Vacation

We went to the Czech Republic, Germany and Istanbul. First of all, back to the wonder that is air travel here. Most of us left the country for the holiday and every single one of us had a flight that left between 1 AM and 5 AM. Do they even fly planes at the hour of the day anywhere else?? So the challenge of getting up at 2AM to get to an airport that is 20 minutes away starts our fun-filled adventure. Can you say bone tired?

There are very few airlines that serve this airport so you have to take what you can get. We flew Turkish Airlines, with mixed reviews. Outbound flight was not good but inbound flight was very good, so who knows? Istanbul was very nice and was our first hint of Christmas, big tree in the airport and all of the stores decorated. We spent most of our time in Prague, which was truly lovely. We have tons of pictures so it will hard to pick the ones that go up here. I may simply post the Prague pictures in Snapfish or something as we have too many to count.

First of all, public transportation is a dream. You can get anywhere you want to go, cheaply and easily. A five day unlimited pass to use subway, tram or bus is about $5 US a day. The smarter way to do it is simply pay as you go, it's about 75 cents a trip.


The astronomical clock is amazing. It was built several hundred years ago and they actually blinded the man who designed it so it could never be replicated. Check out this website for the complete scoop. http://www.orloj.com. The clock was built in 1410 and has the ability to track solar movements, lunar movements, and tell time in addition to having the march of the 12 apostles at noon and all of these other things to watch and look at. It's worth standing there to see it chime at least once.

The Christmas Markets are everywhere and while it's mostly about food there are some great traditional Czech crafts such as marionettes, wooden puzzles and chess sets, and lots of Bohemian crystal jewelry. There are also linens and beautiful pashminas for sale. I managed to get some beautiful handcrafted items for presents.

Traditional Czech food is what you wold expect. Roast pork and dumplings or goulash. Soup is a standard with any meal and the deserts are excellent. Portions are so much smaller than in the states. We also visited a lot of foreign restaurants while there. Believe it or not we went Czech-Mex restaurant (I mean really, with a name like that wouldn't you have just had to go?)and it was some of the best Mexican food we've ever had.

We also spent one day going to Dresden, Germany and visiting the Christmas Market and some of the bigger sites. Since Dresden was leveled in WWII it is simply amazing the amount of older architecture that has survived. One of the places we visited was almost completely restored according to the original plans even though a single wall was left standing.