Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Drive from Munich to Prague - 09/29/13

Because Dustin is awesome, he decided to rent a car to drive from Munich to Prague, where we stayed for a few days, and then dropped the car off in Berlin.

A fantasy of mine from our previous Prague visit was to get to see the countryside. I was really excited to get out of the cities and see how people lived outside of the major metropolitan areas.

Dustin wanted to drive down the "castle road" which would take us via many German castles to Prague, but as an outdoor enthusiast, I made a request to go to the Bavarian Forest to see the world's largest tree tower walk. Unfortunately we didn't realize how long our detour would take us so we did not get to see the castles Dustin requested - sorry Dustin - but sometimes that's just how travel works when you deviate from a plan!

The countryside of Germany is perfectly manicured and spotted with picturesque towns and red thatch roofed homes. It truly is something out of a Disney movie (as was Munich). Thankfully we had a (confusing at first) GPS in the car - without that, we would have certainly been more lost. Either the GPS or German roads are insane, though, I am not sure which, as it took many windy, tiny roads to end up at our location.


While on our way, I was surprised to see signs for "Grafenau" - the second of many sightings involving my last name in some way or another - so requested we pull over for a quick photo:


Shortly after, we arrived at Baumwipfelpfad - the tree walk. The pictures only ALMOST do it justice - the only con was that it was extremely cold and windy, but that didn't stop us!




One lovely thing about Baumwipfepfad is that it is accessible to almost anyone - you can push strollers or take wheelchairs almost to the very top. Dogs are not allowed unless you put them in a box (which they provide for you - this would not work well for Axle.

A few trees grow in the middle of the structure, all the way to the top. This was only built in 2009 so I felt lucky that it was ready for us to explore.


The view from the top was amazing and helped make up for the fact that I did not take enough pictures of the countryside while in the car.





Now onto the Czech Republic! We had our passports ready for the border crossing, but it was something like my experience of entering Mexico - there was no one there and no stopping.

Very anti-climactic. The Czech countryside is beautiful as well, but not perfectly manicured like Germany. As soon as we crossed the border it was very apparent that we were in a different country - a little bit more run down and there were strip clubs and bars at the first town past the border.


We decided to head to Pilsen (Plzen in Czech) before Prague because hey, it sounds like a nice beer town, right? No. It was run down and a factory town. We got some McDonald's because well, it's required when in a foreign country, and we were starving and looking for a quick bite. We entered Plzen about as quickly as we entered it, and then made the short drive to Prague.

Long, but beautiful day! Remaining set of photos here.

-Erin


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