Western Czech Republic: Carlsbad, Ceske Budejovice, and Cesky Krumlov

The western and south western part of the Czech Republic has some simple but very charming little towns.  We toured through Karlovy Vary, Pilsen, Ceske Budejovice, and Ceske Krumlov. 

Karlovy Vary is a famous spa town known for its hot springs.  The town is situated along a the banks of the Tepla river.  With its colorful facades and quiet promenades, the city definitely feels fit for the many famous names that have gone there over the centuries. 

Cesky Krumlov is a UNESCO town located on a tight curve of the Vltava River.  It is really a very cute town, though it is quite small.   It is very well known for its castle.

Dresden

Dresden is a beautiful city, but at the same time is strange to visit.  It seems to be an old city, but the reality is that it isn't.  The whole city was leveled by the British and American Air Forces during the Second World War.  The bombing of the city is well known, because although the city was a center for communications and manufacturing, the level of destruction was excessive.

If you look online for photos of the city after the bombing, you will see that the entire old city center was flattened.  There was no differentiation between military and civilian zones.  Nothing was left untouched.

Today you go to the city and it is hard to tell that everything was reconstructed less than 100 years ago.  Many of the buildings have been rebuilt as they were before, and the center of the city has the feel of an old city.

You can see here on the Frauenkirche which parts of it are from the original church.  Any dark colored blocks were salvaged from the rubble when the city was flattened by the British and American forces.

Berlin

The best part of visiting Berlin is its history.  For a city in Europe it is not really very spectacular, but there are so many wonderful museums about the war and the separation of Germany.  Our favorite museum - the main museum I would suggest to anybody visiting there - is the German-Russian Museum.  It is a small museum and is not normally suggested by tourist offices.  At the time of our visit this museum was free to visit, though I do not know if it still is.  This museum covers the war relations between Germany and Russia during the Second World War.  There are numerous exhibits covering the battles and propaganda of both sides.  I don't think any other museum in Berlin covers the Eastern Front so thoroughly.

We stayed with two different hosts in Berlin.  One was a native Berliner who grew up in West Berlin.  We stayed in his lightly furnished and coal fire heated apartment for a couple nights and really grew to enjoy his company. 

Our other host was a man from Uzbekistan who lived in a beautiful little apartment with his two canaries.  The canaries lived free the the apartment and were super affectionate with their owner.  They were very cautious of us, but they were also very curious.  Every morning I would wake up on the couch with the two of them staring down at me from the top of the cushion.

This Uzbekistani worked remotely as a computer programmer for a company in Austria.  One night he began to tell us about his awesome boss who had a huge house near Salzburg with an indoor pool.  Remember when I told you to remember the house in Salzburg we stayed at?  Well I wanted you to remember that place, because that was the boss of this Uzbekistani!  By complete coincidence, just weeks apart, we stayed with both of them.  It was a wonderful surprise.

What little is left of the Berlin Wall is covered in graffiti.  Much of the wall was torn down, some of it was shipped to other cities as memorials, but there are still some large chunks left.

Romantische Strasse

The Romantische Strasse (Romantic Road) is a route going north-south from Würzburg to
Füssen.  This route is pretty touristic and possibly most interesting to middle-aged married couples, but we drove it as an interesting way to get from München up to Berlin and Dresden.  The route is composed of numerous castles and cute towns.  After a while it may become a bit repetitive to see timber framed houses and citadels, but it is a wonderful way to cross Germany.

This family was singing Christmas songs on the street.  The crowd that had gathered was enormous.  Everybody was amazed by this little boy playing the drums singing his heart out.

Salzburg and The Most Extravagant Couchsurfing

Anybody who has seen the film adaptation of The Sound of Music will recognize Salzburg.  This city was one of the major filming sites for the film.  Salzburg is also the birthplace of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

Salzburg is elegant city of many Renaissance and Baroque (one of my favorites) style buildings.  Walking the old centers of Germanic cities during December is especially wonderful, because there is always a Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas market).  There you can by arts and crafts, eat a bratwurst, and drink some glühwein (mulled wine).  It never grew old for me.

The city of Salzburg was nice, but the best part of our stay in the area was where we couchsurfed.  Outside of town we were in for a surprise - our host's house was enormous.  It even had an indoor pool and sauna.  To date this is the most luxurious place we have ever stayed.

*The man who hosted us owned a computer programming company.  This is very relevant for a story I will tell in the future, so don't forget!

Liechtenstein

Teeny tiny countries that have more businesses than people.  Liechtenstein is one of many.   We spent just an afternoon driving across the country.  We hiked to one of the castles and looked over the valley bottom.  The country is very narrow, and the eastern side is quite steep.  There is no real border between Switzerland and Lichtenstein.  It does not have its own currency; they use the Swiss Franc.