You Can't Get Lost

 The way my cruise schedule worked, Thursday, Day 1, is the day we arrived in Prague.  Friday, Day 2, is when we had our walking tour of Prague, which I really enjoyed.  Today, Day 3, is the day we had on our own to take other tours, sleep or site-see on our own.  I was planning to do Rick Steve's Jewish Prague walk.  In fact, last night after the opera when I walked back to OldTown, I located the first and last Synagogues on the tour.  Except Day 3 is Saturday, or Shabbot, the Jewish Day of Rest.  And guess what, Jewish Synagogues and Cemeteries are CLOSED on Saturdays.  Kinda changed that decision.   When I realized that, i decided to work on the blog in the morning.  I had all kinds of problems with my cell phone network and loading pictures from my phone to my computer.  To the extent that I ended up losing several hours of writing about the Friday tour.....I will get back to it.   I initially felt good enough to ...

 Wow!  It's been quite a day, so far.  And its not over yet. I'm going to be quick here to start, because I have reservations tonight at The State Opera for performances of I Pagliacci and Cavalleria Rusticana, or as they are better know, Pag and Cav.  They are almost always staged together as they are a little shorter and composed around the same time.  They aren't Czech, but they are main stays of the repertoire, and I could get tickets back i November.  And I plan to get an "authentic" Czech dinner about two blocks away.  Sadly, that precludes having Czech beer with dinner, as my lack of sleep and walking for about four hours this morning doesn't need to be augmented by sleep inducing spirits.  Maybe I'll come back to the hotel and have one at the Cloud Bar on the top floor overlooking the city.  (And it will be my first beer in a month or two anyway.  Not a big deal, but when in Prague.....)  And my guide this morning taught us ...

 In rereading, I've noticed that I may have been a little verbose.  I've had a lot of sitting time and I feel, a lot to talk about, at least for now.   And I'm so dogged tired, I'm falling asleep while I'm typing.  I'm calling this Day 1 because that's what Viking is calling it.   Heathrow Airport in London is huge,  no surprises there.  I had taken the shuttle bus from Terminal 5, the big international terminal to Terminal 3. the big regional terminal.  This was about 10:00.  The flight wasn't until 14:00, or 2:00.  I located one of the flight boards, and it indicated that it would announce the gate at 13:15.  That was 45 minutes before flight time.  It did give me time catch up on the blog while trying to recharge some batteries, and have lunch.  I ate at a kind of fancy Sushi place.  I had a Korean Barbeque Chicken over rice, which was surprisingly good, comfortably hot and very filling.   I was...

The Trepid Traveler! It’s 9:15 AM on April 2nd and it’s already been a fateful day.  Well, it really started last night.   I have been searching and researching this trip for months, really since October.  I’ve looked up places to go and cities/towns that I want to visit for various reasons.  When I’d find an interesting site or sight, I’d print it out and throw it in my file (which is just a stack of paper sitting on top of one of the cardboard boxes full of other stuff in my office and close enough to my desk that most of what I toss to the pile doesn’t end up on the floor).  That included walking tours, tickets to events and trains, guides, tours that I wouldn’t take but listed good things to know, numerous important emails from Viking (90% of which was repetitious), etc.   I did my first sorting in February, culling what I could and ended up with about a stack of paper about 3/8” thick in a 3-ring binder.  I started my final sorting and putting in ...

 Hey Everybody, It's April and I have another big trip set up!  This one started back last October and has been building pretty much every day since.   I'm going back to Europe for five weeks. Sadly, I won't hit Norway this time, but I have been there twice in the last two years. In fairness, I really should go somewhere else, so I am.  I'm starting with a trip that Sally and I had talked about a lot over several years and would have done before now, if it had been in the cards.   I'm starting with the Viking Grand European Tour .   Tomorrow (Wednesday, 4/2/20205), I'm flying to Prague, where I'll spend three nights.  Then, I'll be transported to Budapest and start the actual cruise.  There will be two nights in Budapest, two nights in Vienna, and then a portion of each day in each port in the map above to Amsterdam (Sunday, 4/20/2025).  Then, I will spend (on my own not an organized tour): 2 nights in Amsterdam, 3 nights in Be...

The two dives yesterday were really good.  This morning, there were only five of us on the boat (plus Pepe and Ricardo and the pilot, who I'm sure has no name, or voice.  We finally got him to wave at us as we got off the boat this afternoon).   I didn't get a picture of the two guys sitting across from us.  They were two brothers who I would guess to be about 72 and 75.  They were both attorneys.  On Tuesday, we did "where are you from" introductions and they said they were from Fargo, ND.  The young lady on the boat that day was from Minneapolis and was a niece of theirs.  Steve said he was from Denver and I said Laramie.  The social brother asked if I was with the university and I said yes, I was a professor in Civil Engineering for 34 years.  "Oh, do you know a guy named Norbert Svaboda-Colburg?"  "I know him a little, but I know his wife Patricia very well, she was in my department and we worked together a lot."  "Pat...

 Good writing dictates that you are suppose to start with the small stuff.  It's been a long day, my back has hurt the last half of it, and dad-gum-it, I want to show this.  I'll fill in the filler later, like tomorrow.   OK, time to back up.  Diving on Thursday and Friday have been great, the days you remember later and make you want to come back.   We saw lots and my camera worked somewhat on the first dive. These next two days will be mostly pictures, because the photos tell the story.  Our morning dive was to Palancar Deep.  Steve and I stayed fairly close together. (Remember, you can click on the photos to enlarge them!) First turtle sighting of the day.  That's pretty exciting.  You don't see them often.  But a little later: The second turtle sighting.  This is rare.  I don't remember ever seeing two turtles in one day, or one week. It's swimming between Pepe and Steve! There were a lot of fish!  The water ...