Clare and Ross taste Eastern Europe and Morocco

Prague is a city to visit if you like beer. The Czechs are now the biggest beer drinkers having overtaken Ireland Beer powers the transportation system Carbon neutral public transport   In between beers there is icecream (called Trdelnik, this is a sweet hollow pastry which you can fill with any calories you like

Weve done the walking tour, the hop on hop off and the river cruise. We've visited the castle and ridden the trams. This is an interesting city. The old buildings are from about the last Millennium and they are really well preserved. They seem to have built in stone and bronze, been fairly wealthy for a long time and also to have escaped the wars (the buildings, that is) Clare on the way to Old Town Square The river and its may bridges and locks also adds some beauty, as do the picnic islands in the middle. There is every style of architecture here from Gothic onwards and including 10 of the worlds 20 cubist buildings. Though there are churches everywhere, the city has been both catholic and protestant and at the last census was now neither. Eighty percent of Prague were either agnostic aitheist or couldnt decide. Also 5,000 identified as Jedi.

One of my fondest memories of the Spanish Camino in 2013 was an afternoon in Leon. We had been walking for about two weeks and Leon was going to be a rest day. It is a beautiful city with an old town to die for. We had met many people during the fortnight some walking faster and some slower. That is the way of the Camino. As we walked down the main medieval street, a cobbled lane with shops and Cafes, we saw a familiar face. Iain, our companion for many days,  was relaxing with a coffee and chatting with fellow pilgrims. He welcomed us to his table and we met even more pilgrims. Irish Joe, Spanish dad, Ross, Christa, Spanish mum, Iain and Clare  Cafe-gate continued We three stayed at that table for the next two or three hours as more old friends wondered up to our table with surprise in their eyes. Also the way of the Camino is that people join you and people leave. A few days before "Cafe-gate" we had said a sad farewell to Zora, our friend from Czechia. Zo...

We ate dinner in the old town, which was only a short stroll from our hotel. Clare had a soup inside a large breadroll and I had sirloin with dumplings and gravy. Both were nice though a little bland for our tastes. The Old Town square looked great under lights. All the tourists were out soaking up the atmosphere in the cool (10 degrees) evening. I wonder where the locals were. We had our usual red wine - only one glass, don't worry, very nice and strolled home absolutely exhausted.

I am my Prague posts this  from a coffee shop I have discovered about 5 minutes from our hotel. It is open 24 hours has a comfortable bench, great smells, WiFi. Sitting next to me  (at 5.50am) is a chatty Czech philosopher who I am sure would talk with me for hours in fairly good English about next to nothing. He gets up every minute or two to chat with customers and smoke his roll your own cigarette.

Currently killing time at Dubai for transit (3hrs) to Paris for transit to Prague. Aren't airports great!! 1 hr more to wait after a 14hr flight then 8hrs flight 2hrs wait 2 hrs flight. We are flying Emirates and they have been smooth and friendly. Can't ask for more. We have started taste testing the airlines special menus. Last trip we tried "oriental vegetarian". You get your meal very early and you skip the omelette and sausage. I like it but Clare wasn't keen. This time we tried "low fat". We got different forms of bland fish for both meals and we weren't given the cheese and chocolate. Back to the drawing board. Is chocolate Halal? Now we are killing an hour in Paris. The flight was pleasant enough and only six hours. After the Sydney to Dubai leg it actually felt short. The movies on Emirates were fine. I binged on all six episodes of Line of Duty Season Four. A very fine British Crime drama. Clare mostly slept. Getting through the airport the...

Wow - its finally departure day. We haven't done much training which is a bit worrying. We are a year older, inevitably, but still in our youthful fifties. This time we are doing a bike ride then two walks. Prague to Vienna by bikes, then Transylvania on foot through the Carpathian Mountains of Roumania and finally on foot through the High Atlas mountains of Morocco. To get to this point Clare seems to have seen every one of her patients in the last two weeks. I have had to rearrange our finances, glue myself to the mower (I now do the neighbours 11  acres plus our 16) and accelerate our fence building (with the neighbours help). There are a couple of gates strung with wire but we now have a fenced home paddock. So, while we are away, wallabies can no longer eat our plants. Are we fully prepared? The short answer is no!!!!! We have good gear and experience in taking the right quantity. Our trips are supported this time (luxury!) so we will take double eg about 15 kilograms ...