Prague

Well, it's the last night of our holiday, and given that Jody declared Prague "ace" today and is now suggesting places for our next time abroad, I think I can call the trip a success.

After a long train ride from Berlin yesterday, we arrived at the central station and hailed an Uber to take us to the hotel. Given the reputation of Prague taxi drivers, I figured we were better off using a service with clearly published and tracked rates, where I could provide instant feedback and get a credit were there any questionable charges. Unfortunately, standing directly in front of the Uber pick-up spot sign didn't help the driver find us at the station, and it took longer to locate the car than it did to drive the short distance to the hotel once we did. After that small hiccup, though, we spent a relaxing first night listening to the trams rumble past and reading my guidebook, in preparation for a full day of tourism.

I've been looking forward to getting to the Czech Republic for a long time, because I feel my Bohemian genes somewhat more strongly than most of the other European bits that make up my mutt-like form. Reading the guidebook, I was stricken by how every landmark noted had a quirky historical story to go with it. I've never seen so much unusual history in one place. Given that my Czech great-grandmother was quite a character (my mom has often said that I "would've liked her" in a way that really means you and she are the same kind of weird), maybe I was right about the dominance of the Czech genetic material in my makeup. She always claimed to be Bohemian royalty, and while my family rolls their eyes and translates that to crazy gypsy, I took it to mean I needed to check out the old palace while here.

So we got up this morning -- OK, afternoon, it is us -- and set out to see the city. Our hotel is in the old town (Staré Mēsto), so it was just a short walk to the Old Town Square (Staromēstské námēstí) which was full of tourists, with a large statue in the middle, surrounded by lovely old buildings, and home to the famous Astronomical Clock. Sadly, we arrived just a few minutes before the clock did its big display on the hour, so the entire street in front of it was jammed with people waiting. Since Jody had never heard of the thing, and I'm against those kinds of scenes, we wandered off without seeing it and hopped the metro to Prague Castle (Pražsky hrad), which is much more than just a castle.

After a 2 minute ride, we left the metro and walked a couple of blocks to the castle approach, which is a long uphill trek, with a few stairs mixed in. I'm reasonably healthy, but making that walk in the sun was a bit much for me, and I thought Jody was going to kill me for making him do it... until we got to the top and the most incredible view of Prague was before us.

After a lot of photos and a significant mood improvement, we walked around the corner and strolled through the large castle gardens, thoroughly enjoying the scenery in all directions. From the garden, we emerged into a square with the old palace and some other buildings, before going into a castle gate. The architecture was brilliant, so many beautiful buildings with ornate details, that we were constantly stopping to take pictures.

And then we came out a dark passageway to stand in front of Saint Vitus' Cathedral (Katedrála sv Víta), and both uttered curse words in amazement.

I love a cathedral. In addition to my general religion nerdery, they're some of the oldest and most incredible buildings you'll get to see these days. I'm always impressed by them to some degree, but never so much as by this one. We braved the massive crowds to go inside, took even more photos, and just generally marveled at its literal awesomeness for a while. They still do mass there, and I can't even imagine how much more inspiring the place would be during a high mass. Neither Jody nor I have ever done particularly well with religion, but we agreed that if we had that capacity in us, worshiping in a place like that would certainly do it.

After the cathedral, we saw some more nice buildings, all seeming a bit less spectacular than they would have otherwise, and made our way out of the castle. Another metro journey back to hotel, a bit of shopping, some Indian food, and that's us pretty much done for the day.

Tomorrow we're off to another country that's in my genes: work for Jody and another week of vacation for me, back in Edinburgh.

Berlin

I'm writing this somewhere past the Germany-Czech Republic border, phone signal going in and out, on a train from Berlin to Prague. Surprisingly, I've managed to get Jody on another short flight for a long weekend abroad.

After spending a night in Edinburgh, we arrived in Berlin Thursday night, with much less flight anxiety than last time. We found our hotel and some Chinese food (Jody's preferred cuisine, regardless of location), then spent the rest of the evening watching football on television and planning our one full day in the German capital.

On Friday we awoke to a hot and sunny Berlin. Jody picked us up some egg sandwiches and croissants for breakfast while I showered and slathered on sunscreen, then we were off to enjoy the city, notes of the carefully plotted route around the city in hand.

But as I should have known, planning always leads to frustration.

The subway line meant to take us to our first destination had changed since the printing of my subway map, and now the trip planner might as well have said 'can't get there from here!' After much study of a more current map and wandering from station to station, I found a new route with a combination of 3 S and U trains, only to discover the S train we jumped on wasn't going anywhere. Luckily, a functional one finally came along and we made the journey to Checkpoint Charlie.

The checkpoint itself is a relic of the past with a background of the modern consumer world. The guard post stands in the middle of a bustling street, along with the old signage, a couple of museums, and a small portion of the wall left intact. Our city map had a dotted red line to show where the Berlin Wall had been, and it was a bit strange strolling casually back and forward across it during the day, unable to imagine how the same spot would have been when the wall stood.

Next, we hopped back on the subway to the Holocaust Memorial. It seems to go by various names in maps and guidebooks, but by any name, it's a powerful experience. The monument itself is a huge field of cement blocks varying in size, some small enough to sit on, some dwarfing the tourists walking the narrow path between them, all representing those murdered by the Nazis. Jody commented that he had expected there to be names inscribed, but I pointed out that record keeping was probably insufficient in that situation, which made it even more depressing.

From there we took a walk up the road to the Reichstag/Bundestag -- again I was unsure of the correct name to use -- which is an impressive building, but not terribly exciting. No one was allowed inside without an appointment and special clearance, and nothing much was happening outside.

We walked a bit further, grabbed a snack, and jumped another S train out to the Olympic Stadium where Jody had gotten us tickets to see Hertha Berlin versus Werder Bremen. Jody was gushing about how excellent "the atmosphere" would be, which made me slightly concerned that I would hate it. His idea of a fun football game is one with rowdy fans constantly singing and taunting the opposition, where I prefer excitement when something happens, but otherwise... sit down and shut up. Luckily we sat in the calm family section, right next to the crazy die hard Hertha fans, so he got his madness, and I got to sit undisturbed.

As it happened, while I was very glad not to be in their midst, I didn't find the hardcore fans annoying. Unlike the often nasty and antagonistic supporters of most teams, the fans were more positive and joyful about their team; it reminded me of the Bell Centre. Maybe it's because I was one of the home crowd, but I never saw any negativity from them in Montreal. The Boston fans said awful things, and the Montrealers just shook their heads and went on being in love with their Habs. Your poor decision of a team is your own business.

In the end, the game ended 1-1, and was fun to watch, high quality football. While we cheered for the home team like the polite unaffiliated visitors that we were, to my semi-knowledgeable eye Bremen looked the better team for most of the game.

We got back to the hotel after 11pm, exhausted from a long day in the sun (and 8 miles of walking, per the trusty Fitbit), but content that we'd done well in seeing Berlin.