Photos!

Here are some photos from our trip so far - hope you enjoy them!


Schoenbrunn Castle, Vienna, Austria.










Some rocks in the Vienna Natural History Museum. Imagine this multiplied by about 500.




The Tatra Mountains on the border between Poland and Slovakia - we climbed from 1000 metres to 2200 metres and got some AMAZING views.








A random Church somewhere... *blush* I forget where...



Climbing up stairs amongst giant rocks in Teplice, Czech Republic, towards a tree...




The aforementioned tree where a castle used to be, 70 metres above the ground below perched on a rock.
The castle was destroyed by religious fanatics sometime before we reached the top.


Some high slabs in Teplice.


More Teplice Rocks




A pleasant mountain-bike ride in the hills above Cesky Krumlov, taken BEFORE it poured with rain.


Ah, Prague - a tourist Mecca. Far too overcrowded.


Kutna Hora's "Bone Church", outside Prague... macabre.



Boo!


Yes, that is a coat of arms made out of human bones... but look behind it - that's a massive pile of thousands more human bones. They simply had too many bones. What else could they do with them?


I think this is a photo of us taken in Bratislava, and the view is quite possibly the most interesting thing to look at in Bratislava... unfortunately we only had 2 hours there so we didn't really get a good feel for the place at all.


The picturesque and charming town of Cesky Krumlov.







I've actually got many, many more photos and it's only week three... in fact I must have around 800-1000 photos so far I think. But we only have limited time to spend on this blog and Internet access, although common enough, is often somewhat retarded by stupid keyboard layouts.

Budapest

I'm planning a big post with photos soon - but I'm finding using a Hungarian keyboard to be quite challenging. As you can see, it's certainly possible, but it takes a lot of corrections as keys are in different places.

Expect more soon...

Krakow - The Forgotten Post

Ok, I started this entry and forgot to publish it.

Krakow is the old capital of Poland. That title now obviously goes to Warsaw but Krakow is still a fine city. It has one of the largest squares of any city in Europe, and we were fortunate to be there on a Saturday night. During the evening there were many street performers entertaining the crowds and lots of pavement dining opportunities.

Earlier that day a group of us caught a mini-bus to the nearby Salt Mines. I forget the history but they have operated for over 700 years and were only recently retired and turned into a museum/heritage site. The place is impressive - many kilometres of tunnels through rock salt. Yes, you can eat the rock salt. Yes, you can lick the walls. No, it does not taste great.

The remaining time in Krakow was spent exploring the city (the central city is surrounded by a pleasant green 'belt' - a shady park with plenty of trees and bread vendors). Although we didn't have time to go inside the castle, I think I'm not alone when I say that Krakow Castle is one of the most impressive castles we've seen so far.

In fact, I think I'm going to rate it my favourite castle 'from the outside', and Cesky Krumlov Castle as my favourite castle 'indoors'.

Drivers in Central Europe

They are all mad.

I have never seen anything like it. Pedestrian crossings are an invitation to become roadkill. People drive like insane boy-racers. The road-trip from Prague to Krakow was the longest mini-bus ride of my life. People actually overtake in the face of oncoming traffic in some sort of universal understanding that the oncoming drivers will slow down and yield if it doesn't quite work out as planned...

The mini-bus trip to Krakow also gave us our highest non-aircraft speed for the journey so far, 135kph on the Polish motorway (speed limit is 110).

Maniacs.

And in case you're thinking - "well, I'm sure they have heightened awareness and are used to the chaos so it's just as safe as anywhere else" - well, I watched a car skid to a halt in front of a pedestrian crossing on a corner today as people ventured onto the road. This was after watching twenty or so other cars take the same corner with tyres squealing. I also watched a car narrowly avoid being crushed by a mini-bus on the way back from the salt mines. I also watched an intersection get completely blocked up by a car in the wrong place at the wrong time. Bad driving is everywhere.

This was in Poland, but it was almost as bad in the Czech Republic and Vienna.

Food in Central Europe

Meat. Lots of it. Incredible amounts of dead animal served on huge plates (and sometimes planks of wood). It seems like that's all anyone eats around here. Vegetables (other than the potato) appear to be undiscovered.

I'm reminded of one particular meal in Cesky Krumlov - we ordered the mixed grill between us (it said it was suited to two people). What turned up was an entire farmyard. We had two HUGE steaks, two giant chunks of turkey, two enormous pork cuts and two massive fried potato cakes. Oh, and a piece of tomato and a leaf of lettuce. Needless to say, we didn't finish it. In fact, we only really made it through the turkey and a bit of the pork. It's depressingly wasteful unfortunately.

Vegetarian meals almost always involve 'fried cheese'... in one instance, a fellow traveller ordered the 'fried camembert' and when an actual full-size camembert turned up, fully coated in crispy batter, he swore never to order cheese again.

But it doesn't stop there - it appears the usual breakfast around these parts is salami, ham and cheese. There's usually cream cheese somewhere in there too.

So the last couple of days P and I have been searching for real vegetarian meals in an effort to bring a little balance back into our lives. We found a great place in Krakov today that had a nice fresh salad bar and no meat anywhere. It made us very happy.

Auschwitz

Yesterday we went to Auschwitz, in Poland. We stopped there for the afternoon on the way from Teplice to Krakow.

I'm not going to write a lot because it's very hard to put into words what I saw and felt.

It's a terrible, terrible place. I felt angry and disgusted at what went on there. I think the experience there will stay with me for life and I'm really glad I had the chance to visit.

If you ever get the chance to go - please do.

Teplice

Teplice is a little Czech town near the Polish border. It's got a few pubs, some houses and shops, and a lot of trees. There's not a lot going on there and it's cold.

But it's also the site of some of the most amazing rock formations I've ever seen. I haven't yet sorted out photos on this blog so I can't post any, but here's a link:

http://www.skaly-adrspach.cz/en/teplice-rocks.php

There's also the remains of a castle built 70 metres above the valley below on top of a bunch of rocks. It was destroyed by Hussites many centuries ago but the marks in the rock are still visible.

I really should get these photos sorted out! Who wants to see photos?