Advent Europe
Before the European Christmas (2008) I drove around Europe with Dolce Vita. We left Kyiv (from the South Station) at 9.30 and drove off!! ! At night we quickly crossed the Ukrainian-Polish border and slept in the bus until the morning. In the morning we woke up near the transit hotel HOLIDAY INN 3 * in Krakow. Very decent - brand new, renovated rooms, kettle, coffee, tea, sugar, cream and brushes for shoes, hair dryer, soap in the rooms. There is a swimming pool - 1 hour / 35 PLN. Good breakfast. We put things in, put ourselves in order after the road - and on a tour of Krakow. The guide is Mrs. Edwiga. Well, just Clever with a capital letter. I will not even briefly retell the essence of the entire excursion, but I will say right away that the tour is very interesting. You will not regret. Photo #1
What can be said about pre-Christmas Europe? It's clear that all these fairs, decorations, local color - are designed more to attract tourists, but still very beautiful. Photo #2.
This is in Krakow. Gingerbread house theme. I personally stopped on the topic, because buying gingerbread for 3.5 euros apiece was considered a bit too much.
In the evening, after running through the shops and shops, I got to the hotel and finally, with all the amenities, I fell asleep.
In the morning, breakfast and check out from the hotel. Moving to Prague. We were in Prague when it was already getting dark. We checked into a simple hotel (there was no kettle, the heating was turned off in the room, only the next day a locksmith came and turned on the battery, breakfasts were normal. And a sign on the table in Russian "Do not take food out of the restaurant! ") WIENNA 4 *, before the center from it to get about 30-35 minutes, first by bus, then by metro. You need to know the time in order to correctly buy a "ride" - a ticket in our opinion, because - they have everything on time, no matter how you move, but it is important when you started using the ticket.
Evening tour of Prague. Then a warm dinner at the Novomesky brewery, with a glass of Becherovka and a traditional fried knee.
In Prague, I finally saw a monument to two pissing grown-up boys near the Kafka Museum. Photo #3. No one decorated them festively. So I think I’ll come back here to Pasca and see if they can at least paint something for them. : )
The next day - Karlovy Vary.
Everything in the hotels in Karlovy Vary is decorated, and the streets are the same as always. Karlovy Vary residents sincerely believe that their city is so good that it does not really need a festive entourage. Well, I must say that in some places they are right. Photo number 4
Do houses remind you of anything? Personally, all the time it seemed to me that you can break off a piece from them and eat them. You can swim in the thermal pool of the Thermal Hotel, in the open air. Cool - snow is falling from the sky, and you are sitting in the pool and having fun! The snow does not reach a couple of centimeters to the water - it melts. Only now, if they had also repaired it in a modern way, otherwise some kind of Soviet video. The little white tile, like in a hospital, fell off in places. At 8 euros, the entrance does not include a towel or slippers. Everything is mine. Kind of sleazy.
Excursion to Dresden.
Dresden has placed its fairs wherever it "smells" of antiquity.
Photo number 5.
This is the town hall square. It is adjacent to the modern Hilton hotel and the beautiful Dresden Frauenkirche Cathedral built from the ashes, and the monument to Martin Luther. I can also add here the most beautiful opera house and many more historical buildings and monuments. It's all so compact and close that I don't even know in what sequence it would be worth describing. But the Christmas spirit is added here by this sham mill, at the bottom of which they sell Christmas souvenirs. Photo #6. It stands right between the Hilton and the cathedral. Like this. And no indignation that they say there is no place here for all sorts of handicraft tricks.
During the day, mostly tourists walk and stare on the streets. Citizens gather in the evening in cafes, restaurants and fill supermarkets in search of gifts for their loved ones.
These are my impressions.
We went back in the morning and without stopping, except for the Tesco supermarket (1 hour) and sanitary stops, we got home by the next morning.
