On July 25th just two hours before my son and I
departed for Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, a staff member
from
www.lastminute.com called to inform us that our plane would
be taking off at 9:55 pm, nearly three hours later than
previously scheduled. As we had planned to take a city bus #351
from Nation directly to Roissy Airport Terminal 3, we had to
reschedule; the #351 stopped running at 5:00 pm during summer
months.
Unhappily we headed to the subway, took the RER B (the
local Amtrak) with an airport transfer bus to reach Terminal 3.
The cost was considerably more than the €3.00 each the bus would
have taken. In the end I shelled out €16.00 for two, plus that I
had the hassle of finding and waiting for the transfer bus at
Terminal 1. Our whole trip to the airport lasted more than two
hours.
With a start like that, I should have not have been surprised
when we finally arrived at the Europe Travel Service counter to
pick up our tickets. There was no one around. It turned out that
our flight, operated by Smart Wing, had once again changed its
departure time. Now we were leaving at 1:55 am. Fortunately for
Kenny and I, we’ve lived in Europe long enough to know that
sometimes this is how things go, therefore I was grateful when we finally took the
pleasant flight to Prague (even if it was six hours late).
We arrived in Prague at 4:00 am and checked-in at Hotel Lysin.
As we arrived late, our dinner, two dishes of
spaghetti, were awaiting us in our room. My son was very tired
he went straight to bed, but I was starving so I ate both servings.
Then I found the bed, which much to my delight, was covered in the thick, soft linens and pillows
that most Central European hotels offer. It was exactly how we
like them—I fell asleep instantly. Unfortunately, it was
only a brief nap as four hours later we were up and showered for
our 9:00 am departure to Brno. I was able to sleep a bit more on
the bus while dreaming about the comfortable bed at the hotel.
In Brno we visited the charming Malà Strana, an admirably
conserved 18th century baroque quarter of town. We
visited Notre Dame de la Victoire, which protects the children
of God in the city of Prague. A quick stop for lunch then off to Moravie to visit the site of the battle field Austerlitz,
where nearly two hundred years to the date (1805),
Napoleon Bonaparte defeated both the Russian and Austrian armies.
That night we ate dinner and
slept at the Myslivna, a small, charming hotel in Brno.
The next morning, our group, which included people from all
parts of France, assembled to depart to Bratislava, the capital
city of Slovakia. It was a big group of more than 60 people.
Most of them were retired French couples. There was one young
couple with a 12-month old baby girl. She was the center of
attention during the whole trip. This was the most political
group with a gay French couple and one lesbian Mexican couple,
and five Asians including myself, my son Kenny and three
brothers and sisters.
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