This photo is of a brief performance at Budapest’s Opera House.

The woman’s voice was remarkable.

Our Avalon Danube cruise ended yesterday.   Most of friends (old and new-found) were off to the airport and headed home.  Ron & Chris planned to stay another day in Prague.  Ellen mentioned that we should extend our stay in Prague for another day or two which we have done.  We found a modern hotel room at a luxurious price, juggled our car rental, and here we are headed to breakfast at the Michelangelo Grand Hotel.  Easter weekend is not the best time to find accommodations.  We’ve had two experiences with travel and national holidays.  They are best avoided when possible.

We have taken a number of photos on our trip.  Our Avalon cruise took us from Budapest through Slovakia, Austria, Germany, and into the Czech Republic, Prague.  We visited a number of small and mid sized towns, an Abby or two, castles, we climbed atop the castle ruins where Sir Richard the Lion Heart was imprisoned, a of course drank our share of pilsner.  We’ve had a very fun time on the cruise with few complaints.  Some thought the food on the Imagery II was sub par.  For us the breakfast was great, lunches were good, and dinner was hit and miss.  I’d recommend avoiding the fish on this boat.

Our last Avalon tour was to the present day town of Terezin, which was a Nazi concentration camp during WWII.  The Nazi’s used it as a show-piece for a propaganda film and a Red Cross visit (which never happened).

Organized tours like this Avalon cruise do all the logistics and planning for you.  You pick from a list of tours available en-route and off you go.  The tours are informative, but run on a timetable. Your time is not your own. This is the downside of all the tours we have taken on any vacation.  Invariably we find that gem of a local we love, but have to move on with little or no time for exploration.  We hope to go back one day and revisit them, but seldom do.

Today (assuming the hotel allows us to store our car a bit longer) we will explore more of Prague, perhaps driving to the castle atop the hill.  Then it’s off to find The Castle Road.  Wikipedia has a concise list of the major attractions along the road.  We hope to have time for a stop at: Karlštejn, Křivoklát, and Teplá while skipping Hořovice and Švihov.  We do not expect we will get as far as Loket or Cheb today.  Booking.com shows very few properties available before Teplá.

I/We will post photos and commentary as we have time.

Happy Easter!