Karlovy Vary and the Twelve Springs

For Phil's 30th birthday, we decided on an mini-vacation to the Czech spa town, Karlovy Vary, with Brooke and Dustin, new friends who live in Prague. (She's a writer, he's a musician, and they rock). Karlovy Vary is a town nestled in a valley about two hours from Prague. Legend has it that in the 14th century, Charles IV's dog actually discovered the hot springs for which the town is famous. I don't know if that's true, but in light of the Czech culture's love of dogs, I believe it. Because of these natural springs, it became a center of healing and relaxation over the centuries for those who could afford to come here. In more recent times, this tradition has continued and there are an incredible number of spas offers a wide range of "treatments". These spa treatments are "medicinal", and Czechs actually get doctor's prescriptions to come to KV. While looking at the menu of available spa packages, there were massages and facials, but also lymph drainage treatments and colonics...we opted out of the spa experience.

We did decide to "take the waters". What is that, you might ask? Well, the twelve springs are found throughout the central part of the town, flow freely, and can be sampled as you roam around. There are supposed to be healing properties of the water, or maybe just digestive benefits, I can't exactly remember. The only thing I can recall is the awful taste of the water. I had a Czech friend tell me, "The water in Karlovy Vary tastes like blood". She wasn't kidding. The "minerals" in the water must have an absurdly high iron content. The water we sampled was 30, 40, 50, 60, or 70 degree C iron-flavored water. Bleeeeeeech. Brooke, Dustin, and I had enough after just one or two sips from our commemorative Karlovy Vary sippy cups. For his 30th birthday, Phil thought it was important to sample all twelve springs. A fountain of youth, perhaps? Later, he told us that he felt at least 28 after drinking all the water...

More important than "the waters", Karlovy Vary is absolutely beautiful. You can really see how the architecture of the town was built into the rolling hills. I thought KV was quite "vertical" in both the buildings and the landscape. I didn't expect it to be so visually impressive, so I was just thrilled that it was. What I really loved about it was that there are miles and miles of trails all around the town. So as soon as you leave the central downtown, you can be walking in the woods in just a few minutes. If you can tell from the photos, Phil's birthday was a gorgeous, sunny day, and we tried to take full advantage of it. We spent most of our afternoon roaming around on the trails, and found some incredible views of KV from the hills. In true Czech style, you can't hike to the top of a hill and not find a beer garden. So we even had a birthday beer toast along the way. Na zdravi!


After taking the waters and hiking, we roamed around town and in the evening, had his birthday dinner at a Czech restaurace, Posezeni u Sveska. Fried pork, goulash, and Pilsner Urquell for everyone! Our second day was much of the same, but with more fog and gray skies. Brooke and Dustin were amazing travel companions and we were thrilled to share this birthday extravaganza with them. Happy Birthday, Phil!


Last random thought and a factoid that may only interest me (á la Peter King;) - The last James Bond movie, Casino Royale, was actually filmed in the Czech Republic. The first few scenes were filmed at the Prague Hilton, and the scenes in "Montenegro" at the casino were filmed in Karlovy Vary! You might recognize this hotel from the movie, the Grand Hotel Pupp. Strange name, I know, but really beautiful.

München ist Ausgezeichnet! (Munich is excellent!)

Ferris: Cameron, what have you seen today?
Cameron: Nothing good.
Ferris: Nothing - wha - what do you mean nothing good? We've seen everything good. We've seen the whole city! We went to a museum, we saw priceless works of art! We ate pancreas!

My brother, Jonathan, Phil and I went to Munich, Germany last week, and while we didn't eat pancreas, we did see everything good in the whole city, just like Ferris, Cameron, and Sloan in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Well, maybe it wasn't everything in Munich, but we tried pretty hard and it certainly felt like we did an awful lot. Here are a few of our favorite things about Munich:

Outdoor space – There is an incredible amount of beautiful green park space in Munich. Though it was in the high 20’s to low 40’s, we braved the cold and spent much of our days outside. We walked all around the Schloss Nymphenburg, an incredible summer estate built by the Wittelsbachs (the dukes of Bavaria) from 1600 to about 1850. Though the palace was only a summer home, it was pretty amazing: think Versailles in Bavaria. The grounds were equally impressive with miles and miles of trails, woods, lakes, and gardens. Beautiful in the winter, I can only imagine how pretty it is in the spring or summer. Munich’s English Garden (Englischer Garten) is another incredible green space in the city. Just from walking around, you could tell that lots of people use this park for running, biking, dog walking, etc. I loved that it was so used by the people who live in the city. A river flows through the park, and dams give it waves. Despite the freezing weather, there was even a guy surfing on the man-made rapids. Munich really does have an amazing amount of usable outdoor space. It made it feel like a city that people really want to live in.

Beer Gardens and Beer – Could we write about Munich and not mention it?

1. Hofbrau Haus - famous and crowded, but incredibly good beer. We drank liters of HB Hellas (the light lager) where the steins are so large, Phil needed two hands to drink it! This place is known as the city’s most famous tourist destination and can seat thousands of people. One lesser known fact about the Hofbrau Haus is that on the second floor of the building, Adolf Hitler organized a failed coup attempt known as “the Beer Hall Putsch” in 1923. That fun fact is not posted on the walls next to the oompah band…

2. Chinese Pagoda (Chinesischer Turm) in the English Garden – could we go to Munich without a stop at the Chinese Pagoda? Too bad it was bitterly cold by the time we got there, or we would have sat outside. It was a much prettier structure than I was expecting, and my brother and I had to have a photo standing in front!

3. Ayinger – A fantastic and much less touristy beer hall across the street from the raucous Hofbrau Haus. It was recently renovated and had a much more modern feel to it. It wasn’t crowded at all. The basic Hellas beer was a favorite, while the hefeweissen was unfiltered and refreshing.

4. Lowenbrau – we finally got to drink outside in Munich! Some unknown genius planned Munich so there are two beer gardens within a five minute walk of the train station (Franziskaner and Lowenbrau). We hit up Lowenbrau before we left town, and got to bask in the winter sun and toast to Munich before hitting the road for home. It was a great cap to a couple of days together!

Modern Art – Phil and I love to get lost in museums. I particularly love modern art museums, while my brother informed me that he hasn’t been to a museum in years. He decided that it might be fun to see some priceless works of art (call him Cameron), so we spent a few hours at Pinakothek der Moderne. The space of the building was exquisite and created what is now one of my favorite museums. My vote for best installation was by a Slovak artist named Roman Ondek. It is interactive because everyone who enters a large white room is measured against the wall. Then your name is written with the date and you become part of the installation with thousands of other people…and the visual effect is freaking cool.

We were also lucky (or, if you are my brother, “lucky”) to run across a sign for a Mark Rothko retrospective while in Munich. It was a fabulous chance to see the body of his work, instead of just the abstract block color paintings for which he is most famous. It was a very memorable because not only did I learned a lot, but I almost caused an international incident when I was looking for the WC and inadvertently blew past a security guard into a “restricted” area. Let me just say that it is not cool to cause rising blood pressure in a large German guard.

Roasted meats and wurst – One of the goals of Jonathan’s trip to Europe was to sample local cuisine in all its glory. We certainly attempted to eat our way through our three days in Bavaria with an impressive sampling of restaurants. We had multiple kinds of wurst, lots of pretzels and spicy mustard, multiple kinds of sauerkraut and cabbage, delicious goulash soup, roasted chicken…and that was just at dinner the first night. We even had a discussion about how difficult it would be to live as a vegetarian in Munich while eating liver meat balls! (Phil’s note: if you’re offered the Bavarian meatloaf, give it a shot. It’s like a giant loaf of hot dog, but good. Trust me.)

Marienplatz – This is the tourist center of the city, and it is centered on the famed Glockenspiel (carillon) on the Rathaus (new town hall). Tourists gather daily at 11 am and noon to watch a series of clock-work figures dance, sing, and joust(!) while the carillon plays a series of songs. Seriously, it’s much more elaborate than the Prague astrological clock, but a little tiresome. The whole song and dance lasts fifteen minutes, and your neck gets pretty sore. Much better, and just around the corner, is the Viktualenmarkt – an outdoor food market with food, flowers, and (of course) sausage merchants and three beer halls around it. The fruit was fresh and amazing (Phil’s note: even if Danielle’s apricot cost 4 euros), and the atmosphere was incredible. Most beer gardens let you bring in your own food, too, so buying picnic supplies and hitting up a beer hall is a major attraction.

Munich is a wonderful city for so many reasons. We were thrilled to see it with my brother and enjoyed every minute of it!

Ferris: Ladies and gentlemen, you are such a wonderful crowd, we'd like to play a little tune for you. It's one of my personal favorites and I'd like to dedicate it to a young man who doesn't think he's seen anything good today - Cameron Frye, this one's for you. “Danke schön, darling, Danke schön…”

Prague: Matka Mest (Mother of Cities)

So, I have been absent from the blog for the last month or so - I have been finishing a chapter of my dissertation, and it has occupied me for too long. Oddly enough, after spending the day updating footnotes or slogging through Bohemian chronicle entries for 1419, I haven't felt like a little casual writing. I was looking at the old posts, though, and figured that I should respond to Danielle's favorite things about Prague. While I share some, or even many, of those, I don't run, I don't eat sweets that often, and I am less keen on flowers than the resident gardener. Danielle also did leave some key things out (oh, I said it), and these need to be addressed...

So, without further adieu...

1) beer culture - it's not just about how good the beer is, or how cheap it is, but about how people drink in Prague. First, beer is a breakfast drink here. Seriously. I often see folks knocking back a cold one with their bread and butter around town. Indeed, beer is often referred to as "Czech bread." No complaints here! Everybody also has their favorite local pubs near their houses, and on Fridays and Saturdays they are full of folks - neighbors hanging out, kids running around, and burly men (or women) in aprons slinging half-litres of beer. Pubs also usually serve only one or two beers, and they are identified by the beer signs above their doors. So, you know what you're getting when you walk in, and that is incredibly comforting. By the by, the picture is from a little neighborhood hospoda (pub) by our friends' flat (Brooke and Dustin). The words in the picture translate to "against all," and can serve as a convenient drinking mantra.

2) public transportation - it's pretty spectacular here. It's cheap (we pay $1 a day for unlimited use), goes everywhere, and we have developed names for all of our favorite tram lines. The 23 is obviously the Jordan, the 9 is the Splinter (for Ted Williams), the 18 is the Feags (in honor of the immortal Giants punter), and the 22 is the Swayze (a nickel for anyone who can say why - click here for the answer). The trams and subways are also the sites of incredibly rude behavior, but really generous behavior as well. People pretty much always offer their seats to the elderly or handicapped people, and help folks with strollers on and off the trains. Of course, if you don't offer your seat, you might get yelled at/whacked by the aforementioned elderly people. The one major issue with public transportation is the apparent willingness of Prague teens to use it as a spot for make-out sessions. I haven't seen people suck face in a long time, but here it is a borderline weekly event.

3) my gym - I work out at the World Class Fitness Center in Wenceslas Square. It's a pretty classy joint, but I routinely see things there that boggle the mind. For instance, there are break dancers who practice in the yoga studio. Every day, several hours a day, there is a group of people doing head spins, the worm, and the robot. There is also a group practicing their MTV dance moves. I have no idea what they're practicing for, but it must be a big deal. They have had models doing catwalk moves while they danced, a string quartet backing a pop-singing duo, and a guy doing martial arts with swords. I hear he's pretty good with a bo staff, too. It's baffling, but always encourages me to get to the gym..."Who knows, maybe there will a lion tamer or clowns today - I better hit the treadmill so I don't miss any of the insanity." Beyond that, everyone wears spandex and short shorts, black socks with their sneakers, and the number of mullets is truly astounding. Much of my daily entertainment comes from World Class.

So, those are my contributions to the things that we love about Prague. Each of them is silly, and minor, but they also affect us every day, and get us fired up about our adopted home.

Big Blue Super Bowl Champions!

BELIEVE

New York Giants 17

New England Patriots 14


At a little after 4 a.m. Czech time, I rejoiced in the NYG Super Bowl win in a small town called Velke Bilovice, CZ. We were at the Fulbright mid-year conference outside Brno, a few hours from Prague. Late into the night, I listened to the game via the internet with Gamecast on the screen. The Giants last drive was amazing, and to hear Bob Papa of WFAN (the voice of Giants radio) describe Eli scrambling and eluding sacks before David Tyree's circus catch on 3rd down...I had to ask myself, is this really happening? Eli is scrambling? Big Blue is going to win! After the game, I got a ton of emails from friends and family who know how much I love the Giants. You guys are great and they were all appreciated!

This post is a bit late (2 weeks after the big game) because my brother, Jonathan, came to visit us and we've been traveling around. It's been great to have him here, and we had a chance to celebrate the Giants win together! The first afternoon, Phil, Jonathan, and I walked around and happened to come across a street fair at the foot of the Charles Bridge. So we bought a beer and walked across the bridge while discussing the highlights of the Super Bowl. It just happened to be a big bonus that we could discuss the Giants under sunny skies in Prague! Good times were had by all.