I'm here in Prague

Well, I made it..... couple of snafus along the way but what trip is worth it's weight in gold/euros/korunas/dollars if there isn't a flexible moment ior two??

My plane left PDX 50 minutes before the one I had tickets for. Kinda weird. I was just hangin' around the airport and mosy'd on over to my gate but there was no one there except the check-in guy and I just happened to say something to him and he asked me what flight I was on and would you believe it - they were waiting for me! They knew I had checked in at the front counter and turns out it was an over-booked flight and they had asked for bumpers and here's this one empty seat, saved just for me. the guy opened the door, said RUN, I RAN, they were just closing the plane door and someone said, wait! it's her and I jumped on the plane. Got to Dulles almost an hour earlier than I thought I was going to and took my time getting to the next gate, which, wouldn't you know it, was clear at the other end of the terminal....as far away from each other as you could get and still be in the airport.

That flight was pretty uneventful - a nice thing to say about a flight. Oh yeah, the PDX-Dulles flight - I sat next to a woman who was hired as an intern by someone who is now my boss's boss's boss. how coincidental is that? Anyway, we had a good chat about that person and I do mean it was a good one. Then on the Dulles-Franfurt flight, I sat next to a couple of women who were headed for the Ukraine for 2 weeks on a mission they do every year for their church.

The Frankfurt-Prague flight was also uneventful Nice to say again! However, I only got about 2 hours sleep on the long flight and I was pretty well exhausted by now.

First impressions - the Czech Republic is green. Just like the Pacific Northwest, in fact. Green rolling hills with a few samll clear-cuts of trees to build with, no doubt. Nothing like you see when you fly into PDX from somewhere, though.

Prague is warm (80s ?) and humid. The English language is not the one you hear among the tourists. In fact, I haven't heard it much at all. A lot of Germans, East Indians, Japanese, and Spanish-speaking tourists. I saw a wedding party go by honking the horns just like they do at home but the bride and groom in a stretch Hummer and driving through the Prague Castle. I saw an old guy in lederhosen. Another bride walking down the Charles Bridge. A guy with a dog begging. Only the dog was asleep and he was crouched over the dog. Lots of colored hair - bright reds, blues, greens, pinks. Lots of colored shoes - yellow and black tiger striped tennis shoes matching her purse. I couldn't take pictures fast enough!

My room wasn't ready when I got here, although I really needed a shower/bath badly, if for no other reason that I needed to kick out some forward jet-lag. But since it wasn't ready, I dropped off my big bag and headed out.

So far today, I've done three geo-caches, eaten a great pasta and chicken lunch and hiked around the Castle and Petrin areas.

I'm sure I'm rambling but consider this - I'm operating on about 3 hours total sleep in the last 32 hours or so and I'm still trying to stay up for another couple before dying in bed. The room is really cool - very old. There might as well not be walls, I can tell ya!

Tomorrow, breakfast 8-11 at the hotel in the little garden and then off for some more sightseeing before meeting up with the Rick Steves group at 3, when we all troop off to the National Museum and some other place, riding the tram to get there. Maybe I'll get a metro ticket and head out myself in the morning.

Oh yeah - had another Policie type experience. The transportation I hired to get me to my hotel was stopped at an impromtu police stop - they just put stop signs in the road, the driver has to get out and open the trunk and hood. The police men look under the vehicles with mirrors, they all glare at each other and we go on. Pretty interesting.

Well, I'm heading out to find some food and then head back to the hotel.

Hope you're all having as much fun as I am!

Pardon the spelling errors - I can never get the spell-check to work and I'm too tired to go back and check it myself.

Ahoj!