Hello there! So, in the past few months I made a few fairly life-altering choices — quit my job, hopped on a plane to Europe, finished my MBA. Life is a little strange right now (clearly 2020 is in control) and I’ve decided to just go with it.
In the beginning of September I flew to Czech Republic with the intention of traveling locally while there and seeing my family. There were also a lot of loose ends to tie up regarding moving one of my family members over that I had to take care of.
I’m working on writing a few posts detailing some of my adventures while there. I love to be able to show people that a country is about more than just a famous city–Prague is beautiful and intense and full of culture, however, I recommend to everyone to escape the city limits and explore more of what this country has to offer.
Czech Republic is relatively small, clocking in at a population count of a little over 10.5 million and apparently comparable in size to Mississippi or Louisiana. Public transportation is the most popular mode of transport, and since everything is so close together, driving more than 20 minutes to reach a destination is a little mind boggling for them (at least it seems that way to my family).
Even though my entire family comes from this place, I’m always learning new things about it. I’ve included a quote from this website below with just a few quick facts – why summarize when someone else has already written what I wanted to say?
While Prague was the birthplace of the writer Franz Kafka and the poet Rainer Maria Rilke, Brno, Moravia’s largest city, was the site of Gregor Mendel’s groundbreaking genetic experiments in the 19th century and the birthplace of contemporary novelist Milan Kundera. Moravians are as proud of their vineyards and wine as Bohemians are of their breweries and the Pilsner beer that originated in the town of Plzeň (Pilsen), which is also noted as the site of the Škoda Works—a heavy industrial complex that originated with the Habsburg monarchy. Moravia was equally endowed with skilled labour, which helped make Brno into one of the leading industrial towns in textiles and engineering during the 19th century and Ostrava, in the north, into a major coal-mining region, thanks to the vast fossil fuel deposits stretching over from Silesia.
from: https://www.britannica.com/place/Czech-Republic
I will leave you with these few final tidbits — Czech Republic does in fact consume more beer per capita than any other country in the world. If you’re in a restaurant, it is 100% cheaper to order beer than water. Water comes in a little 250ml~ glass bottle and a half liter of beer is usually half the price (if not cheaper). Good excuse, I think, especially seeing as all the beer is actually amazing. I don’t understand how Bud Light is a thing.
The countryside of Czech Republic (Morava/Moravia region especially) is absolutely beautiful – they pride themselves on their scenery, history (castles!), and wine country. It’s like Eastern European Tuscany.
Gardens are everywhere. It’s actually a little difficult to drive around the country and see a house with only an expanse of lawn — there are usually multiple fruit trees (apple and plum are very popular, read: homemade slivovitz), vegetable patches, or flower patches in lawns that are 1/4 the size of suburban American front yards. #gardeninspo
And I won’t even get started on the bakeries. I’ll never stop. Just get a ticket and go (you know. Once covid stops messing around).
Have you ever been? What’s one of your favorite memories? What would you like to hear about from me about this trip? Let me know in the comments below!
The Bohemian Louisan 