A Weekend in Praha

We finally were able to take advantage of London's proximity to other European countries by traveling to Prague for the weekend.  The weekend started with a 3:15am wake-up alarm.  After a cab ride to a bus stop and an hour bus ride, we arrived at Luton airport.  It definitely made me miss DIA and the fabulous economy parking lot within walking distance of the airport.  We traveled to Prague via the Hungarian low-cost airline WIZZ Air.  Yes, the airline was as bad as the name makes it sound.  On the positive side, we were in the city center ready to begin exploring before noon.

Most of the sights in Prague are close to the city center making walking the main form of transportation for tourists.  They do have an extensive tram and subway system as well, but we only used the tram once during our trip.  Prague was relatively untouched during World War II so a lot of their amazing historic architecture was preserved.  Some of the main sights we saw included Prague Castle, Charles Bridge, Old Town Square, Tyn Church, Saint Nicholas Church, Wenceslas Square, and Old Town Hall with the Astronomical Clock.

We had a couple of traditional Czech meals during our trip.  We heard the front desk worker at our hotel describe Czech food to another couple as "like other European food but more fatty."  This was actually a pretty accurate description.  Things like goulash, dumplings, fried pork, and sausages were staples on the menus.  Definitely not something you would want to eat very often.  On a side note, this same couple also was really excited to try out the KFC in Prague which we found to be quite funny.  I guess we shouldn't laugh as we did make a stop at a TGI Fridays for one lunch which was probably one of the best meals we have had in the past three months (London food leaves a lot to be desired).  The best part of the Czech cuisine is by far their beer.  The most famous/popular brand is Pilsner Urquell.  The original Budwieser is also brewed in the Czech Republic.  We had many a half liter of Czech beer on this trip.

David and I agreed that Prague is one of our favorite European cities.  All the locals were really friendly and more than willing to speak English.  There were plenty of playgrounds in the city for Colin to burn off steam and most of the restaurants were very child friendly.  Prague does have a reputation for having a high number of incidents of pickpocketing so we were really careful with our possessions at all times and didn't have any problems. Below are a few photos from the trip.

Tyn Church and Old Town Square

Old Town Square at Night

Prague Castle

Old Town Hall and the Astronomical Clock

David at the top of Old Town Hall

Charles Bridge

Missing the USA

We recently returned from our first trip back to the US.  We visited the Outer Banks in North Carolina for a week to spend some time with David's family and attend his cousin Erin's wedding.  My parents were able to make it out there as well so it was great to spend some time with them too.  London is great but being back in the US made me realize how much I miss certain things at home.  I thought I would write a quick blog post on 10 things I miss.

1.  Family and friends - Of course, this one goes without saying.  Once again, we have an extra bedroom and bathroom at our place, and Colin and I would be more than happy to be your tour guide if you came to visit us in London!

2.  Target - Everyone who knows me, knows that Target is my favorite store. I insisted we stopped at Target shortly after our arrival in the US.  David said he was lucky to get out of there with a $200 bill.  This was mostly because I didn't have any room in my suitcase to buy anything else.  I think we are making up a lot of the money lost by me being a stay-at-home mom by not having a Target in London.  If I was a stay-at-home mom and had Target at my disposal, it would not be pretty (evidenced by the crazy amounts I spent there during my three months of maternity leave last year).

3. US Size Appliances - As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, our washer and dryer is TINY and barely works.  It took me three days and 12 loads of laundry to get caught up after being on vacation for a week.  I do feel fortunate as our apartment is one of the few we saw with a US size refrigerator/freezer.  A lot of our friends here have dorm style fridges.

4.  Television - The TV shows here are AWFUL.  We have spent a lot of time watching reruns of shows such as "Friends" and "Two and a Half Men" since we have arrived.  Fortunately, we got a Slingbox hooked up with my sister and brother-in-law so now we can at least record our favorite shows and watch them through the computer.  It isn't exactly the same quality but much better than the TV schedule here.  On the positive side, I watch way less TV here.

5.  Sports - I am sorry but European football (soccer) and cricket are the two most boring sports in existence.  I miss my Badger and Packer football.  Checking the scores first thing when I wake up in the morning to see who won is a sad way to follow a season.  My poor sports fanatic husband is really suffering (I guess this is a positive too as we aren't stuck watching ESPN non-stop).

6.  Clothes shopping - I now see why Europeans come to America and spend a ton of money on clothes.  The shopping here is awful.  Everything is super expensive and/or not our style.  I can find some stuff for myself, but it is especially bad for men's and boy's clothes.  Everything is super tight.  I am not sure David or Colin are going to get into the skinny jeans look anytime soon.  It was heaven going to an outlet mall when we were back in the US.

7.  Cooking - Cooking is quite difficult here.  I am always on my computer looking at metric conversions.  Some things are a complete guess.  Butter comes in a 250 gram block so trying to figure out what is a 1/2 cup or other measurement is impossible when it isn't in the easily measured stick form.  Plus, our oven has some sort of fan that makes it super hot so I can't just convert the Fahrenheit temperature to Celsius or our food gets burned.  I have to subtract a certain amount of degrees - I have yet to find the proper adjustment for this so my cooking has not been the greatest.  Just when I thought I got rid of one problem living in Denver (I never figured out cooking at an altitude), I traded it for another.

8.  Customer Service - There seems to be a general lack of customer service here.  I am not sure if it is because the standard tipping is so much lower (10% at restaurants and nothing at pubs) so employees don't have an incentive to treat their customers well.  Everything moves really slowly.  I guess this is nice if you want a leisurely meal but not nice when you dine with an impatient 19 month old.

9.  Restaurants - The food at restaurants is mostly terrible.  I am sure there are exceptions to this (probably nice restaurants that don't welcome children).  I keep hearing "but the Indian food is fantastic."  The problem is that neither David nor I can stand the thought of eating Indian food again after our extended stays in India for work.  Steak is especially bad here.  I don't think we will make the mistake of ordering steak at a restaurant here again.

10.  Cost of Living - Everything is CRAZY expensive in London.  I find for the most part that things cost the same amount of pounds here that they would cost in dollars at home.  The problem is that one pound is 1.6 dollars so this means that everything is 60% more expensive.  This is not counting housing which is even more insane and around three times what we paid at home.

Don't get me wrong, I love living in London and feel very fortunate that we get this experience.  However, I think I will be happy when we return to the US in two years.  I will have to refer to this blog post then when I am missing London! 

Here are a few pictures of Colin from our trip to the Outer Banks.

Cheese!

Yummy ice cream!

Beach Bum