What we learned first: don't use Eurail if you can get everywhere you want to go by air. We spent a LOT of time on the train. The countryside is lovely, but in the end we saw too much.
I am glad we travelled once by Eurail, but probably never again. Blazo is still complaining about lugging our huge suitcase up and down stairs every time we changed trains. And I wasn't alert enough to think about what "direct" meant --- "not direct" means you change trains. Salzburg to Prague involved three changes, once because of the border and the other two simply because of a change from intercity trains to local trains. Our last train was direct Prague to Budapest but was filled with students on their way to some sort of tournament (they were carrying what looked like hockey pucks) so no one was too comfortable. At least we were better off that the student who had to sit sideways because we had already put our suitcase where he could have expected to put his feet.
Our biggest mistake was paying 20 Euros to go from the Prague train station to our hotel, a walking distance of 400 meters, although longer by car. I think now that he quoted us 20, meaning krone (about a dollar) and I made a mistake to say "Euros?" in disbelief. But we were too tired to argue when he said "yes, Euros".
We bought a 3 day pass on the Prague metro and never once were asked to show it. So we were too casual in Budapest, and got fined about 15 Euros for being without a ticket. Live and learn.
I took a few pictures with my digital camera which I will edit soon and add to this.
Click on the thumbnail pictures below to see them full-sized; then use the Back button to return to the text.
We booked Hotel Trumer Stube on the internet. Lots of hotels have web sites. Most of them use email to actually take the reservations, so they don't have data bases behind their web sites. It was convenient to the sights, which means it was close to several churches. (Salzburg has 40 Catholic churches, quite a large number for a relatively small town.) There was no sleeping after 7 a.m., when the church bells start competing.
Just a few doors down from our hotel, we saw a sign that we
still don't understand:
Salzburg is the birthplace of Mozart, so of course we visited the house in which he was born and took in a dinner concert with pretty-good food and a pretty-good performance between each course.
Salzburg's major industry before tourism was the salt mines. Now the tourists
can put some rough clothing on over their regular clothes and take a tour
through the salt mine. That was fun.
No one ever explained why working in the salt mines is supposed to be such a dreadful place. However, they did explain why you shouldn't be the guy on the barge taking salt to Salzburg --- they only hired nonswimmers, to be sure that they would be VERY careful with the barge. So if a problem did occur, the bargemen drowned.
The old city is well sized for walking around. We took a bus tour which
made much of the fact that the movie The Sound of Music was filmed in Salzburg.
The fortress or castle at the top of a hill. We took the funicular
up, and regretted that we walked down --- it was quite a ways.
Cathedral of St. Nikolas:
Skyline from the dome of the Cathedral of St. Nikolas.
Blazo did most of the picture taking in Prague.
His 35mm photos will probably wait until September.
Here we are enjoying Czech goulash.
Museum in Prague at the end of Wenceslas Square:
Looking down Wenceslas Square from the museum:
We bought a 3 day pass for the metro and took it everywhere. We saw all the major tourist sites, and they are just a blur. I will have to get out the guide to refresh my mind on what we saw. Blazo was eager to see Prague because it was undamaged during World War II. However, many buildings were damaged by fire on many occasions, and when they were rebuilt, typically they were rebuilt in the current style rather than their original style.
Before World War II there were 120,000 Jews in Prague. Now there are 6,000. Several of the synagogues have been turned into very interesting museums. The Old-New Synagogue (originally called the New Synagogue, it acquired its current name when the next one was built) is the only one that is simple --- all the others are decorated.
Some of the convents have been converted into museums and many exhibit religious art. We saw so many Madonnas and Christs we had to give up on museums.
We spent only one day here. We took a bus tour to get oriented to the sites,
then walked and took the metro (the oldest in Europe) around. The inside of the
Opera House is gorgeous --- sorry, they don't let you take pictures inside.
Not a single surface is without decoration.
According to our guide, Franz Liszt (Liszt Ferenc to the Hungarians) did not speak the Hungarian language, only German (the official language at the time) and a bit of French. But he thought of himself as Hungarian, so Hungary thinks of him as their native son.
There is a funicular to take you up and down from the Buda castle. It is usual
of course to put castles on hills because they are easy to defend. What is
unusual is that the Pest side of the Danube River is very flat.
This was a nice change from the heroic statues: some successful
hunters with their quarry and their dogs. On the right is a separate
statue of a woman with a small deer; presumably she is protecting the deer from
the hunters.
Heroes' Square: I think this is my favorite statue. Imagine being
a peasant living a simple life and having these guys come out of nowhere.
Especially the horse decorated with antlers.
The view from the dome of the Basilica of St. Stephen.
The guidebook said that it is not truly a basilica, but that is what
everyone calls it.
I think these views are from a place called the Citadel, where the
bus tour gave us a camera stop.
The chess set in the lobby of our hotel was the only high point
of an otherwise lackluster and badly designed hotel. Our room
was spacious but the two windows opened onto a corridor so any
passerby could look in. And no elevator --- poor Blazo got to
carry our suitcase up two flights of stairs.
We didn't have enough time to go shopping --- I had hoped to buy a lifetime supply of paprika for everyone. We did try Hungarian goulash (as well as Czech goulash).
We had dinner at the Intercontinental Hotel and watched the lights come on
on the Buda side of the Danube. Very tastefully lighted.
Copyright © 2003 by Mary Sredanovic. All rights reserved.
