And the journey has begun!

[Daisi]

Talk about a small world...it's amazing how you can run into people anywhere. Glad to hear you enjoyed your tasting cruise, hope you now have all your luggage.

[Got2Cruise]

Rebel54 I loved your story meeting your former supervisor. You first met in Japan and then 30 years later you meet in Budapest on vacation. Amazing.

[Rebel54]

Rebel54 I loved your story meeting your former supervisor. You first met in Japan and then 30 years later you meet in Budapest on vacation. Amazing.

 

It's so crazy. We are actually in Prague. She didn't remember me which I understand because I don't exactly look like that 18 year old kid anymore.

[Rebel54]

Luggage is ALLEGEDLY in country. We shall see. It SHOULD be delivered today.

 

I have to say this is probably the LAST time I ever use British Airways. Sadly this is not an uncommon occurrence.

[Rebel54]

Sooooo...

 

More on Taste of Prague. We met up at a church across from the Hotel Maxamillian (SP). Jan, the owner of TOP gave us a brief welcome and introduction. As I said before we all introduced ourselves. Then we walked over to the first location. Here's a break down of what we had and where we went:

 

1. We had the the beet root puree with goat cheese, and the celery root remoulade chlebicek, the open-faced sandwich, at the Sisters bistro.

 

((My comments: The shop has all sorts of different types of sandwiches. I wasn't a huge fan of either of these but the concept is great, nice way to get a light lunch and have tastes of many different things.))

 

 

2. We followed with meatloaf on bread, Wiener sausage, headcheese, and smoked pork cracklings at the Nase maso butcher shop. Both the bistro and the butcher shop are at Dlouha 39 street.

 

((My comments: This is literally right across from the Sister's bistro. Everything was good. This is a very popular place that I recommend you look into. All of the meats (and they only do beef and pork) are raised by farms selected by the owner and live "happy, cage free" lives. The meat is dry aged or prepared using processes and recipes from 100's of years ago. I loved it all. Well the headcheese was ok. The cracklings were a heart attack on a plate. The cracklings are made from the skin of the specially prepared ham. It's smokey, salty and fatty all at once. They do a special dinner there that is only open to I think 7 people a night. They lower a table from the ceiling and they serve a 6 course meat meal. Literally...all just meat. If you want to try it out, you must make a reservation in advance. They are also well known for their hamburgers. So you can go here to pick up steaks, burger, etc to take home to cook or for a small grill fee they will season and cook your steak for you on the spot.))

 

 

3. We had the pork schnitzel with potato salad, the Prague ham with horseradish cream, and beef goulash with dumplings at the Lokal pub at the Dlouha 33 street. We also had Pilsner Urquel lager - regular pour and milk style pour.

 

((Lokal pub is an austere looking place. It's what you would imagine of a soviet style cafeteria. The food was good. The "spicy" goulash was not spicy at all...but slightly salty. The Prague ham was good and the horseradish cream was not as spicy as I thought it would be. The cream cuts the spice a lot. The schnitzel was my favorite of the night. I don't drink beer so I had a Czech cola which tasted a bit earthy .. sort of like a mix of coke and rootbeer. Everyone seemed to enjoy the beer. If you don't know what "milk style pour" is....it's a glass that is 5/6's foam and 1/6th beer. The foam is apparently the sweet part and very popular here. The beer is pulled from in house kegs. I can't remember a lot on that topic because beer isn't my thing.))

 

 

4. We had wines at the Bokovka wine bar at Dlouha 37.

 

((My comments: we sampled 3 wines...a sour, fizzy, cloudy wine, a white and a red. The red was my favorite. All the wines were locally produced in Moravia.))

 

 

5. We had the Scotch eggs and the vanilla custard donut at Maso a kobliha at Petrska 23.

 

((My comments: I was not feeling really great by the time we got here and thanks to a very restricted diet...I can't eat much anyway so I was bordering on over full...but my husband said the scotch egg was pretty good. I did taste the donut which was warm and filled with a wonderful custard. Very good.))

 

 

6. We finished at the Eska restaurant (Pernerova 49) with fermented celery root soda, burnt potato in ash with potato espuma, fermented red wheat with sous-vide egg and button mushrooms, and zemlovka: bread pudding with apples in an espuma of vanilla and rum.

 

((My comments: This is a vegetarian place but they do offer some protein options as well. Everything was pretty good...good flavors. The bread pudding was probably the best thing. The soda was ... weird. We also had a beet root thing...it was sort of like a mini meringue drop with a dab of goat cheese on top. It looked like it would be soft...but it was a very surprising texture.))

 

And that was the end. He gave us each a couple parting gifts and a transportation ticket back to our hotels. We took the metro back. Side note.....the escalator down into the metro...not for the faint of heart or anyone that has fear of heights or vertigo. It's steep, long, high and pretty fast for an escalator.

 

All in all we had a wonderful time. At the end of the meal we felt like we had all known one another for years. Well, in my case....I literally did know one of them for years...over 30 to be exact.

 

So...there you have it. Check it out at:

 

http://www.tasteofprague.com/ and don't wait too long to try to book a date with them. They run about 10 tours a week and they fill up fast.

 

Let me know if you have any questions.

[ewizabeff]

Thanks for the excellent review of the food tour! We've previously spent a week in Prague, but I'm bookmarking this thread for the food suggestions in case we ever go back. There's still so much to see there.

[jpalbny]

I think we'll spend a few days in Prague next year. Your food tour sounds great! Thanks for the detailed review. And the story of meeting Kathy is incredible.

Edited July 24, 2016 by jpalbny

[Rebel54]

Thanks for the excellent review of the food tour! We've previously spent a week in Prague, but I'm bookmarking this thread for the food suggestions in case we ever go back. There's still so much to see there.

 

You really can't go wrong with them. Even if you can't get on one of their tours, they have a great blog and they are more than willing to give you personal advice on where to eat. They have an eBook on where to eat in Prague complete with a map. Jan was awesome...even trying to help us track down our luggage. Much easier for him without the language gap...but even he got the run around on the topic.

[Rebel54]

We have a bit of weather that has moved in. Our photo tour was cancelled last night thanks to a brief rain storm. This morning it's rather overcast. We are heading to Kutna Hora for a tour today, hoping the weather cooperates.

 

Friday we headed out early (while it was cool) and walked down to the Charles Bridge to see it before it got crowded. It was nice to see without too many people and none of the sales booths. After that we wandered back to the Jewish quarter and spent a few hours just wandering around that neighborhood. After that we came back to the apartment and I laid down because the jet lag was getting to me.

 

Our luggage was arriving one bag at a time with the first of 3 "scheduled for delivery at the 24 hour mark. Friday AM our other two bags had arrived in Prague and were also scheduled for delivery. We waited ALL day for the call that the courier was on the way with our bags. No call. We also tried calling ALL day with no luck. It was either busy or it would ring and there would be no answer. Jan (from T.O.P) also tried throughout the day on our behalf with the same results. Finally at about 6:30 pm one of the managers of our apartment got a hold of a friend that works at the airport and he was able to confirm that our luggage was indeed at the airport. There were a couple times throughout the day that I just wanted to head out there in person but we were told to wait because if it was with a courier we would likely pass it on the road. Sooo we waited. At 6:30 we had confirmation that it was at the lost luggage section at the airport. If finally found a number to the airport switch board that someone would actually answer. When I spoke with an operator he told me that "British Airways had a huge mess with luggage right now and that likely the reason they weren't answering phones was because they were dealing with the customers in front of them. That coming down in person might be a better option."

 

At 7:30 we got in a cab to go get it ourselves. Had enough. Allegedly, a courier had "tried" to deliver it but was told that the streets around Old Town were blocked off due to a reception...Never saw any streets blocked off. I threw the BS flag on that. When we arrived I was expecting pandemonium in the luggage area. Couldn't have been further from the truth. No line at the lost luggage counter at ALL. Three ladies just standing there smiling at us. To the left of the counter a nice collection of about 20-30 unclaimed suitcases, neatly stacked in rows. There were our three bags...just sitting there. By the way, the reason we could recognize them right away....besides the fact that mine was hot pink and his was harley orange .. were my wonderful bright yellow Cruise Critic luggage straps. One of the three bags was a non-descript black garment bag...also wrapped neatly with the CC luggage strap.

 

So we collected our wayward luggage...and off we went. It only took 48 hours, two cab rides, many, many unanswered calls and emails...but we were finally reunited with our belongings. I am so thankful that we weren't running right off to meet the river cruise...I would have probably had a break down.

 

Early yesterday, with fresh clothes :) we took the 18 tram down to Vysehrad and walked around the complex. From there we wandered down to the farmer's market and got some snacks and drinks. I had some cold deer sausage that was yummmmy. Had a hot cooked sausage that was to die for. From there we walked up to the Church of St. Cyril and St. Methodius and went down into the crypt to see the memorials to the soldiers that died there after assinating Reinhart Heidric. After watching Operation Daybreak it was really neat to see the place in real life. It was much smaller than I expected it to be. Couldn't go into the church because it looked like there was an event going on in it.

 

Walked back along the river and stopped at the Museum of Torture by the Charles Bridge. Goodness....some of those torture devices! Finally we stopped at the Paneria and got some sandwiches and returned to the room to relax bit. Big guy is heading out to try to get a shave and then a quick workout in the gym.

 

 

Was supposed to go on a photo tour but were rained out so we grabbed some dinner and then wandered around Old Town Square. We checked out the "Sex Machine Museum" as well. That was quite interesting. Funny thing...some of the contraptions were quite similar to those in the Torture museum. I guess there's a fine line between pleasure and torture :).

 

 

 

Today we are off to Kutna Hora...will be back to let you know how that goes.

[Rebel54]

The trip to Kutna Hora with Sandeman's was nice. The guide appeared a bit....unorganized trying to herd the cats for our group. There were maybe 25 or so, including two children in strollers in our group and a couple in strollers in the Spanish group. We met in Old Town square (nice for us since it's right outside our apartment) and walked to the coach down past the InterContinental Hotel, across the river.

 

Kutna Hora: https://www.tripadvisor.com/Tourism-g274701-Kutna_Hora_Central_Bohemian_Region_Bohemia-Vacations.html

 

The trip was about an hour. Coach was very comfortable. They sold water for 10k a bottle (it was 50 just across the bridge in a little kiosk). While on the way a "menu" (it was a hand written list of available options) was passed around and our guide took our lunch orders. We had to pay for our food but it was ready pretty fast on arrival. We had the Chicken schnitzel and potato salad and it was pretty good. I kid you not...the schnitzel covered the entire plate. It was NUTs.

 

Our first stop was the Bone Chapel. Very small, lots of bones in some very nice arrangements. They are restoring the chapel so it's under construction. I was a little disappointed that the big chandelier was missing. After that we took the bus over to the town of Kutna Hora and checked out the scene there. What a beautiful place. I do believe this is one of the options with the cruise as an extra trip...I would recommend it. Worth the trip. St. Barbara's Cathedral was just amazing. You have some very picturesque views from the Cathedral as well as back at the Cathedral from town.

 

After that we had our lunch and continued the walking tour through the town. Finally we boarded the bus and we were back on our way to Prague. We were due back at 6:00 but were about 30 min late.

 

The guide was very knowledgeable but sometimes I don't feel she made the best use of time. I would have preferred that she give some of the general history of the locations during the 1 hour bus ride and then some details on each as we arrived.

 

My biggest grip would be with the group that had kids in strollers who we had to wait for several times because of one reason or another. Makes me glad that there won't be any babies on our cruise.

 

When we returned we made a beeline for the Palladium mall to get big man a pair of clippers. His were not good for here and smoked as soon as he plugged them in. We found him a place to get a shave but he prefers to do it himself. If you need anything in Prague, it's probably at that mall. I was happy to find the Pandora store and got my Charles Bridge charm. I will also admit that I got my Eiffel tower charm there as well...one less thing to look for in Paris.

 

On the way back we stopped at the Hotel Paris and enjoyed some warm apple strudel (me) and pancakes with a fruit compote and cream (him). MANY years ago (in the 80's) I had dinner there with a group of friends. It was a 6 (or more) course meal that ran us about....$5.00 each. Can't get that anymore for sure.

 

Back to the room to relax a bit. It was a long day. For some reason I keep waking up at 3am. I should be over that by now. I managed to sleep until 5:30 today.

 

That's all for now.

 

Today we are off to Terezin. When we get back, weather permitting, I also have a sunset photo tour. Tomorrow I have a sunrise photo tour and we move down to join the tour group at the InterContential. Thankfully the manager of our apartment has arranged for transport to move our luggage down there so we don't have to try to drag luggage down the cobble stones.

Edited July 25, 2016 by Rebel54

[garycarla]

Love reading all your travels. We did some a380 flights recently. Such a nice plane to fly.

 

As to luggage. Though we have had good luck over the years and never lost on the way to our destination, only a few delays coming home. On our recent trip RTW (link below) we opted to go with carryon only. After reading your comments, I think we will do that again on our trip to Germany/France/Prague this fall.

[Rebel54]

Love reading all your travels. We did some a380 flights recently. Such a nice plane to fly.

 

As to luggage. Though we have had good luck over the years and never lost on the way to our destination, only a few delays coming home. On our recent trip RTW (link below) we opted to go with carryon only. After reading your comments, I think we will do that again on our trip to Germany/France/Prague this fall.

 

I've only had luggage lost once until now. When we were there to get our bags there was a guy from the UK that was trying to locate his. He had brought a carry on but arrived late at the flight and had to gate check his bag. He made it...his bag did not. I would have been furious because my carry on bag is 3/4 full of my camera gear.

[Rebel54]

Just in from our Day Trip to Terezin. I'll share more later because I'm getting ready to head back out to do my first of two photo tours. I'm beat...been on my feet since 10:00 am but I will make it through.

 

While at Terezin, we ran into a group from Viking. There were three wheel chairs in that group. I was a bit surprised.

 

If you want to book Terezin on your own, we went with Sandeman's New Europe and it was a great tour. They recently acquired their own buses so there's no more going by public transportation. Nice coaches with bathrooms and water for 10KCR.

 

Today was HOT. My husband laughed at me when I was planning things to bring on this trip. One of which was a set of Chill Towels. He wasn't laughing when I broke those bad boys out today and we were rocking ice cool towels on the back of our necks while standing in the sun listening to the tour guide!

 

Off to take photos.

[bama4cruisin]

Enjoying your reports and making many notes for next year!

[stonepebble]

I'm enjoying your report Rebel & the stories!

 

Can't wait to hear more!

 

Chris

[Rebel54]

Just checked out of our AirBNB and into the InterContinental. Got here around 9:30. Room will be ready in about an hour. Checked in with Avalon. Only 46 meeting our group here, only 52 on the cruise total.

 

Yesterday the photo tour was amazing. Despite the fact that I was totally exhausted after the walking tour of Terezin, I am so glad I did it. Johnny's Prague Photo Tours is who I went out with. He's a great guide, very knowledgeable and will help you get the most amazing photos. He was very helpful and carried my tripod after a while because I was seriously dragging. We shot from 7-10 pm and I got to see some places that I hadn't seen before.

 

This morning we met up again at 5:10 am and went out and hit some additional areas for another three hours.

 

You don't have to be a pro or have pro gear to go out with him. We had a lady today with just a point and shoot and he was showing her how to use graduated filters with it.

 

After a little bit of rest and a bit of refreshing we have the welcome reception tonight at 6. At 7 we are going on an Underground Ghost tour our of Old Town Square. :)

 

That's all for now. Hope to be getting into a room here shortly.

[jm485]

Wow -- that sounds like a terrific photo tour! I will keep this in mind when I (someday) get to Prague.

 

Enjoying your journey with you. Hope to see some of your photos at some point.

[Got2Cruise]

Such low number of pax. I believe that someone else on a previous itinerary reported same low numbers.

[caviargal]

Such low number of pax. I believe that someone else on a previous itinerary reported same low numbers.

 

Very low numbers! I suspect a combination of overbuilding for the river cruise companies as well as lost bookings for Europe in general.

 

That being said, there were a total of 5 cabins left when we booked our Douro cruise with AMA last month and the Danube sailing on Sonata this fall has limited cabins left. I changed cabin categories recently and there was little to choose from.

Edited July 26, 2016 by caviargal

[KathyK13]

Very low numbers! I suspect a combination of overbuilding for the river cruise companies as well as lost bookings for Europe in general.

 

being said, there were a total of 5 cabins left when we booked our Douro cruise with AMA last month and the Danube sailing on Sonata this fall has limited cabins left. I changed cabin categories recently and there was littele to choose from.

 

I read recently that overall tourism is down 25% in France this summer, which may explain why some French river cruises have declining numbers of passengers. I also suspect that the glut of new ships as well as fear from terrorist attacks have reduced bookings. I'm curious to know if other cruise lines have had unfilled cruises this summer. I've received notices in the mail from Vantage offering very high discounts on quite a few 2016 cruises; these prices were not advertised on their website, possibly because they don't want to publicly advertise such low rates.

[Daisi]

Enjoying your adventures so far Rebel...hope the ship and cruise are just as good.

[YoungDubFan]

I was on Avalon's Paris to Normandy trip at the end of May / early June & we only had 50 passengers. I found that the sailings on the older ships, which are cheaper, seem to have less passengers while the newer "Suite Ships" are sailing with more passengers. Avalon has more ships on the rivers & just aren't always filling every itinerary. I felt very lucky to have fewer passengers & felt I was really spoiled by the experience. I also like that Avalon doesn't cancel these sailings & try to combine 2 sailings with lower numbers.

[KathyK13]

I was on Avalon's Paris to Normandy trip at the end of May / early June & we only had 50 passengers. I found that the sailings on the older ships, which are cheaper, seem to have less passengers while the newer "Suite Ships" are sailing with more passengers. Avalon has more ships on the rivers & just aren't always filling every itinerary. I felt very lucky to have fewer passengers & felt I was really spoiled by the experience. I also like that Avalon doesn't cancel these sailings & try to combine 2 sailings with lower numbers.

 

We did the same cruise in September 2015 on the Luminary, one of the older ships. There were 98 passengers, so the ship wasn't full but more than you had. Avalon does have a lot of ships doing this itinerary, alternating the suite ships with the older ships. AMA and Avalon both have discounted prices for several itineraries for August through October this year.

[Rebel54]

We are on the Artistry II which is one of the newer ships. I think there are only 7 cabins filled on our deck. Most people booked deck 2 and 1. I also think that the route we chose doesn't seem to be as popular but I'm ok with that because it's going where we want to go. We were told that in general numbers are down because of the fears associated with terrorism.

 

A bit more about Terezin. Having been to Dachau many times, I wanted to point out, for those who have not been to a concentration camp, that Terezin is not what I expected of a concentration camp. The place where you see the sign "Arbeit Macht Frei" is actually a prison, not the actual place where the Jewish people were moved to. Terezin is actually a town, where people still live today. You really don't get a feel for what a camp was like there. They do have a museum that shows you how they lived and what it was like but unlike Dachau you don't walk through where they really lived. Terezin was not a death camp, although that was on the horizon had the war not ended. It was a transit station where they were sent and then further to other camps later. There is a lot of history around Terezin and how Hitler used it as a propaganda site to show the Red Cross how well he was treating the residents there. The sad part was that it went so well that after the Red Cross left he had a movie made to further push the propaganda and then anyone that was used in the ruse was sent off to other camps.

 

Today we walked up to Hrdcany Castle. On the way up we stopped a the US Embassy and met up with my former supervisor (see how we met up in the story on our Taste of Prague tour). She took us around the embassy grounds and got a great history of the property. The buildings were sold to the US for $170,000 when it was originally acquired. We walked up to the top of the grounds and let me tell you...the view is amazing. When you are at Hrdcany Castle, and look across towards the "Eiffel Tower" you see a white building with the US flag on it. We went to the top of that building and looked out towards Hrdcany castle.

 

After that little break we continued up and stopped for lunch. Well, my husband did. It was too hot for me to eat. I enjoyed some water and an ice cold Coke. :)

 

Up to the Castle we went. We just wandered around the grounds and enjoyed the sites. We arrived at 12:00 so we witness part of the main changing of the guard. At 12:00 if you are there you get the big show. Marching band, a large group of marching soldiers and a bit more hoopla. Little more exciting than the regular changing of the guard.

 

After that we made our way back down to the Charles Bridge and stopped in the Saint Nicolas cathedral and back to the hotel. The Mr. is currently snoring away while I update you all.

 

I am ready to get on with the rest of our trip. While the numbers may be low on river cruises....Prague is crawling with tourists and the crowds in the main areas are unreal. I'm quite tired of people expecting everyone to get out of their way when they are walking 3-4 abreast. I do my best not to walk in front of anyone and to be aware of my surroundings when I stop to take a photo. Apparently I'm one of 3 people in Prague that thinks that's a thing.

 

Tonight we are going to have dinner here in the hotel upstairs on the roof and then we are going back down to the bridge area to meet up with Mysterium Tour Prague to take the night tour that focuses on the dark history around the Castle Quarter.

 

Tomorrow we pack up and head out to start the cruise!

Edited July 27, 2016 by Rebel54

[dln929]

Your updates are fascinating. Thanks so much for sharing them with us. And keep 'em coming (as time allows of course!).