Just a little something to think about...

I dwelt in a city enchanted,
And lonely indeed was my lot;
Though the latitude’s rather uncertain,
And the longitude also is vague,
The persons I pity who know not the City
The beautiful City of Prague.
- William Jeffery Prowse

Madame Bovary

So, I've been reading the classic novel, "Madame Bovary". It's been really good so far! I haven't had a whole ton of time to read because of school and traveling and such so typically in my spare time I'm reading for class and such. However, whenever I choose to not study and be a nerd, I read it on my kindle. It's really nice that it just sits there waiting for me haha. I mean, I know a regular book does that too, but I think I've started like 5+ books or so and they're all just chilling on my Kindle waiting. Anyway, it'll be fun and what not.

On a little side note, I'm going to Florence tomorrow!!! SOOO excited. The gelato, the Duomo, the museums, everything. I cannot wait. Pictures to come!!

Whoops! Forgot to add pictures...

The actual Temple Bar, in the area of Dublin called Temple Bar haha.

Half Penny Bridge at night.

View from Half Penny Bridge at Dusk

Kilmainham Gaol, this is where the political prisoners were executed by firing squad.

The "new" area of the gaol.

Guinness Storehouse!

Flower Market in Dublin on Grafton St.

First Picture of Dad in Dublin!!

The leaves are turning all around the CR, this is in Moravia though.

That 2kc piece there is mine, and it means that I'll be going back to that wine cellar in my lifetime =]

Attempting to get the water all the way to the top. Oh and the bucket of water was on the ground, so that's how far it has to travel too.

The entrance to our wine cellar dinner/wine tasting!

Beautiful doorway to a church.

This was in the caves. It used to be one huge cave, but the ceiling collapsed a loooong time ago and made it this beautiful area that it is now!

Some of the columns formed by stalagmites and stalactites.

Dad in his favorite place in Prague... Petrín Hill!

Moravia

I dropped my dad off at the airport Friday morning at like 4 am, came back to my dorm and slept until 930. Why didn't I sleep longer? Because I had to get up and pack for Brno!! Brno is the capital of the Moravia region of the eastern Czech Republic. We met in the lobby at 1030 am, then we jumped on a bus and went off to Tišnov to see a cloister. It is one of the oldest buildings of it's type in the CR. The church gate was absolutely AMAZING and decorated so intricately that it seems weird to know it was built over 500 years before USA was a country haha. The gate is called Porta Coeli or "Gate to Heaven". After we saw that, we headed into Brno to check into our hotel. We literally had about an hour there before we had to jump back on the bus to drive to dinner. We all assumed it wasn't too far to dinner, we were all wrong. It was over an hour to dinner and we were all STARVING. However, when we learned that there would be wine tasting involved, our tunes changed. They didn't give us a lot of food, but we definitely made up for the lack of food in how much bread we ate and wine we drank. There was about 20 or so of us, and we drank a SOLID 10-15 bottles of wine. The wine was made by the mayor of this little town, and we were in his private cellars. It is all traditional Czech wine and is all grown and made in this town. Out of the 10-15 types we tried, there was only 1 I didn't like, and that's because it smelled fricking rotten. Yuck. Anyway, other than that one they were all good and amazing and delicious. Then we went upstairs and there was a little competition waiting for us up there. We had to see who could pull the most water out of a bucket with one of those glass wine barrel taster things with the breath in their mouth. You had to suck the water up this LONG tube and then fill up the center part (which was about the size of an old school round canteen) and take it all the way to the top. Whoever could do that would win a bottle of wine. Well, since no one could get it all the way to the top, the guy and girl that got the closest got it. Anywayyy, after that we went down into the wine cellar where he stores his wine, and he told us some more history and we got more wine and then he said that if you stick a coin on the wall and it sticks, then you'll be destined to come back. Naturally, I did it. IT STUCK. It's happening, I'm going back. I have photographic proof that it stuck. Anyway, after all of this, we got to buy bottles of wine. Take a guess how much they were. $10? $20? WRONG. 70 krowns each... that's less then $4 a bottle, for AMAZING wine. I can't even explain how happy this made me... so I bought 4 bottles, and drank one with my friend Allison that night haha.

The next day we got up and did a bunch of touring and what not. We did Gregor Mendel's garden (you know, the wrinkly yellow pea guy? father of genetics? Ya, him), the Slavkov hill where the Battle of Austerlitz was fought by Napoleon against the Austria and Russia and just annihialated them. Take THAT, guys. Anyway, after that we went up to the Memorial of Peace on Prace Hill, which is the war memorial commemorating the loss of lives in the Battle of Austerlitz. After we did that, we went back to Brno and did a little walking tour of the city. We saw city hall, St Peter and Paul's Cathedral, St. James Church, main town square, etc etc. I also got to try burčak (which is "young wine" that is highly potent in alcohol content and tastes like lemonade for the white and grape juice for the red. Amazing stuff. THEN, we headed back to the hotel for the evening. Allison and I were going to go down to the bowling alley, but we decided to finish our bottle of wine from the night before, and Andrew and Michaela joined us and we stayed up til somewhere around 2 am just talking, telling real life ghost stories, talking about movies and things of that nature. It was a really awesome night.

The next day, we had to be checked out of the hotel at 930 am and when we got to the bus, we headed over to like 5 other towns to see churches and things like that. The first one we saw was the "Pearl of Moravia" church in Křtiny, which is considered one of the most beautiful baroque churches in Europe. After that we went on over to the town called Adamov to see the altar at their church there and it was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. EVER. So amazing. I didn't get a picture because we weren't supposed to take any, but google "St Barbara's Church, Brno altar" and you should get a picture of it. After that, we went to the Moravian Karst cave complex, and into the Punkva section of them. We walked through them for about 40 minutes, and then we took a little boat through for the rest. It was sooooo amazingly beautiful to see the stalagmites and stalactites and then the stalemates which is the meeting of the 2. Check out my facebook to see more pictures of those, because I won't be able to post too many.

All in all, the trip to Moravia was a really awesome one that had it's up and downs, like any other, but overall it was awesome!

Next weekend, Florence! Absolutely CANNOT wait for that!! ITALY!!!!!

Dublin

AKA The Emerald Isle. Well. I didn't see ANY green while I was there. The city itself is really nice, the people are friendly, they speak ENGLISH (which was a huge relief for me), and all in all it was a really great time. Especially since I met my Dad there!!! That was sooo much fun!! I missed him so much and it was amazing to be able to have this experience with him! He met me at the airport at midnight when my flight came in (such a good Dad), then we went back to the hotel and went downstairs to the bar for a few beers. After that, we crash out.

Day 1: We got up at liiiiike 10 am because I was tired and apparently Dad was jetlagged, since typically he's up at 630 or so at the latest. So that was nice. But then we went down to Grafton St to have some breakfast since we slept through the free breakfast our hotel offers and had an amaaaazing bacon egg and cheese sandwich at this cool cafe. After that, we wandered around Grafton St for a while (which is the big shopping area). Once we were done just meandering, we went back to the hotel so I could grab my camera, and then set off to find a bus stop for the red bus "hop on hop off" tours. The tour was really fun, we took the whole thing around without getting off just so we could get a feel for the city. We saw Trinity College, St Stephen's Green (a big park), the zoo, Guinness, Jameson, Kilmainham Gaol, and a TON of other stuff. Once we were done with that, we were both pretty tired but we grabbed a hotdog and then headed back to the hotel for a nap. Once we woke up from the nap, I was STARVING as always when I get up from anything. So we set off into Temple Bar to find somewhere to eat. Let me tell you a little bit about Temple Bar... It's about a 8-10 square block area just FILLED with bars and restaurants. We walked around for a bit before we picked a place. We had our dinner and a few drinks there, and then we just meandered around Temple Bar watching the street performers and the drunk people dancing jigs and such. It was a really fun time and the people were very interesting, but in a good way! We headed back to the hotel at about 12:30 or so and crashed out.

Day 2: We got up pretty early this morning (thanks to Dad adjusting quickly I guess...) and it was so early that breakfast wasn't even open yet!! So we headed down to Grafton St to have some breakfast. We ended up at BK. Quick, cheap, easy, done. So then we went back to the hotel so we could grab all of our stuff, and headed out to the bus stop again (our tickets were valid for 48 hours).

This time we got off at the Guinness Storehouse stop first. Guinness was So awesome! Their tour was a self-guided tour but it was totallyyyy worth it. The info was good, the visuals and stuff were really good, and there wasn't really ever a dull moment. Once you finished the making of the beer process, they give you a little taste of Guinness Draught, their original. We thought that was the "free beer" that comes with the tour, which would have been lame because it was like 2 sips worth. After that, you walk through another hallway and you realize that you're only on floor 3 out of 6. So there are floors about advertising and marketing, transportation of Guinness, barrel making, and the exportation to other countries. This part wasn't as interactive as the beer making part, but that's okay because it was still really interesting. Especially when it said that in 2003 (I think!) Guinness had launched a rally trying to get March 17th to be a national holiday in USA haha. It failed, but I'm sure they'll try again! After all of that, we went up to the very tippy top of the Guinness Factory to the Gravity bar, which is the highest pub in Dublin, and we collected our free Guinness pints. Dad couldn't finish his (he actually highly dislikes Guinness), and I only finished mine because I really felt like I had to haha. I like Guinness, but I don't love it. I would NEVER order it of my own accord and drinking an entire pint was hard for me.

Next stop, Kilmainham Gaol! This gaol (the Irish way of spelling "jail") was really awesome. It was built in 1796 as the "New Gaol". It functioned as a gaol for 128 years, and ended up closing it's doors for good in 1926, after being reopened in the early 1900s to serve as a jail for political prisoners, including the people for the Easter Rising in 1916. The youngest prisoner said to have ever served there was a 7 year old buy for 3 months because during the potato famine he stole a loaf of bread. The jail was really interesting, but I guess I thought there was going to be more ghost stories or something. I liked it, but since everyone said it was the "best tour in Dublin" and we "have to take it"... I expected more. It made for some nice pictures though.

And finally, Jameson Distillery! This place was really cool! The building was a lot smaller than I expected though, I expected something HUGE like how Guinness was (it was like 42 acres or something) and it's just not as big. Which is fine, it does the job juuuuust fine. Their tour was wayyy more high tech. They had all kinds of videos and presentations, and stuff lit up and then other stuff lit up to accentuate facts etc etc etc. I mean, either way it was really cool. We got to hear how it was made, distilled, how they don't use new oak barrels, but they buy barrels from other types of liquor making places and then reuse their barrels after being brought up to Jameson standards. It was really interesting. Not to mention, we got free Jameson at the end. They gave it to you a few different ways. Either with cranberry juice, ginger ale, coke, or straight up orrrr on the rocks. This OLD guy was in front of me (we're talking like at least 80+) and he took his straight up and was hoarding it like someone was going to try and take it from him haha. So funny!!

After that, we went back to the hotel and napped again because getting up at 630 am just isn't my thing. So we after we went to dinner, took some pictures of cool stuff around Dublin at night, hung out in Temple Bar again, and just went to bed. But the place we went to dinner was sooo amazing. It was called "Mexico to Rome" and it was a mexican/italian food place. I got a starter of cheesy garlic bread, then a beef burrito, and some dessert that I can't spell. Dad got tomato and mozzarella with basil things for a starter, chicken something or other for dinner, and then tiramisu for dessert. I'm not typically a huge fan of tiramisu, but this was AMAZING. Anyway, we obviously did one of those "3 courses for 1 low price!" things. So that was awesome. I was very very happy.

All in all, Dublin was a great time, it was lovely to see my Dad but would I ever go back? No. I would go somewhere else in Ireland to see all of the rolling hills and beautiful countryside and stuff, but just for Dublin? Hell no.

BUT! The next day we went and got souvenirs and all of that, and then we boarded our flight to Prague and headed on over here! It was soooo nice to have my dad in Prague! It was really nice to be able to show him "my city" and have him see what I do on a day to day basis, plus he got a really good tour guide since I have been living here for about 2 months now. We did all the touristy stuff, but then we also went and did the non-touristy stuff. The stuff that I like to do and see and where I like to eat and what not. It was a ton of fun, all in all. It was really nice to see my dad getting out of Salinas and exploring the world. He keeps telling me how now he wants to go to Costa Rica and all these other places and all I have to say is "Do it Dad!! You deserve it!!" So I really hope he sticks with that =]

So busy.

The last 10-15 days have been insane. I have been so busy that I haven't even had a moment to tell you all what I've been up to! I'm going to post 2 separate posts on the adventures I've been having, so basically this is just to say I'm sorry for slacking and I will be attempting to keep up better from now on!

Budget

I just made a budget. I'm so proud of myself. I sat down with all of my money and figured out what the rest of my trips are going to cost, what food is going to be, going out money, Christmas money, hostel money, etc etc etc. Now, let's hope I can stick to it! I have a little bit of lenience in there, but I also pretty much overbudgeted for everything just in case. I need to make sure I come home with enough money to move into an apartment, otherwise I'll have to live with my dad again. No offense, Dad, love you to death... but I need a place of my own and we BOTH know this haha. Anyway, so if I can stick to this, I should be set for 2 months of living on my own just in case I can't find a job right away or something comes up. Hopefully nothing does and I get a job right away because then I'll have a little play money! Or I'll save it... that would be the smart thing to do I suppose. Damn. Oh well.

Say a little prayer (if you're into that sort of thing, if not just wish!!) for me and my budget, I'm probably going to need it!!!

Zurich update....

Well, Zurich would have been fun... If i hadn't read the ticket wrong and made us miss the train, resulting in not going to Zurich. Whoops.

This is literally the stupidest thing I've ever done in my life, and I messed up all of our travel plans. The girls were very nice about it, saying it couldh ave happened to anyone (which in my defense, it could have). The ticket read 19:30 and I read (in my silly American head) 9:30. Shit. Well.

Basically what happened is I paid them all back for the train booking fee ($25 to each person), and the $40 deposit fee for the hostel. The woman there was SUPER nice and didn't charge me for the first night like she was supposed to because 2 of the girls made a reservation for next weekend. So, thank god. I'm happy about how it all turned out. I ate $115, but it's better than the $400 I thought I was going to.

What it all means is that I have another weekend in Prague to go out here, and I don't get my boots that I wanted. I'm really bummed about the boots, but maybe someone will get them for me for Christmas. That's what I want! Bummer that I want the brown and black though haha.

Budapest!

So, this past weekend I took a little weekend trip to Budapest, Hungary with 3 other girls from my study abroad group. We had a really great time!

Some highlights:

FREE (yes, I said free) walking tour of the city
Getting lost, only to find some really great buildings!
The indoor market
Wine tasting
Train ride (my first!)
Night cruise on the Danube
Big Fish Hostel

Okay, soooo. From the top! The walking tour was sooo amazing!! Our tour guide, Agnes, was hilarious, very informative, educated, friendly, and all around great! On the tour we saw all of the major sights in Budapest (pronounced Budapesht). It was very nice because the day before we had gone on a hunt for this market thing we'd heard about, and we saw all of the same buildings but we didn't know what they were! Putting a name to the building and it's purpose was helpful.

The market. WOW. It was an indoor market in (what we think was) an old synagogue. Not 100% though. It was really great!! There was 100s of food vendors selling fruits, meats, strudels (which I of course took part in), clothes, lace doilies, souvenirs, etc etc. It was HUGE. Oh, and of course they had the traditional Hungarian paprika. Of course I bought some.

Wine tasting! One of my favorite hobbies!! Well, Hungary is known for it's wine and Palinka (I'll explain what that is in a minute). We went wine tasting and we tried a red, a white, and something called Tokoj. Tokoj is a sweet dessert wine that is only made in Hungary. It was AMAZING. It smelled like apples and pears and all of the good things in life. Naturally, I bought a bottle of that as well. YUM. Plus, no one in my family likes sweet wine! ALL MINE! =]
We had a little coupon saying that we got a free gift with the wine tasting. So we got to choose if we wanted another glass of wine or some Palinka. let me explain Palinka... It's a Hungarian brandy type liquor, but it's only made in Hungary with Hungarian fruit and it's very strictly regulated. There are laws protecting how Palinka is made... crazy. Anyway, so we opted for Palinka. I got plum, Amy got black currant, Michaela got pear, and Allison got strawberry. Out reaction when we all tried a sip?
HOLY SHIT!! IT BURNS!!
No joke... it was that bad. The aftertaste was fine, but MAN was it hard to drink. A good brandy is easy to drink, very smoother etc. This was just plain fire in the throat. Then we looked at the alcohol content... 46%. No wonder. So we finished off our glasses, and wandered back to the metro station, all slightly tipsy.

Oh! The train ride there!! It was my first train ride EVER and it was pretty fun. Nothing too spectacular happened, but that's okay. It was enough just to be on a train!

Night cruise on the Danube. It was sooo beautiful!! We went up and down the river between what used to be the two cities of Buda and Pest (before they became one) and saw all the lit up sights, buildings, bridges, etc. It was amazing! Freezing cold, but still really fun! I loved it.

Big Fish Hostel is the best hostel in the world. It was homey, comfy, clean, the staff was nice, they had food for us, homemade baklava (one of my favs!!), nice bathrooms, HUGE rooms, and it was amazing basically. The 4 of us had our own private room with 4 twin beds and a locked door, so we could leave our stuff in there if need be. The supplied us with sheets, blankets, pillows, EVERYTHING. Most hostels make you pay extra for all of that! Not to mention free wifi, they offered us TONS of food, baklava, wine, Palinka, and just great hospitality. It was a great stay in Budapest!

However, I am happy to be back in Prague and planning my next trip to......



ZURICH!!

We leave on Thursday, so I better go book us a hostel!