euroSlurve

We’ve finally reached Prague, the last city on this little excursion of ours. We arrived on an overnight train from Krakow, where we spent the day with Scott and Gail Pursley and Vinny and Mary Anne Dahmen (from our church). We all traveled to the Krakow train station together on Tuesday night, but took different trains. Theirs went to Budapest. Ours came to Prague. I don’t think they liked traveling with us.

For only the second time on this trip, it’s just Jamie and I. Somehow, we managed to meet up with family and friends in almost every city throughout the past five weeks. Now it’s just the two of us, a couple bags of dirty laundry, a near empty wallet and the beautiful city of Prague. Fortunately, Prague is cheap. Like surprisingly cheap. I wasn’t expecting this at all. A half liter of beer in this city costs around $1.20 US. (In Copenhagen, it was around $9.00 US.) Lion Bars are like 50 cents. I should stock up.

Needless to say, we’re loving Prague. I’ve always heard great things about this city (and the Czech Republic as a whole) and it’s certainly living up to the hype. Like Krakow, it came through the World Wars fairly unscathed. So there are bridges and buildings from the 14th century. We walked over a bridge the yesterday that was built in 1357. And it’s still standing and being used.

The language here is nearly impossible to figure out. I don’t even know how to say “thank you.” In Poland, it was something that sounded like “Dave Coulier” so I would just say that really quickly. It’s nothing like “Dave Coulier” here in the Czech Republic. So I’ll probably just keep quiet and nod my head a lot.

There are lots of English speakers here. Mostly tourists from Britain. Those people are everywhere — and understandably. That beer I paid $1.50 for is only $0.75 for them. The British pound is kicking the crap out of every other currency right now. It’s a good thing I’m not British … because my travel obsession and that exchange rate would be a problem. You’d never see me. I’d be all over the globe. But of course, if that were true you wouldn’t see me anyway, because I’d be British and I wouldn’t know you silly Americans. I know, I’m confused too. Moving on…

There are also lots of pickpockets here. Apparently it’s a huge problem in this city. People in Poland warned us. The guy in the lobby of our flat warned us. There are signs everywhere, especially on the trams. You feel like you need to walk around with your wallet in your hand in your pocket, flinching whenever someone comes near you. It’s a little unnerving, but hey.

So this is our final day here in Europe. We’re planning on exploring more of Prague and seeing how many 50 cent Lion Bars we can eat in one day without getting sick.

Tomorrow we fly from Prague to Zurich and then from Zurich to Newark. I’m hoping it’s still warm at home. I keep hearing people talk about 80 degree weather. Is this true? I’m looking forward to a little Indian Summer action before the winter starts. OK, we’ll seeya on the other side of the pond. Dave Coulier for reading my random thoughts from the road.