Off to Praha-or-Adventures in Czechoslovakia-or-Lost in Czechoslovakia
I am watcing Rick Steve's Europe as I start this, and I find it interesting how much more I am able to put myself into the scene now that I have been 'on the ground' recently myself, even though he is not in places I was able to go when I was there. It all looks more real somehow.
On Saturday morning I awoke around five am, a good hour before the three minute wake-up clamor of the six am church bells across the street. Harry was sound asleep, so I went quietly out to the sitting area and did my early morning scripture study, prayer and then just read for awhile. He was still sleeping, so I snuck in and got my shoes and camera and went for an early morning walk to one edge of town. The air was still cool and the shadows long. The streets were quiet. There were a few people on the street. I saw one woman come out of a house with a basket on her arm and walk two doors down and into the little grocery store. I saw several other women with baskets or shopping bags heading to or from the store or the bakery. Morning seemed to be the time to do the day's food shopping. At the edge of town I could see out over the fields and see part of the town from that perspective. I took a few pictures of that and the surrounding fields and woods. When I got back Harry woke up and we went to breakfast. Breakfast on the weekends starts at 8 am and lasts until ten. Weekdays there is an early breakfast for those who are heading to work, whether on road crews or to Vilseck for the military base. After a week of work, Harry was in no rush to get away early and without breakfast.
Breakfast was wonderful. The Buffet took up the entire wall on one end of the main breakfast room. First was a warm electric frying pan with eggs, either scrambled or fried. Every morning Owner Hans' 80 + year old mother comes from her nearby home, neatly dressed for the day and makes the breakfast eggs. She and Trudi (pronounced 'Traudi'), Hans's wife, and sometimes one of the local hired women service the breakfast room, bringing in coffee, tea and herbal tea, and providing omelets made to order on request. Trudi speaks good English and was the one person in Germany I was able to have extended conversation with.
Beside the eggs was a covered tray of sliced bread with a nearby toaster, then two big baskets of various brochen rolls, from kaiser rolls to whole grain rolls filled and studded with various seeds, including pumpkin seeds. Those were my favorites, but I also love the crispy on the outside, cloud soft on the inside rolls mom remembers so fondly. Platters of various thinly sliced meats and creamy mild cheeses were nearby, with cream cheese and wedges of pure fresh butter. Harry always stuffed a roll with meat and cheese and ate it as a sandwich, but I liked to butter half the roll and eat the meat and cheese European style with knife and fork. The second half was always for a spread of Nutella to finish off with.
There was also fresh fruit, yogurt, and carafes of milk, apple juice (apfel saft) and orange juice, and dispensers for several kinds of dry cereal. Some days there were also leftover slices of cake, cheesecake, or chocolate dipped waffles left from dinner the night before.
We took our time eating and then got ready to head out to Prague. From were we were it was a really reasonable distance to go to Prague, and made more sense to go there while we were staying in Edelsfeld. It wouldn't have been reasonable from Garmisch, which is much farther south. Prague is close enough that it is on the autobahn signs as a destination. It was between two and three hours drive away. On the way we stopped at an autobahn rest stop for fuel for the car and chocolate and soda for us. Here's the second decision point that created more adventure than we craved in the Czech Republic. The first decision point occured when I was still at home and suggested we get the European map set for my GPS. I found a deal on it for around $100. Reviewers said it would pay for itself in saved time and relief from aggravation. I believed that from past travel experiences with and without GPS with a good mapset. GPS info saved the day so many times! But Harry said that spending that much for two weeks was too much, and that there were good maps there that would be perfectly adequate. Only thing is, he didn't have his good maps this time, just the Germany, Czech, Austria map that came with the rental car. Rick Steves cautioned that a visit to Prague requires a really good map of the city. So I looked through the rack of maps at the Autobahn store and found one for Prague. I showed it to Harry, but he said that 7 Euros was a bit much for a map of one city, and we could probably get one free when we got there and found a tourist information site. Since the signs for tourist informations sites are fairly prominent, I hoped for the best.
So off we went, merrily on our way to Praha (that's the Czech word for it, much more fun than Prague, I think, sounds like laughing in another language). It was easy to find, the autobahn goes right there. Czechoslovakia isn't partof the European union, so we took our passports, prepared to go through a border check. Happily, the border there is no more trouble than going from Washington to Oregon. We sailed right past the abandoned border stations and on to Prague. Once there we tried to find a tourist information, but once in the confusing maze of streets it was hopeless. Then it was just try to find the the aldtstadt, which goes by a different name there, in Czech. With all the signs in Czech, I was more lost than usual.
We finally ended up in a very scary part of the city. We'd been warned about crime in Prague, and I didn't want to be in that part of town. Fortunately, Harry spotted a policeman strolling along on an industrial property, a very young man. I was pretty sure he wouldn't understand us or we him, but luckily he did speak some English, and he sent us right back around the way we'd just come. We wandered a bit more, looking for signs. Thank goodness Rick Steve's put the czech name for the aldtstadt in his description, because that's how we finally got close enough to finally feel confident to park. We went down into an underground parking garage, hopeful that it would be safer than parking on the street. It turned out to be a very fortunate choice. It was very secure, as it was attached to an upscale multi-level indoor mall. It was called The Palladium and was fairly new and full of great stores and a big food court. We got some information and a map and some Czech krones from an ATM machine. Whereas it was one Euro to $1.40, it was more like 20 Krones to $1.00, but nothing was less expensive when you figured out the exchange rate.
It was around eleven when we finally got parked, so we grabbed some lunch in the food court at a NordSee, a chain restaurant that is the usual one at German Autobahn stops. It was cafeteria style. Harry had fried shrimp and french fries and I had lovely baked salmon with dill sauce and mixed steamed vegetables with herbed butter seasoning. As I looked around, I saw no place featuring Czech food, but lots of exotics, like Indian, Greek, a Harley Biker themed bar, and a place called L.A. Finger Foods (Titled in Englsh not Czech) that looked like it had things like hot dogs, sandwiches and fries.
When we finally headed out to find the old town, we only had half a day to see the sights. My first objective was to see the medevial clock, which is really famous. At the stroke of the hour the square below the clock is crowded with tourists craning their necks for the striking of the clock. When that happens various actions are set into motion by ancient gears and works. It starts with a skeleton pulling a bell cord and turning over the hour glass of mortal time. Then two doors open at the top of the clock and the town fathers rotate by, paying their respects. The clock itself is a marvel of various rings that count the seasons, phases of the moon, and who knows what. There is also an astrological calendar, more recent under the main clock. We got there ten minutes before the striking of the hour and had a good view. I got video, but forgot that it can't be rotated afterwards and turned the camera sideways to take the video. Oh well.
We wandered around the historic square, following Rick Steve's tour info to identify churches, fountains and other buildings, then wandered around the area looking at other significant sights. Eventually we made our way to the Charles bridge, the most historic of the many bridges that span the river that bisects the city. The bridge has numbers of wonderful statues placed there over the years, each with its own history, one of which will grant one wish in a person's lifetime. one side of the bridge was under renovation, so it was extra crowded getting across it. A band was playing partway across, fun jazz. We'd heard another jazz band in the square, and decided this is a very jazzy city.
By the time we got to the other side, we were ready for a break. It was hot, and we'd done a lot of walking. We stopped at a little sidewalk cafe alongside the end of the bridge by the stone tower that marks the beginning of the bridge. Coke for Harry and Spaze for me, with a signature strawberry Praque dessert to go along with it. It was a nice break. There was a tourist information office in the round tower that was part of the bridge. We tried to get some directions for getting back on the right road out of town for heading home and got some scribbled directions and a tourist map of the city, that I didn't feel too confident about.
We then headed for a tram stop to catch a trap up to the Prague castle. It is located on a hill overlooking the old town, and would have been quite a hike up to it. We hopped on the tram expecting to pay for the ride, but I discovered in the guidebook on the way up that we needed to buy tickets at the tram stop. That was a little nerve wracking, but no one came around for tickets, so we got by. We did get tickets for the ride down, however. The castle was really a large collection of government buildings enclosed by a wall with a large interior square whose centerpiece was the St. Vitus cathedral. The guidebook said this was a must see, so I was determined we needed to get to it.
It was huge and very impressive on the outside. It was difficult to get an adequate picture, and we enede up in the far corner of the square with other camera toting tourists trying to do the same thing. There was a line being held back from entering, so we wandered a bit and sat and rested until the line was gone and we could go straight in. It was even more impressive inside. It was massively large inside as well, beautifully decorated everywhere with carving, stucco, painting, statues, side chapels, tombs, and everything a work of art. Every side chapel was overlooked by a huge stained glass window, one of which was done by a famous artist. That one and one other were mesmerizing to me. Around the whole circumference, every side chapel was another collection of impressive religious art. There was one tomb that was decorated with so much solid silver sculpture that there was actually nearly a ton of silver in the whole thing. We lingered a long time taking picutures as much as we could.
When we got done there and took a tram down, we headed for the main square to have some dinner before heading back. One of Harry's friends had recommended we eat at an outdoor cafe connected with a big hotel on the square. He'd had a seafood platter that he said was the best food he'd ever eaten. It was pretty expensive, but we figured it was a once in a lifetime experience. When we were done, Harry determined to ask the guy how much he'd been drinking when he had that meal. It was much less than the best seafood we'd ever had. The lobster was tough and tastless, and most of the other seafood as bad or worse. We were pretty disappointed. As Rick Steve's warned, the waiter was a master at padding the bill and we paid more than the already large amount we expected to pay.
We found our way back to the shopping mall and had an ordeal trying to get more cash from the ATM, which was out of the denomination we needed. It was difficult to understand directions to another alternative and we ended up in a bank where we got more cash than we needed and then found another ATM a few feet away. We were frustrated and tired when we got in the car, and tense and worried about finding a way out of the garage that would put us on the right street to connect with our directions for getting out of the city on the right highway. At the exit the gate wouldn't open, and Harry was led away by attendants who showed him where to pay at a machine and get a ticket to put in the exit machine. Sure enough, the exit put us on a road heading in the exact opposite way from where we needed to be with no way to get off and circle around to the right road. Right away we were over the river and into a tunnel that spit us out on a road that had one side closed down for construction, so we couldn't even retrace our steps. I could see where we were, but I couldn't find any way to get to the highway we needed. We drove on, with Harry insisting I give him directions, while I had nothing useful to tell him to do to get us where we needed to be. As we rounded a corner of a one way street with heavy traffic, he spotted a pair of Elders -missionaries. He swung to the curb, rolling down his window, and shouted, "Missionaries!" "Say 'Elders'" I prompted, and he did. They looked around then, startled, and we waved at them until they came over to us. One was from Oregon, the other from Utah. We were so glad to see them.
They puzzled with us over our little tourist map, and then said that the mission home was right there and they could go in and Mapquest us directions. We waited about twenty minutes as the sun set while they did that. They brought back maps and directions in Czech, somewhat translated, and said if we went on straight on the road we were on and followed the directions, we would connect with our highway. We were so relieved, but as we went forward we never saw the tunnel they talked about, so somehow missed the connection. We did find an entrance to a highway that had the right number, and listed the right destinatination, so we were relieved and gladly left the cities' rats nest of streets and freeways.
After twenty or thirty minutes, as I kept checking our map against the signs we were seeing, I realized we weren't on the right road after all. The road we needed angled efficiently towards our destination, SouthWest from Prague. The road we were on headed straight West. To get back on the right road meant retracing our route and entering the maze of city highways in the growing darkness with no real idea of how to connect once we got there. We really didn't want to do that. I could see that half way along to the next major city there was a road that went straight south and intersected our road soon enough before our own destination to end up ok. It meant traveling the right angle sides of the triangle rather than the direct angled side, but We thought it was the best alternative.
We were going far into the sparsely populated Czech farm country. There were small towns at intervals with lots of fields and woods in between, and no large towns at all. We found the turn and headed South. It was midnight and we were three quarters of the way down that leg of that road when we encountered a barrier over our half of the road. It was inconceivable that the road could end, since it was the main road South and there was no other real alternative to it. We actually had been seeing signs warning of this, but couldn't read them, so didn't understand what they were warning of. Finally we got to a place where we couldn't go on. The railroad tracks were being worked on and the road bed was all removed from between them. There was no way to drive over them without ruining the car. (side note: I'd had thoughts of using the WC at the time we met the missionaries, but decided to wait until we were on the autobahn. That was hours before, and by this time I was fairly desperate, but there was little I could do at that point) We were flummoxed. We had no idea a main road could be closed without any one there to direct or any alternative offered. For a bit I was at a loss, then I started looking for a way to backtrack and find a way around that wouldn't take us all the way back to Prague.
We headed back to the nearby town, and got ourselves mixed up there until we were actually headed back towards the edge of town again the same way as the blockade. I'm not sure why we were going that way again, but we sped by one of those big signs I'd been ignoring for miles and in that flash I saw the diagram of the road ending with a break and a detour going around to the left and reconnecting beyond the break. Harry had a hard time believing what I'd seen in that moment's view, but caved into my insistance that he make the next left hand turn. We didn't know the Czech word for Detour was, but I assumed that the sign there said something like that. Other cars were turning there, even at that late hour, and coming out towards us, and I took that as confirmation that this was a detour, since the town was asleep otherwise. The roads here were barely wide enough for two cars and wound through the countryside connecting towns here and there. When the road intersected it wasn't always clear which way was the detour, but we went by where the traffic was coming from, and stopped once to ask directions from a man leaving a tavern. We didn't share any words in common except our destination, and he motioned us the way we needed to go.
Eventually we connected back with our southbound road, and went on to intersect with the road home. Soon after, to my great relief we came to a rest stop. We got in to our gasthaus at 2 am, which was pretty late considering that Harry had to get up early to go to work the next morning.
So that's the story of Lost In Czechoslovakia....
I am watcing Rick Steve's Europe as I start this, and I find it interesting how much more I am able to put myself into the scene now that I have been 'on the ground' recently myself, even though he is not in places I was able to go when I was there. It all looks more real somehow.
On Saturday morning I awoke around five am, a good hour before the three minute wake-up clamor of the six am church bells across the street. Harry was sound asleep, so I went quietly out to the sitting area and did my early morning scripture study, prayer and then just read for awhile. He was still sleeping, so I snuck in and got my shoes and camera and went for an early morning walk to one edge of town. The air was still cool and the shadows long. The streets were quiet. There were a few people on the street. I saw one woman come out of a house with a basket on her arm and walk two doors down and into the little grocery store. I saw several other women with baskets or shopping bags heading to or from the store or the bakery. Morning seemed to be the time to do the day's food shopping. At the edge of town I could see out over the fields and see part of the town from that perspective. I took a few pictures of that and the surrounding fields and woods. When I got back Harry woke up and we went to breakfast. Breakfast on the weekends starts at 8 am and lasts until ten. Weekdays there is an early breakfast for those who are heading to work, whether on road crews or to Vilseck for the military base. After a week of work, Harry was in no rush to get away early and without breakfast.
Breakfast was wonderful. The Buffet took up the entire wall on one end of the main breakfast room. First was a warm electric frying pan with eggs, either scrambled or fried. Every morning Owner Hans' 80 + year old mother comes from her nearby home, neatly dressed for the day and makes the breakfast eggs. She and Trudi (pronounced 'Traudi'), Hans's wife, and sometimes one of the local hired women service the breakfast room, bringing in coffee, tea and herbal tea, and providing omelets made to order on request. Trudi speaks good English and was the one person in Germany I was able to have extended conversation with.
Beside the eggs was a covered tray of sliced bread with a nearby toaster, then two big baskets of various brochen rolls, from kaiser rolls to whole grain rolls filled and studded with various seeds, including pumpkin seeds. Those were my favorites, but I also love the crispy on the outside, cloud soft on the inside rolls mom remembers so fondly. Platters of various thinly sliced meats and creamy mild cheeses were nearby, with cream cheese and wedges of pure fresh butter. Harry always stuffed a roll with meat and cheese and ate it as a sandwich, but I liked to butter half the roll and eat the meat and cheese European style with knife and fork. The second half was always for a spread of Nutella to finish off with.
There was also fresh fruit, yogurt, and carafes of milk, apple juice (apfel saft) and orange juice, and dispensers for several kinds of dry cereal. Some days there were also leftover slices of cake, cheesecake, or chocolate dipped waffles left from dinner the night before.
We took our time eating and then got ready to head out to Prague. From were we were it was a really reasonable distance to go to Prague, and made more sense to go there while we were staying in Edelsfeld. It wouldn't have been reasonable from Garmisch, which is much farther south. Prague is close enough that it is on the autobahn signs as a destination. It was between two and three hours drive away. On the way we stopped at an autobahn rest stop for fuel for the car and chocolate and soda for us. Here's the second decision point that created more adventure than we craved in the Czech Republic. The first decision point occured when I was still at home and suggested we get the European map set for my GPS. I found a deal on it for around $100. Reviewers said it would pay for itself in saved time and relief from aggravation. I believed that from past travel experiences with and without GPS with a good mapset. GPS info saved the day so many times! But Harry said that spending that much for two weeks was too much, and that there were good maps there that would be perfectly adequate. Only thing is, he didn't have his good maps this time, just the Germany, Czech, Austria map that came with the rental car. Rick Steves cautioned that a visit to Prague requires a really good map of the city. So I looked through the rack of maps at the Autobahn store and found one for Prague. I showed it to Harry, but he said that 7 Euros was a bit much for a map of one city, and we could probably get one free when we got there and found a tourist information site. Since the signs for tourist informations sites are fairly prominent, I hoped for the best.
So off we went, merrily on our way to Praha (that's the Czech word for it, much more fun than Prague, I think, sounds like laughing in another language). It was easy to find, the autobahn goes right there. Czechoslovakia isn't partof the European union, so we took our passports, prepared to go through a border check. Happily, the border there is no more trouble than going from Washington to Oregon. We sailed right past the abandoned border stations and on to Prague. Once there we tried to find a tourist information, but once in the confusing maze of streets it was hopeless. Then it was just try to find the the aldtstadt, which goes by a different name there, in Czech. With all the signs in Czech, I was more lost than usual.
We finally ended up in a very scary part of the city. We'd been warned about crime in Prague, and I didn't want to be in that part of town. Fortunately, Harry spotted a policeman strolling along on an industrial property, a very young man. I was pretty sure he wouldn't understand us or we him, but luckily he did speak some English, and he sent us right back around the way we'd just come. We wandered a bit more, looking for signs. Thank goodness Rick Steve's put the czech name for the aldtstadt in his description, because that's how we finally got close enough to finally feel confident to park. We went down into an underground parking garage, hopeful that it would be safer than parking on the street. It turned out to be a very fortunate choice. It was very secure, as it was attached to an upscale multi-level indoor mall. It was called The Palladium and was fairly new and full of great stores and a big food court. We got some information and a map and some Czech krones from an ATM machine. Whereas it was one Euro to $1.40, it was more like 20 Krones to $1.00, but nothing was less expensive when you figured out the exchange rate.
It was around eleven when we finally got parked, so we grabbed some lunch in the food court at a NordSee, a chain restaurant that is the usual one at German Autobahn stops. It was cafeteria style. Harry had fried shrimp and french fries and I had lovely baked salmon with dill sauce and mixed steamed vegetables with herbed butter seasoning. As I looked around, I saw no place featuring Czech food, but lots of exotics, like Indian, Greek, a Harley Biker themed bar, and a place called L.A. Finger Foods (Titled in Englsh not Czech) that looked like it had things like hot dogs, sandwiches and fries.
When we finally headed out to find the old town, we only had half a day to see the sights. My first objective was to see the medevial clock, which is really famous. At the stroke of the hour the square below the clock is crowded with tourists craning their necks for the striking of the clock. When that happens various actions are set into motion by ancient gears and works. It starts with a skeleton pulling a bell cord and turning over the hour glass of mortal time. Then two doors open at the top of the clock and the town fathers rotate by, paying their respects. The clock itself is a marvel of various rings that count the seasons, phases of the moon, and who knows what. There is also an astrological calendar, more recent under the main clock. We got there ten minutes before the striking of the hour and had a good view. I got video, but forgot that it can't be rotated afterwards and turned the camera sideways to take the video. Oh well.
We wandered around the historic square, following Rick Steve's tour info to identify churches, fountains and other buildings, then wandered around the area looking at other significant sights. Eventually we made our way to the Charles bridge, the most historic of the many bridges that span the river that bisects the city. The bridge has numbers of wonderful statues placed there over the years, each with its own history, one of which will grant one wish in a person's lifetime. one side of the bridge was under renovation, so it was extra crowded getting across it. A band was playing partway across, fun jazz. We'd heard another jazz band in the square, and decided this is a very jazzy city.
By the time we got to the other side, we were ready for a break. It was hot, and we'd done a lot of walking. We stopped at a little sidewalk cafe alongside the end of the bridge by the stone tower that marks the beginning of the bridge. Coke for Harry and Spaze for me, with a signature strawberry Praque dessert to go along with it. It was a nice break. There was a tourist information office in the round tower that was part of the bridge. We tried to get some directions for getting back on the right road out of town for heading home and got some scribbled directions and a tourist map of the city, that I didn't feel too confident about.
We then headed for a tram stop to catch a trap up to the Prague castle. It is located on a hill overlooking the old town, and would have been quite a hike up to it. We hopped on the tram expecting to pay for the ride, but I discovered in the guidebook on the way up that we needed to buy tickets at the tram stop. That was a little nerve wracking, but no one came around for tickets, so we got by. We did get tickets for the ride down, however. The castle was really a large collection of government buildings enclosed by a wall with a large interior square whose centerpiece was the St. Vitus cathedral. The guidebook said this was a must see, so I was determined we needed to get to it.
It was huge and very impressive on the outside. It was difficult to get an adequate picture, and we enede up in the far corner of the square with other camera toting tourists trying to do the same thing. There was a line being held back from entering, so we wandered a bit and sat and rested until the line was gone and we could go straight in. It was even more impressive inside. It was massively large inside as well, beautifully decorated everywhere with carving, stucco, painting, statues, side chapels, tombs, and everything a work of art. Every side chapel was overlooked by a huge stained glass window, one of which was done by a famous artist. That one and one other were mesmerizing to me. Around the whole circumference, every side chapel was another collection of impressive religious art. There was one tomb that was decorated with so much solid silver sculpture that there was actually nearly a ton of silver in the whole thing. We lingered a long time taking picutures as much as we could.
When we got done there and took a tram down, we headed for the main square to have some dinner before heading back. One of Harry's friends had recommended we eat at an outdoor cafe connected with a big hotel on the square. He'd had a seafood platter that he said was the best food he'd ever eaten. It was pretty expensive, but we figured it was a once in a lifetime experience. When we were done, Harry determined to ask the guy how much he'd been drinking when he had that meal. It was much less than the best seafood we'd ever had. The lobster was tough and tastless, and most of the other seafood as bad or worse. We were pretty disappointed. As Rick Steve's warned, the waiter was a master at padding the bill and we paid more than the already large amount we expected to pay.
We found our way back to the shopping mall and had an ordeal trying to get more cash from the ATM, which was out of the denomination we needed. It was difficult to understand directions to another alternative and we ended up in a bank where we got more cash than we needed and then found another ATM a few feet away. We were frustrated and tired when we got in the car, and tense and worried about finding a way out of the garage that would put us on the right street to connect with our directions for getting out of the city on the right highway. At the exit the gate wouldn't open, and Harry was led away by attendants who showed him where to pay at a machine and get a ticket to put in the exit machine. Sure enough, the exit put us on a road heading in the exact opposite way from where we needed to be with no way to get off and circle around to the right road. Right away we were over the river and into a tunnel that spit us out on a road that had one side closed down for construction, so we couldn't even retrace our steps. I could see where we were, but I couldn't find any way to get to the highway we needed. We drove on, with Harry insisting I give him directions, while I had nothing useful to tell him to do to get us where we needed to be. As we rounded a corner of a one way street with heavy traffic, he spotted a pair of Elders -missionaries. He swung to the curb, rolling down his window, and shouted, "Missionaries!" "Say 'Elders'" I prompted, and he did. They looked around then, startled, and we waved at them until they came over to us. One was from Oregon, the other from Utah. We were so glad to see them.
They puzzled with us over our little tourist map, and then said that the mission home was right there and they could go in and Mapquest us directions. We waited about twenty minutes as the sun set while they did that. They brought back maps and directions in Czech, somewhat translated, and said if we went on straight on the road we were on and followed the directions, we would connect with our highway. We were so relieved, but as we went forward we never saw the tunnel they talked about, so somehow missed the connection. We did find an entrance to a highway that had the right number, and listed the right destinatination, so we were relieved and gladly left the cities' rats nest of streets and freeways.
After twenty or thirty minutes, as I kept checking our map against the signs we were seeing, I realized we weren't on the right road after all. The road we needed angled efficiently towards our destination, SouthWest from Prague. The road we were on headed straight West. To get back on the right road meant retracing our route and entering the maze of city highways in the growing darkness with no real idea of how to connect once we got there. We really didn't want to do that. I could see that half way along to the next major city there was a road that went straight south and intersected our road soon enough before our own destination to end up ok. It meant traveling the right angle sides of the triangle rather than the direct angled side, but We thought it was the best alternative.
We were going far into the sparsely populated Czech farm country. There were small towns at intervals with lots of fields and woods in between, and no large towns at all. We found the turn and headed South. It was midnight and we were three quarters of the way down that leg of that road when we encountered a barrier over our half of the road. It was inconceivable that the road could end, since it was the main road South and there was no other real alternative to it. We actually had been seeing signs warning of this, but couldn't read them, so didn't understand what they were warning of. Finally we got to a place where we couldn't go on. The railroad tracks were being worked on and the road bed was all removed from between them. There was no way to drive over them without ruining the car. (side note: I'd had thoughts of using the WC at the time we met the missionaries, but decided to wait until we were on the autobahn. That was hours before, and by this time I was fairly desperate, but there was little I could do at that point) We were flummoxed. We had no idea a main road could be closed without any one there to direct or any alternative offered. For a bit I was at a loss, then I started looking for a way to backtrack and find a way around that wouldn't take us all the way back to Prague.
We headed back to the nearby town, and got ourselves mixed up there until we were actually headed back towards the edge of town again the same way as the blockade. I'm not sure why we were going that way again, but we sped by one of those big signs I'd been ignoring for miles and in that flash I saw the diagram of the road ending with a break and a detour going around to the left and reconnecting beyond the break. Harry had a hard time believing what I'd seen in that moment's view, but caved into my insistance that he make the next left hand turn. We didn't know the Czech word for Detour was, but I assumed that the sign there said something like that. Other cars were turning there, even at that late hour, and coming out towards us, and I took that as confirmation that this was a detour, since the town was asleep otherwise. The roads here were barely wide enough for two cars and wound through the countryside connecting towns here and there. When the road intersected it wasn't always clear which way was the detour, but we went by where the traffic was coming from, and stopped once to ask directions from a man leaving a tavern. We didn't share any words in common except our destination, and he motioned us the way we needed to go.
Eventually we connected back with our southbound road, and went on to intersect with the road home. Soon after, to my great relief we came to a rest stop. We got in to our gasthaus at 2 am, which was pretty late considering that Harry had to get up early to go to work the next morning.
So that's the story of Lost In Czechoslovakia....
