Merry Christmas and New Year!!!!

This Chicken has been eating and relaxing it’s little heart out.  I hope everyone had a fantastic break and are fresh and ready to tackle 2010.  I personally think 2010 will be a great year!

Anyway, back to all things travel!

We headed off to Prague (still sick – and it was my turn to drive), a long day, we headed into the city and managed to get lost, oh yes and we traveled into an area where you are not allowed to drive, I guess the good thing about being a tourist is the police let you off a little bit more (just say sorry lots and that you didn’t see that big, huge sign – which I didn’t, oops)

Due to us feeling a bit under the weather and not really being bothered to stay in a hostel, we stayed in a nice hotel instead, one with parking out the front, and just near one of the bridges into town so it was easy to walk.

After a blissful sleep, we woke up just at sunrise and took a walk through the town. Prague has got to be one of the coolest places ever….well, that is until it hit about 9am and I swear every tourist known to man packed the streets.  Shame really, but at least we got some time, so today we checked out the castle (now one of my all time favourites, gothic, dark, all looks sinister, like lots of bad things went on, one of those great atmospheric places….hmmm should research a little more), we took the stairs up the top of the tower, which has a great view of the city, and we checked out a really cool mosque, and of course the all famous Charles bridge.

The next day/s we then went back to the Charles bridge in the morning as the day before you had to push your way through the crowd, we checked out the square, and spent the rest of the time looking at buildings at the outer edge of the city, why?  We basically had enough of the crowds, the city instantly loses it’s charm. Anyway there are some really cool buildings on the outer edge where no one bothers to go. So that was cool.

Ok, so the good bit, where are all the cool photos?!  Chicken hanging off the tower? Jumping off the bridge or posing with one of the statues?  Maybe one of chicken acting all evil in front of the castle?

Well, I have gone through all my photos, and here it is:

TA DAAAAAAAA!!!  The chicken and the cow!  Well it was a cow in the middle of town.  I know, all those great places that I missed out on…..I was a little awe struck (this place is awesome)… anyway it’s still a cool cow!

Hope you have a great new years eve, and I will see you in 2010!

Ok, soooo, I can finally say everything is not all ‘awesome’

The short version…Am very disappointed, now in the czech republic we thought we would have to try some ‘real’ absinthe, and found out it does not make you see Kylie Minogue fairies like on Moulin Rouge (the movie), we did the whole melting of sugar on a spoon, it tasted kind of nice….however many more later, this chicken found out that absinthe just makes you very, very sick.  We were going to head out towards Prague, however, instead spent the whole next day in bed (Todd had to go and ask for an extra night as everyone else couldn’t move from the bathroom), luckily the room was free for another night and I was free to sleep the day away. Actually, I should mention, we had a fun night, we found a place to go dancing, got very lost, sign language (not sure if that was because the person I was talking to couldn’t understand english, or just couldn’t understand me – lol) and the usual general silliness, so all wasn’t lost.

Not really much else to say, a couple of days later, I am still feeling sick, heading out to Prague.  Oh yes, I do have one thing, breakfast.  I am used to a bit of cereal, fruit and maybe some bacon and eggs.  Because we get up early to drive or to sight see, I have been eating a lot of fresh bread, it’s cheap, you don’t need anything with it and it’s yum, it’s always interesting to see what each country offers, here is what was included for our breakfast:

The photo is on a strange angle, must be that absinthe (I will now blame all bad things on that evil drink – hehe), however it is just a big plate of cheese and meat, and it’s funny, it’s not that much different to having eggs and bacon, but I just can’t stomach it (for lunch I would be happy to have it), it’s amazing how we get so accustomed to what we are used to. They also offered bread rolls….so, bread it was again!

Now we are leaving Cesky (a little sad because I never got to walk around early in the morning to avoid the crowds), and heading off to Prague.

PS.  I just read a bit more about absinthe…. hmmmm, now I understand why I was very, very sick.  It seems the quantities we drank were a little/lot high! ….although, I didn’t really need to read that to know…was very much aware!

Hey,

Well, before I talk about this little town, thought I might discuss accommodation.  Due to the flexible nature of our travels (ie wake up then decide where we want to go next), we don’t really book anything, and so far this has worked out pretty well.  One thing we found excellent about having a car, is that if you are driving, it’s late, there isn’t anywhere to stay and you know you are going to have to get up REALLY early, you can sleep in the car (which we have done once, and are willing to do again if need be – although, only if we have to)!

Some suggestions: Find one of those huge service stations with the truck stop, try to get a park that is not directly under the bright lights (and not alone in the complete darkness either – if you are lucky you can park near a truck that will block the light for you), fold down the back seats, get a couple of air mattresses and sleeping bags to sleep on and voila you have a bed for the night!  Not only that, they have showers, fresh hot bread and coffee for when you get up and head off!  While we are not planning on making a habit of it, it’s really handy and takes the stress off finding somewhere to stay.

I should mention that while I slept like a chick, I am not sure my much taller travel mate would say the same, so if you decide to follow this tip, please don’t hold me accountable for any grumpy tall people the following morning – hehe!!

So, that is Chickens tip for today.

Ok, so back to the topic at hand, Cesky Krumlov!  Can you believe it, another country!?!  This is a medieval town is pretty much prefect …… well, except for the tourists, all I seem to only hear English as I walk around!!  We did manage to get the gardens to ourselves (except for a curious squirrel), and had a nice afternoon tea by the river.  We are staying in a cute  pension just up the cobblestone road from the castle, speaking of which, this is no ordinary castle, nooooooooo, this castle has bears in it’s moat!!!!

Check it out, they were being very cute:

Today we saw a cheap cocktail bar during our sightseeing and think we might just check it out, I have yet to try absinthe and plan to do so!  I also plan on getting up early tomorrow to wonder around without so many tourists, this place would be awesome to have to yourself!

More on Salzburg,

We walked around the old town some more and took an audio tour of Mozart, here I am with him:

We had a very posh afternoon tea in a fantastic little cafe, great food, although we didn’t really fit in too well. All the walking seemed to make the afternoon tea wear off pretty quickly as we stopped by a stand to see what they have, here is me having a bite, num, num:

We are  staying at a campsite just outside the city, it’s green and very pretty, we meet up with a couple that came to visit Salzburg for a couple of weeks and are still yet to leave 2 years later!!

We will be heading off to Chesky Krumlov next, a beautiful medieval town in the Czech Republic.

We are here, a new country, and Salzburg!

Anyone that has seen ‘The Sound of Music’ would recognise Salzburg, if you are not a fan of the movie, then I suggest keeping it to yourself, this place seems to be full of fanatics (or you could just stir up some trouble, that’s fun too)!

We walked around the old town, just admiring the buildings, tripping over cobblestones, looking the churches, and watching the sound of music fans.  We then headed up to Festung Hohensalzburg (the castle).  Here I am overlooking Salzburg.  Unfortunately this is the only photo I have to show for the day, shame really:

I read an article the other day (I can’t find it now), it gave descriptions of different traveler types, and then asked which one describes you.  Today I have come to the sad realisation that I fit into the category of ‘little miss prozac’, as everything is always awesome…. while I thought it sounded sad when I read it…. it’s very true.  In order to embrace who I am, I now going to have awesome in my sign off.  edit:  I found the article, ended up It was actually about identifying your fellow traveler, but it’s still fun, and true: TravMonkey article

Salzburg is Awesome!

PS I will try and find the article.

Well,  it’s time to press on, we are on our way to Salzburg.  I am pretty excited, one of my travel mates tells me we had to go here because it’s ’sooooooooooo pretty’ (her words not mine), so we are back on the road again, I love looking at the scenery, I love how it changes as you progress, and I particularly like all the green. Back home has been very, very dry, brown and boring to look at, but not here!! Just check it out!   In this photo you can see me with the map navigating (this photo wasn’t a deliberate shot of me, but I thought I would post it anyway):

Here is another shot of me looking out:

It’s a quite day, lots of driving, it’s certainly a different pace to the sightseeing days. But I think it’s when you drive (especially if you take the non major roads), where you get a better feel for the country, you get to see the non touristy side of a country, and you can stumble across some of the best stuff (like we did Legoland, although that might not be the best example).  The freedom of having a car is great, we haven’t planned this trip at all, and if a town or a scenic road looks interesting, we just take it.

We have been listening to some of the radio stations on the trip, which is cool (we already know the words to the songs and have been singing along, or at least we sing something that somewhat resembles them!), and we have our cds to listen to, so when you get a little tired you can just put on your favourite song and chirp at the top of your voice!  Good fun.

Some more photos of Legoland….

This is a tower thingy where as you travel up, you turn around so you get a view of the whole park without leaving your seat (or rail in my case), so here are some shots of me looking out:

Just after lift off:

You can see the water ride from this one, that was a fun ride:

Other side of the park you can see a bit of the monorail:

Excellent photo of the roof of the toilets (the one with the cool sign)…hmmmm, oh and the little lego cities:

I just realised, I should have just stitched these all up (although might look funny with 5 chickens in it, although I could argue that it was just successful cloning):

You can see the taller part of the roller coaster in this pic, I am feeling very tall looking down so far down:

Well, that is (I promise) the end of my photos at Legoland (I probably took more here, than the whole time I was in Paris!!!!!).