We're in Prague!

Hey guys!

Alright, well let me think for a bit, what's been happening? Well, we spend one more ngith in Znojmo. Predictably, after giving us one night of shovelling beer down our gullets, Peppa decided that the second night was just the night to take us to a beer restaurant, then an Irish Pub, then back to the beer restaurant on the way home. He also ordered John and myself (and himself, of course) a half-litre of every beer they had on tap to begin with at the first stop. Intertestingly, the beer at this restaurant was pumped with air, not carbon-dioxide. The end effect was the head didn't last as long (shame, I enjoy long-lasting head), but you didn't get bloated from the stuff! No enourmous burps! Needless to say, mum was impressed.

Ok, after Znojmo we headed off to more family as Streznice (not sure if I spelt that correct), but firstly, Vranof Castle. We couldn't take any pictures inside, but here's a pretty one from the outside.
In case the castle looks a little familiar to the movie buffs, it's the castle that was used for the filming of XXX, starring Vin Diesel. The interior was also used for the movie, it's a pretty damn spiffy place!

Now, Streznice was nice and relaxing, if you call being stuffed with food and alcohol like a turkey the night before christmas relaxing! What else happened there? Oh that's right, I got sick :(

Yeah, and not the cute sick either, the "stay away, and clear the way to the toilet!" sick. Anyways, I got over that in a day or so, and we were off!

Next place of accomodation, Ceske Krumlov. Of course, Ceske Krulmov is at the other end of the country, so we had some distance to cover. On the way we stopped at Telc. Telc is a thouroughly unremarkable town, except it's got this awesome, UNESCO world heritage listed, central square. All the buldings are so cute! Here's a pic to prove it!



Anyways, after Telc, we found ourselves come accomodation in Ceske Krumliv for a couple of nights, and wandered about the town. It's really hard to capture this town in photos, so I'm going to try with words. It's like you locked a medieval, eastern european, country town, in a time capsule for a few hundred years, opened the time capsule, and invited tourists in the see the result. The result is awesome! Of course, this means that all the residents have been kicked out of the town, in favour of hotels, restaurants, and "authentic" shops, but I'm not one to nitpick.
Here's a shot from the castle, looking back down at the town.


By the way, yes, it is exactle as picturesque at street level as it looks from above.










Ok, we spent a couple of nights there, and then head up towards Prague. On the way, we stopped at a couple of castles (0f course) the most impressive visually, was the castle of Hudlovice. It's not exactly a castle, as a massive hunting ranch, designed to look like a castle.

Either way, the effect is pretty presuasive. I hope you agree.



Ok, the other castle we didn't take any photos of, for the simple reason that the outside is pretty boring, and the inside we're not allowed to take photos of. It was in the day, however, one of the private residences of Franz Ferdinand, before he got shot, of course. Inside it is quite a large selection of his hunting trophies (apparently his career count was approaching 300,000 animals, he liked to hunt) and a massive selection of his weapons and armour collection. Quite literally, every hallway, and more than a few of the private rooms, were decorated with armour and arms, and that was before we got to the armoury. One notable were duelling pistols owned by Napoleon. Anyways, it was cool.

And that gets us here, to Prague. Hmm, I wrote a lot tonight. I'm sure you guys will cope.


Have fun people,
Bob (John's elsewhere)