at so it didn’t really matter). We decided to find the Charles Bridge (the oldest stone bridge in the country? This part of Europe? Help me out history people!). Anyway, the bridge was awesome and we walked across it to our side of town (mind you, we walked A LOT today). We meandered around some shops (I really wanted to buy this shirt that said “Czech me out” with Prague written down the side, but I kept thinking I’d find a better price or better color in another store…then I ran out of stores. Sad! I probably won’t get my shirt…



            We kept walking, in hopes that we'd find our hotel. We thought about asking someone, but we just kept walking. Then, guess what? We found a familiar street and walked right back to our hotel. Go us! We took a short resty to rejuvenate ourselves. I read while the others slept (I don’t do well with afternoon naps).

            We freshened up a bit and decided to try to go find the Eiffel Tower thing we missed yesterday. We had a bit more education and sense under our belts today and we knew just what to do! We bought tickets from our hotel people, walked a bit to the thingy that takes you straight up the hill (it has a cool name, but I can never remember it), hopped on, rode up, and walked out into a beautiful park! We found the tower, got our student discount (you can be a student here until you’re 26!) and rode the lift to the top. The view at the top was BREATHTAKING! You could see FORVER! We quite enjoyed ourselves up there, so we decided to walk down instead of taking the lift to enjoy more of the view. Then it was back down the side of the hill thing and off on our way.



            We decided to find a mall because Nicole had mentioned some amazing juice there, so we hopped on a tram and hoped for the best. We found the mall and decided to get some grub at the food court. I decided upon KFC. Now (much like McDonalds) I would not choose to ever eat at KFC (unless I’m with my grandpa of course), but over here it’s just so much better! We used to eat at KFC in Romania a lot and I loved it! It’s actual chicken, lightly breaded, with yummy seasoning. Delicious! It took me back to my RO days.

            Then we wandered around some (sorry Dad!) and found ANOTHER H&M. Of course we had to go in. Sam found a cute dress and top and I got a shirt (I’ll admit, it’s the same shirt I got at H&M in Hungary, but a different color!).

            Back to the hotel we went, and up to the rooftop we sauntered. Dad and Sam had coffee, and I had a few bites of Dad’s cake, and we enjoyed the evening breeze. When we got back to the room I called my mama (Hi Mama!) and Lauren to congratulate her on her new job (YEAH LAUREN!!!), and I sat down to write to you lovely people. Thanks for reading. It warms my heart to hear that people have been following us and enjoying our tales from foreign lands. J

            Tomorrow is the LONG drive back to Budapest, picking up the dogs (oh joy!), laundry, and repacking for ENGLAND!!!!!!!!!!! Ciao for now!

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