Nuremberg & Long Drive to Prague
Tuesday, June 2
I thought maybe I was lucky and got out of having a roommate, but she showed up at like 9:00 pm last night. She's super friendly and easy to talk to. Younger than me and just finished med school to be an orthopedic surgeon. Fancy. She seems pretty focused on spending time with her parents who she came with, which is fine with me! Unfortunately, she snores--so tonight I'll be sleeping with my earbuds in.
Good news: I found my phone charging cord last night! Thought I lost it, but actually I am just an idiot. However, in a very recent development, I'm fairly certain that I left my camera cord at Joyce's. Sad about this because I like uploading pictures at the end of each day. I guess it'll have to wait til I get home...
We had to leave our luggage outside of our door at 7:20 this morning (to be loaded up on the bus), so kind of an early start at 6:45 am. Buffet breakfast was included with the tour, so I had some bacon, sausage, fruit, a smoothie, and some kind of bread roll. Boarded the bus and left Munich at 8:20 and started making our way to Nuremberg (Nurnberg). We had about a 2.5 hour drive and we were dropped off in the Christkindlmarket, which is in the city center and is a fresh food market with a beautiful fountain (currently under construction) and a gorgeous church. We were there when the clock struck noon and there were bells and a little ditty that the church clock tower went through. I look a short video of it.
I went into the church and observed people being Catholic (ha). I looked at the food stands, visited some nearby shops, bought a pretzel for 60 Euro cents (65 US cents) from a street vendor for lunch, and walked up a very steep hill to the Nuremberg Castle. It was free to go in up until a certain point--luckily the "free" part had a pretty good view of the city. A couple of shops had nutcrackers! I am a nutcracker collector and thought seriously about buying one, but they were pretty expensive. Nuremberg is known for Christmas ornaments, as well, but I didn't see one that would go on my gingerbread house-themed tree.
We are now at the hotel in Prague. Several people in my tour group elected to go on an optional Czech dinner thing tonight, but I didn't want to spend the extra $52 for it. Luckily the hotel has a couple of restaurants and the one I ate at was reasonably priced. We aren't close to the city center, so there's not much for me to do tonight unless I want to hop on the metro and I don't really want to negotiate that on my own. It's getting late, anyway!
I've talked with a few of the couples on the tour somewhat consistently. We have couples/families from Vancouver, Atlanta, Virginia, India, the UK, Australia, Indonesia... I'm sure there are others. Mostly I've talked to the couples from Vancouver and Atlanta because they sit by me on the bus.
Tomorrow is a lot of sightseeing in Prague!
I thought maybe I was lucky and got out of having a roommate, but she showed up at like 9:00 pm last night. She's super friendly and easy to talk to. Younger than me and just finished med school to be an orthopedic surgeon. Fancy. She seems pretty focused on spending time with her parents who she came with, which is fine with me! Unfortunately, she snores--so tonight I'll be sleeping with my earbuds in.
Good news: I found my phone charging cord last night! Thought I lost it, but actually I am just an idiot. However, in a very recent development, I'm fairly certain that I left my camera cord at Joyce's. Sad about this because I like uploading pictures at the end of each day. I guess it'll have to wait til I get home...
We had to leave our luggage outside of our door at 7:20 this morning (to be loaded up on the bus), so kind of an early start at 6:45 am. Buffet breakfast was included with the tour, so I had some bacon, sausage, fruit, a smoothie, and some kind of bread roll. Boarded the bus and left Munich at 8:20 and started making our way to Nuremberg (Nurnberg). We had about a 2.5 hour drive and we were dropped off in the Christkindlmarket, which is in the city center and is a fresh food market with a beautiful fountain (currently under construction) and a gorgeous church. We were there when the clock struck noon and there were bells and a little ditty that the church clock tower went through. I look a short video of it.
I went into the church and observed people being Catholic (ha). I looked at the food stands, visited some nearby shops, bought a pretzel for 60 Euro cents (65 US cents) from a street vendor for lunch, and walked up a very steep hill to the Nuremberg Castle. It was free to go in up until a certain point--luckily the "free" part had a pretty good view of the city. A couple of shops had nutcrackers! I am a nutcracker collector and thought seriously about buying one, but they were pretty expensive. Nuremberg is known for Christmas ornaments, as well, but I didn't see one that would go on my gingerbread house-themed tree.
After about 2 hours in Nuremberg, we were back on the bus for about 4 hours to Prague. That sounds long, but the time went pretty fast. Took in all the sights of the German and Czech countryside--pretty fields and rolling hills (mountains?), cute houses and towns.
I've talked with a few of the couples on the tour somewhat consistently. We have couples/families from Vancouver, Atlanta, Virginia, India, the UK, Australia, Indonesia... I'm sure there are others. Mostly I've talked to the couples from Vancouver and Atlanta because they sit by me on the bus.
Tomorrow is a lot of sightseeing in Prague!