Road trip north, part 12

Munich: to some, it's the land of beer. To others, it's the home of the BMW museum and factory tour! Tip for visitors: try to book ahead for the tour in English. Otherwise you end up on the German tour and have no idea what the guide is saying. In our case, the tour guide wouldn't even give us the earphones so we didn't even get to try to hear what was said. Still, you can see factory workers and robots putting together the various parts of the cars and pretty much figure out what's going on.

No photos are allowed on the factory tour, alas, but we did take some in the museum. A classic motorcycle:



There were some real beauties on display.



What lines! Smooooooth.



And oh, yeah, we looked at the town as well. Here's the Town Hall (Neues Rathaus).



We were lucky to catch some great chamber music on the street. Ever seen buskers with a piano before? Not exactly the usual instrument of choice of street musicians.



Here in Bavaria and also in the Tyrol (Austria and parts of northern Italy), we noticed many shops that sell traditional clothing, like lederhosen, caps with a jaunty feather, and sort of peasant girl/milkmaid outfits. In Munich, non-traditional colors are available, as shown below.

Road trip north, part 11

Does anyone know what these flowers are? We saw huge fields of them all over the Czech countryside.



Kutna Hora is a UNESCO World Heritage site and a former silver mining town.



Miners even figure in the cathedral's 15th-century frescoes.



On to Prague, the beautiful capital city.

Here's a closeup of the astronomical clock in the main square.



Spires and statues.



A view from a hill.



Intricate design on this facade.



The famous Charles Bridge.



Is this guy proposing marriage to the deer? If not, what is this about?



The Vltava River.



A mural that makes one think. You might not be able to tell, but it's the infinity symbol.

Road trip north, part 10

Olomouc, Czech Republic. Doesn't ring a bell? It's a city in the eastern part of the country, in the region of Moravia. It was conveniently on our way between Krakow and Prague, and it was approaching dinner time, so we stopped there. (Note: restaurants in Olomouc close much earlier than those in Rome. Be sure to finish your meal by 9!)

Olomouc's Holy Trinity Column (another baroque plague column) is a UNESCO World Heritage-listed monument.



There are several fountains around Olomouc. The one shown below is the Arion fountain. Arion was a mythical singer who was saved from drowning by a dolphin attracted by Arion's song. As you might be able to tell, this sculpture is contemporary (completed in 2002).



On one wall of the Town Hall is an interesting astronomical clock. This one is different than many others that we've seen in that it features scientists, workers, and athletes rather than saints and religious figures. Apparently the communists replaced the original religious-themed clock with this one between 1947 and 1955.


At noon the little figures near the top rotate around, and the blacksmith hammers in time to the clock chime.



Saw this ad outside a shop. Does that photo make you want to buy those glasses?

Road trip north, part 9

This may not merit its own post, but I forgot to mention something about Poland in part 7 of the Road Trip North posts. The topic is dubbing.

American television shows and films are popular around the world, and they are often dubbed into the local language before being broadcast. For example, here in Italy we can watch Lost, Rescue Me, Veronica Mars, West Wing, Alias, and other shows in Italian. Actors speak in Italian over the lip movements of the original American actors. You can tell it's dubbed, but it's done fairly well with emotion, not just saying lines.

In Poland, though, it's another story. There aren't multiple actors playing each dubbed part. Instead, there's just one guy called a lektor reading the script. He reads every line of every character, whether it's a man or woman, little kid or old person. He uses the same monotone voice no matter how dramatic the situation. I read that it's a holdover from Communist times. Seriously lame! I wonder if this annoys Polish viewers. I found it at first laughable, but then unwatchable. They should go with subtitles.

The Wall Street Journal published this article about it in 2007.

Road trip north, part 8

Near Krakow is a place where some of the most horrific acts in history were committed, the World War II concentration camp of Auschwitz.

The sign above the entrance reads "Arbeit Macht Frei," which means "work sets you free." You may have heard that the sign was stolen last year, later found and returned. While it was missing, it was replaced by an exact replica. I'm not sure if this is the original or the replica. Anyway, upon entry prisoners were given the impression that it was a labor camp, but it was much worse than that.



This site was originally a Polish army base and therefore contains sturdy brick buildings. When it was turned into a concentration camp, barbed wire was added. In these former barracks, prisoners (adults and children alike) were warehoused and made to endure horrendous medical experiments.



Nearby is Auschwitz II, also known as Auschwitz-Birkenau. This place was built more hastily, with wooden stable-like buildings for housing prisoners before they were sent unknowingly to the gas chambers. Some were not even housed at all, but sent directly to be killed upon arrival because they were not useful as laborers.



Many of the buildings are gone now. Some were destroyed by the Nazis when they realized the Russians would soon arrive to liberate the camp.



Many people come to see the sites and remember those who suffered. We saw lots of different groups and tours being given in many different languages. It's sickening to hear about the events that went on here, but it's also important not to forget. More information available here.

Road trip north, part 7

From Slovakia, we drove north to Poland. There was a bit of flooding in the area at the time, but fortunately it wasn't bad enough to block our route.

We stayed in the southern city of Krakow, which is nicely preserved because it was not bombed during World War II.



Rynek Główny is the central square.



There are all kinds of vendor booths in the square's center, including this one selling pierogi.



We visited Krakow's engineering museum, which has an interesting collection of cars, motorcycles, scooters, trucks, trams and buses.



A lot of these models are not seen in the States.



You can sit in the driver's seat of the trams.



We tried to visit Oskar Schindler's factory, famous from the book and movie "Schindler's List." However, the museum is currently undergoing major renovations. We took a picture anyway.



There was a flea market one morning near our hotel. It was completely packed with people despite having few items of apparent interest, to us, anyway.



Krakow is a pleasant city to walk in. We saw plenty of people strolling. During a pause in the park, we saw this young person who seems to prefer driving. Can you blame him with a sweet ride like that?

Road trip north, part 6

From Vienna, we drove about an hour, crossing the border to Slovakia and had lunch with friends in Bratislava. We knew them back in Accra, and it was weird and so nice to spend time with them in a temperature less than sweltering.

Bratislava is divided into the old and new sections of town by the Danube River. The old part of town looks like many picture-postcards towns in Europe. The new part is full of boxy, concrete buildings. This 1970s era bridge leads to the new part. The authorities destroyed a section of the old city, including the Jewish quarter and synagogue, to build the bridge.

On a hill in the old city sits Bratislava Castle. It was reconstructed in the 1950s.

After lunch with our friends, we moved on to Levoca, several hours northeast. It's a medieval walled town with a very pretty central square. Here's the view from our hotel room.

Here's a view of our hotel (U Leva) from across the square. I highly recommend both the hotel and the restaurant, which are fancy and reasonably priced, especially compared to expensive Vienna!

Some of the buildings feature intricate surface designs, similar to those we saw in Bolzano and Austria.

Next we visited Spis Castle, the most famous site in Slovakia.

It's a 13th-century castle in the middle of nowhere, and it features prominently on Slovakia travel posters.

Sections were added over the centuries.

Much of the castle was destroyed by fire in 1780, but some of it was reconstructed in the 1970s. It's worth a visit if you happen to be passing by.

Between Spis and the Polish border, we were very fortunate to have found Tatrabob, a sort of alpine slide/roller coaster kind of thing with individual bobsleds for each rider. It wound in and out through a forest with sharp turns and deep drops -- fun!