Knoodeling down the canal

Canoeing down the Ohře, more precisely.

One week into Amber's new school term the first outing is planned. It is to be a canoe trip. The parents are keen to go along to meet other parents and school peeps, and mingle a bit whilst having some fun with the girls.

What is more, faaaall (as the Americans say - to the English-speaking world "Autumn") can be seen storming down on us and this is a good time to enjoy the outdoors before it arrives.

The trip is going to take up Saturday, and is scheduled to begin about an hour south of Prague at Tynec, but there is not enough water in the river, and so we will paddle the Ohře between Hrad Loket (a very nice castle) and Karlovy Vary, our oft-visited haunt.

The country out there is picture pretty and so we are all looking forward to it.

All the necessary prep was done on Friday, which was simultaneously our anniversary date night, and so it was a late and somewhat wined night.

Needless to say, the Wood household, slow in the mornings when speed is in the air, was out of the starting blocks about an hour after the pistol sounded. Our trademark haste was in evidence as we scrambled for the subway to the meeting point. However, as we left the apartment, it became clear that summer, which has been ruling unopposed for the last weeks had abdicated, faaaaall was negotiated out of the deal, and winter seemed to have everything under control.

Ignoring the immediate exclamations from the girls as we left the building, we somehow convinced ourselves and out offspring that it would warm up as soon as we got into the sun. Problematically, the sun didn't show up.

Chilled, we arrived at the departure point, a full 30 minutes late and, thank heavens, not the last to arrive! Logistics sorted, we make for the hills and, apart from Sarah returning her early-morning Mc Donalds chocolate doughnut partly digested into a cardboard cup, the trip went along smoothly enough.

Upon arrival at the river, the temperature was a bold 7 degrees, and I'm not talking about the water. 7 degrees is not ordinarily any kind of problem at all, but when all you are prepared for is the mid 20's, 7 is a challenge. 7 with wind is even worse... we had wind.

*sigh*

Leslie (the principal) giving the law and safety drill to a shivering crowd.

It was cold! The change of clothes we'd taken in case one got wet were put on, with the raincoats over that to keep the wind out.

That, with the addition of a life jacket worked long enough to get us onto the river, and then, with all the exercise, the warmth came back... slowly.

We 4 were on a raft with another couple, so remained together for the duration. We had considered taking 2 canoes instead of the raft, but the thought of being lone paddlers for the entire trip seemed a tough ask and so we opted for the raft thinking it would be easier...

Praise the Lord, Hallelujah and glory to God... the sun came out almost as soon as we were on the water. The river lit up and was a real beauty...

Enlarge the one above... moments before, or should that be minutes before, all the leaves you see on the surface of the water were falling from a tree on the river bank, right in the middle of a sunbeam. It looked like giant, golden glitter bits falling onto the water. I wanted to capture it on camera, but you know... the camera was in a zip-lock bag as a precaution and, as with so many other precautions, by the time I had finished dealing with them, the magic moment had passed! Bother! From that moment forward, the camera ran the risk of swimming precaution free! It's close enough to upgrade time to take a little risk ;)

We stopped for some well-earned lunch at this wonderful spot on the river, opposite a rock-climbers paradise, with a good number of them in paradise.

All my girls attending to hunger on the river bank.

This was the lunch stop, looking ahead from the previous shot - BTW, all these photos are geotagged, so, you can have them show up in Google Earth, MS Maps etc if you feel inclined. I want to find an easy way of doing this right here in the blog, but haven't gotten around to that just yet.

Now all filled up, back to nature and the shallow river Ohře.

Job (the organiser), his wife Jana and their mutt Alex, enjoying the ride.

Apart from stopping to go around a weir (which would have been WAY more fun to go over) we didn't stop until we got to Karlovy Vary and the endpoint.

De-boated, and in the little remaining sunlight of the afternoon, the kids had some fun running around while we waited for everyone to arrive and trek all the way back to Praha again.

Only 2 of us were awake by the time we got home, and we all 4 will be sleeping well!

Royal Treatment in the Royal Spa Towns Part 2: Karlovy Vary

After Lunch, we did the 40 minute drive to Karlovy Vary, founded in 1350 by the Czech king and Roman Emperor Charles IV.  There was much expectation in the back seat as they had heard much about the famous Spa Town and were really psyched about seeing it.  They were so psyched in fact that the electricity in the air was punctuated by the deep snoring of Mutherdux :).

We arrived at the one end of the town and parked near the Grand Pupp Hotel, scene of the latest James Bond movie.

We strolled along the main boulevard, which has 13 main springs, stopping to admire the view,

chat to locals,

and drink the mineral water.

After walking the full length of the town and back, the only thing keeping us going was the promise of tea and cake along the river near the car.

And Mutherdux rounded it off with the most delux hot chocolate..

(Part 1:  Mariánské Lázně)

Adele's visit

Adele's visit was preceded by a rather large amount of anxiety and speculation as to whether she would actually be allowed across the border or not.

Aparently, she did not need a visa if she she came in from 1 country and left by another and stayed for a max of 5 days. So herein lies all the stress: Adele will be arriving by train, would not be able to communicate with the Czech Foreign Police - no, don't gasp in disbelief, the "foreign" police do not speak English - and would also have no visa!!

Anyway, she did arrive and we had the most divine week-end with her here.

Friday 18th & Sat 19th, Karlovy Vary:
Adele arrived on Friday afternoon and we took the extended daylight that Europe has to offer and drove straight through to Karlovy Vary. We arrived at around 7pm but still had a couple of hours of daylight to meander a bit through the town and to find a restaurant for supper.



The next morning we set out on foot, ready to spend the day meandering the small village, really excited to see Karlovy Vary again in the sunlight (it was freeeezing the last time we were here).

The girls remembered everything about the place and as we got close to the first spring, they both dashed ahead to find the "snake spring". I had completely forgotten already, but the water sprayed out of the snake and the girls took great delight in showing "Aunty Adele" how is was done.

Now the water here is world renowned for its healing properties, and there are even doctors just specialising in the prescription of the various springs for any ailment. What they don't warn you about however, is how bad the water tastes - according to Adele (and the face vouches for it), it tastes like hot rust would probably taste if you were to lick it off an old car (she was very quick to emphasise the "probably").

Sarah had the right idea though as she discovered that the water really didn't taste too bad if you alternated sipping with licking lollies.

The rest of the morning was spent pretty much just ambling ...

We took the trip up the funicular again to the Diana Lookout and enjoyed a forest walk before having lunch at the foot of the tower

Did we mention that the beer is really good in the CZ?
The girls (all 4 of us) had goulash soup in bread for lunch (and that was not a grammatical fault).

The afternoon was spent ambling up side streets; sitting at coffee shops (drinking beer); ambling down side streets; eating ice-cream on main streets; and finishing off with dinner along the canal.
Sunday 20th, Loket:
We headed back to Loket and sincerely hoped that this time round there would be a little more life in the tiny town of Loket. Our last trip was also on a Sunday and it was a ghost town with only the Vietnamese shops open. This time round we were in luck with a gorgeous day and the town had a very different feel about it. We even had some eye-candy with some road workers working on the bridge (funny, you can actually say that in Europe and not be joking!!!!). We did the tour of the castle and then continued on to the Monastary.

Klaster Tepla:

It had been a very busy week-end already for the tikes and Adele had her share of parenting practice in the back seat with the girls
The Tepla monastery was founded somewhere in the 1300s and is still in use with around 10 monks in residence.

Sarah giving her mother a mild cardiac arrest below while Dad took photos ..

We signed in for the next tour which was in about 30 minutes time and so took the opportunity to walk around the grounds for a bit. We got exactly half way around, however, when we realised that it was time for the tour to start and we ended up running around the grounds to get there on time.
Adele setting up the camera for one of her famous group shots
A view of the monastery and chapel from the back (it was exactly at this point we started to run)

The inside of the monastery showed a former glory with the building severely needing some TLC and millions of Czech crowns.
The room below was the dining room with a really beautiful fresco on the far wall, painted as though the room continues around the corner
After the tour finished, we walked back to the grounds behind the chapel and had the most soulfully refreshing hour or so wandering around the garden and forest beyond the lake. We could quite clearly understand how anyone could be a monk and spend everyday in meditation and prayer in these conditions.

Plzen:
After the monastery, we headed back for Plzen and got home around 6pm. Adele and I then took the gap to go into the centre of Plzen for Adele to see our sleepy little town (which it definitely was at 6pm on a Sunday) while Colin took care the bath and bed routines back home. (I have the most amazing husband!!! He even had to wash and dry their hair while Adele & I sipped coffee and shopped!)

After coffee at the square, we headed off to the 24 hour tesco down the road. Although we went in for bread, milk and jogurt, we spent a good couple of hours extra while Adele revelled in being inside a supermarket from the first world. In every ilse (of which there are MANY), Adele could be heard oohing and aahing over the choices, exclaiming often "if only there was a shop like this in Bangalor ....". Adele used to be my professional shopper back in SA and was my first point of call for advice on perfumes and pretty much the purchase of anything in general. I couldn't believe it, but she was in Tesco for one evening and was already able to provide me with shopping advice on the availability of thai green curry in ilse 10 and peanut sauce in aisle 12!

Monday 21st May, Prague:
On Monday morning, the girls' teacher picked them up for school and we got on the early bus for Prague. We were able to cover a lot more ground without A&S and even got to fit in a good couple of hours sitting soaking up the shade with a beer in hand.

The first port of call was the Prague Castle:

Followed by a walk through Small town, over the Charles Bridge, through New Town (where we stopped for MacDonalds for lunch) and then to Old Town - the Czechs are not altogether creative with their naming of suburbs in this place!

A view of the castle behind Charles Bridge:
Adele on Charles Bridge:

By the time we got to Old Town Square, we were very hot, sunburned and very eagerly ordered 3 large beers.
It was so hot that we were not even too skaam to take off our shoes under the table:
After the recovery rest, we took a walk through Jewish Quarter and took a peek at the old cemetery. There are something like 20000 gravestones in this tiny little cemetery:

With an hour or so to kill before we needed to catch our bus home, we sat along the river bank at a coffee shop to end the day.

Photos of Karlovy Vary

Photos of Loket

Photos of Klášter Teplá

Photos of Plzeň

Photos of Prague